‘Boring is too strong a word,” said Paul Hollywood, “but it’s on its way.” He was talking about a showstopper cake presented to him by Josh, a Leicestershire 27-year-old who hoped his three-tiered celebration of the English seasons, complete with a biscuit greenhouse, would win him series 14 of The Great British Bake Off. But the veteran judge could have been referring to this year’s final.
Josh seemed the obvious winner from the start of the last episode, despite presenters and judges trying to impress us with his rivals’ achievements in earlier rounds. “They’ve all had a handshake!” protested Prue Leith, referring to the gesture of approval that used to be sporadic and understated, but which has now become awkward and somehow slightly icky. Perhaps we have just seen everything in this show one too many times.
Up against positive, charming Josh were smiling, personable Matty, 28, and upbeat, friendly Dan, 42, the three of them cordially egging each other on before putting just the right amount of egg into their mixes for the opening round, the signature bake. Eclairs had been demanded and were to be made in two flavours.
In between shaky-fingered attempts to pipe choux cylinders full of creme pat, the Bake Off tradition of visiting the finalists’ homes and meeting their families was upheld. While the show cannot be blamed for ending up with three nice middle-class white men in the final – if they are the best three bakers, so be it – it was hard to distinguish between Matty, whose fiancee said he baked every evening but was humble about his talents, and Dan, who baked every evening and whose mother said was humble about his talents.
The only grit in the Taste the Difference oyster came from Josh’s mother, who, while strongly giving the impression that her son had always been humble about his baking skills, attributed this to her mother, Freda, who had often picked her grandson up from school and spent many an afternoon with him in a kitchen strewn with caster sugar and flour.
Freda died in 2021, too soon to experience the pride of seeing her boy in the Bake Off final. Baking as a simple, shared domestic pleasure, the memory of it often bonding two family members, has long been one of Bake Off’s most delightful motifs; this was a particularly affecting example.
When the eclairs were assessed, Dan’s were simply “a mess”, with his chocolate praline criticised for a grainy inner and his Wimbledon-themed strawberry-and-cream effort so soggy one feared Cliff Richard might start an impromptu singalong. Josh’s were predictably excellent: a “delicate” mango, coconut and raspberry; and a mocha eclair with a “clever” mix of coffee and chocolate. But Matty, despite his self-bestowed underdog status, impressed Prue with his cream-filled tube: “That’s the first one we’ve had that is properly firm,” she said, eyeballing the young baker intently.
On to the technical round, where the bakers were given elliptical instructions for a fatty retro treat, lardy-cake slices: layers of pastry lagged with butter’s unsophisticated cousin and dotted with candied fruit. Intuiting how long to prove the dough was key, as was careful folding of the layers. Josh’s looked like a gold-edged, special-edition paperback. When each baker presented their nine squares of stodge, Josh’s were just so, Matty’s were underdone and Dan’s were a stiff, singed farrago.
With only two bakers plausibly in with a chance and one well in the lead, the final showstopper required a tiered cake inspired by the contestants’ first ever bake, a low-key assignment that produced underwhelming results. There was a Victoria sponge, a lemon drizzle, a chocolate Genoese; basic stuff that might have been elevated to final-worthy spectacles by superb execution. But Matty’s top tier was “on the wonk”, as Prue put it, and his daubs of colour just made his cakes look unfinished. Dan’s decoration was so cracked that he tried to hide the worst bits with lemon macarons, but these were broken and ragged.
Josh’s three sponges were fully covered and stood up straight. It seemed that all he had to do to win was not faceplant into his buttercream on the walk to the judging table. But, as he sampled Josh’s work, Hollywood bristled. The flavours were only “adequate”! The sponge was overbaked! The design was on the way to boring! Matty’s sponges had been wonderfully light …
Outside in the sunshine, the winner was announced: Matty Edgell had come from nowhere to triumph. In its very last moments, an undercooked series finally sprinkled some spice.
