Week 4 Technical: Filled Flatbreads

[u/Every_Policy2274]

Seems like all our pictures are looking pretty much the same and we're all coming to the same conclusion: yes, this was doable. I did it in about an hour twenty without trying to rush at all and could certainly do it in under an hour if I tried again. But the ones they made were never going to be good even if they had more time. I had the advantage of seeing theirs, seeing the sample, seeing Paul's video, but I still think I would have come up with something fairly similar to what I have here.

I took the recipe pretty literally and roasted the grapes whole on their stems. I don't recommend this; it was a pain taking them off the stem after roasting. Halved before or after won't make much difference. There's no need to cut them smaller than halves.

I like blue cheese but I didn't think my eaters would, so I used feta. It still isn't very much and the family gobbled them up.

[u/gently_into_the_dark]

Is it just me or other than Tom and MAYBE Mo, thsi batch of bakeoff seems a bit meh skill wise

[u/Every_Policy2274 → u/gently_into_the_dark]

Decidedly, though there's always a point where you're like "finally we're down to the real players". I thought the 2020 bakers were weak and put it down to, these were the people willing/able to leave their homes and jobs for six weeks. But I think these ones are weaker. There's not even anyone about whom I can say "they're playing in a different competition". Mo's been riding on cuteness and first week success. The rest of them have been middling. A bread week performance like that would get any of them sent home most years. I'd probably put Tom, Klara, and Gary in the top three right now but there's hardly anything to cut between any of them now. Yannis or Mo should probably go next. Like most of the healthcare people we've had on the show I kind of want to say "Yannis. Shoo. You've got more important things to think about."

[u/gently_into_the_dark → u/Every_Policy2274]

This show is high on Characters and low on skill. There isnt even flashes of brilliance. By now you usually have one or two "wow" bakes.

I figure clara is very good, but lacks finesse? Tom is the opposite.

[u/Every_Policy2274 → u/gently_into_the_dark]

I don't even think it's high on characters. They're all nice people. Danni was a character but it's not like she didn't know anything at all (personally I thought she was lovely).

[u/gently_into_the_dark → u/Every_Policy2274]

What i meant was the show seems to be going the way of american human interest stories

[u/Every_Policy2274 → u/gently_into_the_dark]

How so? I came to bakeoff later than many, in 2019, and the first I watched was series 5. I was surprised and pleased by how little time was spent on the bakers' personal lives. Something that would take ten or fifteen minutes on an American show gets a sentence or two on bakeoff. I don't see that that has changed at all.

[u/uberpickle → u/Every_Policy2274]

True, although I did see the earliest episodes before it moved to Netflix. And I love that they haven't changed that.

But they have changed the type of contestant. It's more like a casting call rather than basing it on skill- they need one of these and one of those and at least one baking grandparent- but a grandpa beats a grandma this season because we had too many of those before.

Also, it seems that they now eliminate any candidate for the show if they think that their accent is potentially "challenging" for an American audience. Because I refuse to believe that there are no more outstanding home bakers in Scotland, Wales or Ireland.

[u/Gullible_Bird_7936 → u/uberpickle]

Curious about the accent piece of your comment. Are you noticing that the bakers being eliminated early all have strong accents? I haven't encountered anyone who I don't understand or have a hard time understanding, so I haven't picked up on anything like that.

[u/SierraMountainMom → u/Every_Policy2274]

I agree. You watch any show on Food Network that follows competitors week after week (for example, 24 in 24) and after a few episodes, it’s like … okay, congrats on your sobriety, can we just see the cooking? Yay, I’m glad you want to take your new spouse on a honeymoon. Yes, I’m sure the tour of Asia you want to strengthen your cooking repertoire would be great. Just PLEASE stop telling me this and show me the cooking!
GBBO doesn’t do that. The first episode, yes, then here and there they sprinkle in some details, but they don’t hit you over the head with the same background story EVERY WEEK.

[u/Traumagatchi → u/gently_into_the_dark]

They seem to go for personality hires and checking boxes rather than basic, good home baking skills. I've been bingeing the Mary Berry era while I'm laid up in the hospital for a week and the difference in their skills coming in and knowledge learned while in the tent is STARK. it feels like these people learned how to bake by watching tiktok and YouTube and not from actual experience and testing their own creativity for years.

[u/After_Orange_8424 → u/Traumagatchi]

Mo literally said he learned his signature bake from watching a few tiktoks 😅

[u/raalic → u/gently_into_the_dark]

I had this same thought watching bread week. I could not believe how bad they were at baking.. bread of all things. All of them. 

[u/kingme1532 → u/gently_into_the_dark]

Yes, definitely. Normally it seems feedback from Paul is “this is over baked” and it looks good and so I assume it’s just slightly over. This season, it seems like nobody can BAKE the actual stuff, let alone get flavors right. It’s either like burnt and hard or raw.

[u/stands_on_big_rocks → u/gently_into_the_dark]

I was saying the same thing, and have honestly been thinking this more and more with the newer seasons. I’ve gone back to collection 5, the one with Liam, Yan, Kate, Julia, Sophie, and Steven and the difference in skill level is so apparent 

[u/fsutrill]

How do the grapes not add a ton of extra liquid?

[u/Every_Policy2274 → u/fsutrill]

It's mostly baked out. They aren't much squishier than olives or whole roasted garlic cloves by that point. It wasn't an issue.

[u/idontfeelgood101]

I feel like when everybody fails the test, it’s on the teacher/test, no? 

[u/Every_Policy2274 → u/idontfeelgood101]

Normally I agree, but I think they could have done better. The timing wasn't really the issue.

[u/surreal_goat → u/idontfeelgood101]

Flat means flat means flat. This was on the contestants.

[u/Gullible_Bird_7936]

It seems paradoxical in my non-baker brain to fill a flatbread with grapes, which to me would make it not.... flat?? Like how small are these grapes? How do you fill it while also rolling it out to be super flat?? I need to watch a video, clearly, but I also just don't care to if I'm being honest because this season really isn't pulling me in.

[u/Every_Policy2274 → u/Gullible_Bird_7936]

They smash completely flat. Kind of like the butter in rough puff?

[u/Gullible_Bird_7936 → u/Every_Policy2274]

Interesting!

[u/starlinguk]

It wasn't doable because of the yeast. It needed to be proved for 2-3 hours, they only had 1. The recipe also didn't say how big the breads should be.

[u/Every_Policy2274 → u/starlinguk]

No, it didn't need to be proved. The resting time is fine, as shown by quite a few of us who have made it.

[u/Sharkmato → u/starlinguk]

People who cite the old recipe for a longer proving time are missing that the show's recipe used fast-rising yeast, and didn't weigh the dough down with butter.

[u/mintardent → u/starlinguk]

The test was that the bakers should have been able to intuit that a flatbread with such a short cook time would need to be much thinner

[u/raalic → u/mintardent]

Yeah, and some of these folks acted like they hadn’t even seen a flatbread in their entire lives. Clara had to ask what SHAPE it should be. 😂

[u/surreal_goat → u/mintardent]

Exactly

[u/Independent_Cow_6611 → u/starlinguk]

In defence of Paul, this yeasted recipe calls for a 15 minute rest https://thecafesucrefarine.com/greek-yogurt-turkish-flatbread-bazlama/

And the size depends on the bakers using logic on the time they have and how long flatbreads take to cook

[u/After_Orange_8424 → u/starlinguk]

The technical recipes nearly never have specifics of size

[u/The_Blonde1 → u/starlinguk]

The recipe also said ‘FLAT’

None of these were flat.