To accompany the new series of the GBBO comes the latest book of recipes for the baking fiend, The Great British Bake Off – How to turn everyday bakes into showstoppers, a sizeable book of 320 pages. Organisation is straightforward, with chapters on Cakes, Biscuits, Breads & Sweet Dough, Tarts, Pies, Desserts, Puddings and the basics. The recipes themselves, as befits the follow up to the first GBBO book, are generally more complicated so, for example, there isn’t a recipe for a victoria sponge.
On flicking through there a a good number of recipes that look well worth trying – multi seed savoury crackers; fig, walnut and gruyere bagels, lardy cakes (a childhood favourite); pistachio salambos; pecan pie; chickpea, spinach and mushroom wellington; and classic apple strudel for example. But it is also noticeable that many of the recipes involve a lot of post cooking assembly – for example, there is a jubilee cake, best described as a Union Jack battenberg. I have to admit that I’m not quite sure I could be bothered with the complication; I will agree that for a one-off celebration, though, it does look great. But perhaps the moment for a jubilee cake has gone? In contrast, however, it is sometimes difficult to decide whether to try a recipe as not every one has a photo showing what the finished article looks like.
However, we did try the treacle tart, and found it pretty straightforward (although, truth be told it’s pretty hard to imagine a treacle tart that isn’t straightforward), and there are plenty of other recipes that are similarly uncomplicated, but basically, this is a book aimed at someone whose inspiration has been fired by watching the program, and wants to spend a weekend afternoon creating something special. If all you want is simpler recipes for those moment when you just fancy whipping up a quick cake, then other books are perhaps more suited.
Fuss Free Rating
The Great British Bake Off: How to turn everyday bakes into showstoppers by Linda Collister: ***1/2
The Great British Bake Off – How to turn everyday bakes into showstoppers is published by BBC Books, cover price £20
Slightly simpler is the Great British Bake Off app with 50 recipes from the book for £2.99. Cleverly designed so it is hands free – you wave above the screen to advance through the steps. I especially like that you can e-mail a list of ingredients to yourself and sort recipes by difficulty. Well worth a look if you bake away from home.
Fuss Free Flavours received a complimentary copy of the book and app for review. All opinions are our own, we were not required to write a positive review.
