This Side of the Pond

It seems there’s a new craze sweeping this country thanks to the invention of streaming video, and its name is The Great British Baking Show. I can completely understand why this low-key game show has captured imaginations.

In a time where everything is high stress and soaked in adrenaline, it’s nice to settle down with a cup of tea and forget that anxiety is a thing which exists. There’s something comforting about watching good-natured contestants bake Victoria sponges and parkin without a care in the world.

In case you’ve never heard of it, The Great British Baking Show follows a similar format to your average elimination contest. A group of wannabe master bakers gathers in a tent and, every week, answers a challenge from the judges that will dictate whether they get to stay for another round.

But what makes this show different is that the stakes are so very low. The winner gets a boost to their pride, a pat on the back and an engraved cake stand to take home with them.

Without a million dollar check to battle for, there’s not a lot of backstabbing going on and there are no heroes and villains. Contestants are known to actually help one another (I know, shocking) and even the hosts occasionally muck in.

Aside from the delicious creations, the main draw is probably the tiny disasters that happen along the way, few of which ever cause a tantrum. It’s pleasant to step away from the international news and see problems that both have solutions and are not world-ending in their severity.

There was the time one contestant accidentally flung her pastry dough across the room, for instance, and responded to suggestions she should just use it anyway by pointing out the lint that had stuck to the sides and exclaiming she wasn’t going to serve green carpet to the judges.

There was also the time one of the hosts leaned on the counter to speak to a contestant and flattened his muffin with her elbow; the episode when Nancy turned her stand mixer up too high and flung creamed butter and sugar all over the studio; and the one where John used salt instead of sugar in his retro rum babas and the judges had to spit it out.

Perhaps the standout drama of the show’s entire run was the time a lady called Deborah accidentally used another contestant’s custard. The poor thing was mortified and the nation was aflame.

Not only was Twitter in a frothing mess, but Howard himself was interviewed by national newspapers about his distress over being left with Deborah’s “slack custard”. It was talked about for weeks.

A similar tragedy happened a few seasons later when one contestant accidentally removed another’s Baked Alaska from the freezer for less than a minute and the country split down the middle in its opinions. On one side, those who felt she had destroyed his dessert (including the headlines splashed across tabloid newspapers) and, on the other, those who felt a few seconds of warmth couldn’t have done that much damage.

Then, of course, you have the loveable contestants. Some sport entire wardrobes of cozy patterned sweaters, others are charmingly self-deprecating. Then you have memorable characters like eccentric retired headmistress Valerie who “listened” to her cakes, dropped things every few minutes and said she bakes love into everything she makes.

The hosts are the goofiest of the bunch. Mel and Sue, the original duo (before the show was bought by a different network), can make light of any situation, offer hugs whenever needed and challenge themselves every week to find new ways to make jokes about a pie crust having a “soggy bottom”.

It doesn’t always go right, as Mel can tell you. Larking around on set at one point caused her to knock over a cookie tower that a contestant had been painstakingly building. She had to stand very still holding it until the judges arrived.

There’s also a strong element of traditional values to the show. An older baker named Norman once got excited about his recipe for the week because pesto, to him, is extremely exotic.

I should also point out, having talked a couple of weeks ago about the British use of language and our reliance on tiny specks of body language, that Judge Mary Berry is an excellent example of this. Just watch the hard stare and miniscule flinch when one contestant admits they bought their fondant from the store.

All of this set in a tent complete with bunting in the glorious British countryside, with the occasional shot of a squirrel running past. Is it any wonder people everywhere are beginning to find it the perfect antidote to the pressure of the modern world?

Apparently, Mel and Sue are responsible for the happy-go-lucky tone, after storming off the set when the show was first being filmed when a contestant burst into tears describing her personal life. No, they said, we’re not going to manufacture drama like an episode of X Factor.

“No one ever cried again,” Sue was quoted in The Telegraph. “Maybe they cry because their soufflé collapsed, but nobody’s crying because someone’s going ‘Does this mean a lot about your grandmother?’”

This might be the key to its popularity and the reason former UN Human Rights Director Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein told Reuters he watches the show as a release after dealing with trauma across the world all day. Meanwhile, baking groups are popping up all over America, inspired by episodes of the show. It seems there’s something to be said for being cheerful in the face of adversity, after all.