24/10/2011 Blue Peter

Today, crazy chef Stefan Gates takes the ingredients of a kuch

cake to a whole new level. -- cup cake to a whole new level. Sure you

are ready for this?! It's going to Hello. Hello. As you can see,

Barney is poised at this piano and he's going to be playing live for

us. Don't worry, he has something much better up his sleeve than that

which is seriously impressive. He's going to accompany a Britain's Got

Talent star who's 13 and today he releases his first album. It's

Ronan Parke. We danced there, we can't help it,

we're excited. Make some noise for Ronan Parke.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE Hello. Hi. Ronan! Welcome to the

show. Thank you. Because it's your first time, before we get started,

I have something to give to you. It's a Blue Peter badge. Argh.

whiting is that? Shall I put it on for you? Yes. Tell us how it's been

for you, one minute you are in a talent show, the next you are on

Blue Peter, talk to us? It's been crazy but I'm having so much fun.

Recording material, you are going on TV, do you still go to school?

Yes, I still go to school quite a lot but when I'm away I have a

tutor but it's harm term now so it's OK. Firework on your album,

Edge of Glory, Lady Gaga, did you have a say on what was going to be

on there? Yes, a lot of say, all of them are songs I like, so I hope

people like it. I have to say, I love the song that you two will be

performing for us later on. You've never performed together, in fact

you've only just met a few hours ago. We are doing it live. How are

you feeling? Nervous but excited. How are you feeling, do you trust

him? Yes, yes. For now I want to tell you something, a couple of

weeks ago, Stefan Gates was talking to us about this simple cup cake

but it's got pink icing on it. You can make it pink by apparently

mushing up dead insects and using their blood. He's going to take

some more of these ingreedients and show us how explosive they are. You

are going to love this. I'm Stefan Gates and if you have seen me on

gastro nuts, you will know that I love cooking and am obsessed with

the wild side of food, not only how it tastes but experimenting with it

and pushing the boundaries of what food can do.

And now I'm on a mission to expose the extreme side of one of the most

popular baked goods of all, the sweet, humble cup cake.

Last time I proved that the first three ingredients of cup cakes can

be bizarre. So what goes into this to turn it pink? It's an insect.

Unexpectedly strong. The strength is in the shells. Here we go. Oh,

my word. And highly reactive. The Lemon juice is reacting with the

bicarbonate of soda and releasing carbon dioxide. Now it's time to

meet the cup cake bad boys. Icing sugar and flour. Are you sure

you're ready for this?! Icing sugar. What does it do? The icing is there

to give a lovely extra sweetness on top of the cake and it's made out

top of the cake and it's made out of this stuff here, icing sugar.

All that icing sugar is is normal sugar grind down into a fine powder.

Looks boring, but it's packed full of energy. To show you the energy,

I'm going to release it by burning I'll put a couple of spoonfuls into

this apparatus. And then, I'm going to blow the icing sugar across a

This fireball is the icing sugar being set on fire by the gas flame.

The kind of sugar you put into tea wouldn't do this, icing sugar

particles are tiny and powdery, so they burn quickly and violently. A

lovely smell of toffee in the air now. All of that flame was all the

energy in the icing sugar being released in one go. It's powerful

stuff. It's not just icing sugar that

reacts like this. Let's go extreme with the last extraordinary cup

cake ingredients. It's flour. Looks boring doesn't it? But this stuff

is immensely important. Billions of people eat products made with flour

every day, it's in bread, cakes and it's thought to be the most ancient

baking ingredient of all, first used about 11,000 years ago. But

this stuff has one surprising extra element to it.

It's highly explosive. Nour on its own like this is

completely safe. -- flour. However, when you throw it up into the air,

the energy is mixed with the oxygen in the air and all it takes in one

spark to release all of the energy very fast and very violently.

Inside flour is a nutrient called carbohydrate and that contains the

energy released into our bodies when we eat it, or when it's blown

up, which is exactly what's about to happen next. Now, I've never Don

this before in my life. I've got no idea if it's going to work. But for

my final experiment, I'm going to test the true power of flour in its

most dangerous state. I've got two massive bags of plain flour, it's

exactly the same sort of stuff used to make cup cakes. I'm going to see

if we can blow this up. And if the heat of the explosion can be enough

to melt some marshmallows and toast some cup cakes. I've recruited

special effects designer Mark who's responsible for Big Bangs, dramatic

stunts and flashy effects in loads of TV shows. It's a highly skilled

job, requiring years of training, so Mark's the perfect man for a

dangerous stunt like this. How are we going to go about this? I have a

kilo of gunpowder here. We have to be quite quick to lift the flour

into a dust suspension, these sparky bits will light the cloud of

dust and give us a ball of flame. To work with gunpowder, you need a

special licence issued by the police and Mark's got one.

dispersing all the particles to the right kind of concentration and

hopefully it will be flames going up to ignite it with the air and

the oxygen around. Exactly. Sure about this? Yes. What can possibly

go wrong?! Purely in the interests of science,

I want to see a food that would normally get bake and towed like

marshmallows and crumpets will be cooked by the heat of the explosion.

And the other stuff? Well, I just fancied blowing them up. Do you

reckon these will cook? Marshmallows possibly, I wouldn't

count on the baked potato, to be honest. If all goes to plan, the

gunpowder will blast into the air and sparks will ignite the flour

cloud and make it explode into a lovely orangey fireball, hopefully

cooking my food in the process. I'm so excited. It's like I've built

the world's most dangerous oven. Everything's in place ready to go.

I'm standing way back and my finger's on the detonator button.

My heart's going quite fast now. OK, The red flame ball is the flour

combusting at a super high speed. Now, the same energy release

happens inside your body when you eat flour, but luckily it happens

much more slowly inside you. That was enormous! This is carnage.

Bits of stuff everywhere. There's a strong smell of burnt flour, I

suppose. Did anything survive? The potato mad it all the way over here.

It's kind of turned into tar. It has actually toasted my cup cake.

Whether it's made it any better or not is another matter. Ah. Oh, look,

that's actually a bit of obliterated marshmallow.

Made it go very, very gooey. Look, here is another whole marshmallow.

I would eat it, but it's covered in gunpowder. It's kind of intact

though. I think that flew, rather than toasted.

So there you go, five every day ingredients that turn out to be

extraordinary. Pink icing made from crushed up

insects, superbly structured eggs, strong enough to take my weight and

more, bicarbonate of soda which reacts strangely with Lemon juice,

icing sugar, sweet but deadly and plain old flour, essential for

making cakes but has the explosive power of a bomb. All packed inside

your sweet little cup cake. I don't know about you, but that's

really made me want a toasted marshmallow. They were a bit more

crispy than I'm used to. He looks mad but Stefan is a trained

professional and takes every precaution to make sure everything

he does is safe. Don't try that at home. He's mad in a good way. The

reason he's been playing with the ingredients is that we are hoping

to get you into the kitchen and hold bake sales. You have been out

there holding your own sales and raising money for Children In Need.

It's been happening for so long, we thought we'd show you one of the

many bake sales that's been taking place.

All across the country, lots of you have been getting involved with our

Bake A Difference appeal. We are in Loughborough to check in on this

school to see how they're getting on. We managed to sell cakes for

Children In Need. And we are going to raise a lot of money. I think

making cakes is a brilliant idea because everyone loves cakes.

cake you sell makes a difference. With the money collected, we are

going to help provide funds for children living with chronic or

life-limiting ill nns the UK. To find out more about getting

involved with the appeal, head to the Blue Peter website for more

tips and recipes. Let's see how the We'll give you a discount.

great. After a hard morning's work, they sold a whopping 50 cakes. I

think that deserves a cheer. It really does. Thank you so much

to everybody getting involved with the appeal this year, you are

really making a massive difference to children's lives. Thank you so

much. Only a couple of weeks left until Children In Need, so if you

are thinking about having a bake sale, get cracking. Lots of you

have been getting involved including Ella and Thiana. They did

a sale and raised �83 selling over 200 items. Thank you, ladies.

Connie and Jack held a sale outside their house with the amazing help

of their friends and sold at least 50 fairy cakes, five big cakes,

flap jacks and banana bread and lots more. The neighbours were

great and donated cakes and together they raised a whopping

�110 in just two hours. Amazing. appreciate your efforts and are

trying to give you a mention. Look out for some of your names and some

of your pledges are scrolling across the screen now. These kids

in Barnet baked cakes and raised some money. They enjoyed raising it

and are proud to be sport and are proud to be sport

and are proud to be sport supporting Children In Need.

Mia is aged nine, one slash two. Nine-and-a-half. Started at 1

o'clock, had loads of people calling in. She had a spotty table

cloth like Pudsey. That's caught! She told everything and raised

�108.93. Impressive. Thank you so much. I think it's almost time to

light up the totalliser. We are asking you how many items you

pledge to bake and sell for Children In Need. Last week, we

were at 14,000. Et us see how we are doing at the minute. Drum roll,

please. The total number is... 23,099. That is incredible. Thank

you so much. Keep baking, keep selling and keep letting us know

what you are selling. We like it when we hear we've got 47 cakes, 25

biscuits, you like the fruity and oaty bars, so keep your pledges

coming in. Almost time for you and Ronan to perform for us. You are

going to love it! And, if you've sent in a question for Ronan, stay

tuned because some of you are going to be joining us via the magical

means of technology to ask Ronan some questions. But before that,

let's see what else is coming up in this series of Blue Peter.

I'll be having a jiling and finding out why laughter rally is the best

medicine -- jiggle. The stars of Young Dracula will be making

gruesome goodies for Halloween. the wonderfully talented Pixie Lott

will be here in the studio. So much to look forward to, so don't move

your bums from those seats. like Pixie don't you? Great voice,

great songs. You are chomping at the bit to speak to him and he's

right here, it's Ronan Parke. How you doing? Good, thank you. We've

loads of keen callers wanting to speak to you. Ready to answer some

questions? Yes. Before we do that, I have to ask because lods of

people have been asking, who do you think is going to win X Factor?

have a favourite and I think she will win, it's Mica B. What is it

like being in one of those competitions because everyone's

watching and analysing everything you do? It's really nerve-racking

but I guess because I have such a passion for music and singing, I

just love doing it and wanted to do it more and more so...

Let es get stuck into the calls because they are ready and waiting.

Jake, are you there? Yes. Hi, Jake, that's got to be the girliest

scream I have ever heard. Can I please just say happy birthday to

my friend Poppy? You just did. Happy birthday, Poppy. What is your

question, Jake? Hello. What is it like being on stage and like, do

you get nervous in front of the cameras? It's great being on screen,

it's all different to normal and it's just a great experience, but

yes I do get really scared and nervous before I go on, but when I

start singing it just really goes away really. Do you have any

techniques to get rid of your nerves? It's just as soon as I get

on and the crowd's reaction, it goes away really. Thank you very

much for your question, Jake. Easy zi, are you there? -- Issie.

Can I just say I'm a huge fan and I'm married to him so, if you could

work with any celebrity who would it be and what style of song would

you like to do with them? favourite artist is Lady Gaga, so

it would probably be her and one of her songs is on my album and it's

Edge of Glory so I think I would like to do that with her as a duet.

A proper stomping anthem that one, isn't it, a great tune. Thank you

Issie. Hi, Nadia, are you there? everyone. What is your question?

question to Ronan is, what job do you see yourself doing in the next

ten to 15 years? Well, when I really wanted to do singing, I

thought I was going to be too nervous and I wouldn't be able to

do it so I thought of a back up plan and thought that I would be a

policeman. Loosely related, I suppose. You could sing people's

fines to them. That would work! Nice! Amber, are you there? Yes.

Amber, what is your question? PROBLEM WITH SOUND

Are you near a TV with your phone, trouble with the sound there. Can

you hear us? Yes. What is your question? Will being in the

competition enable you to fulfil any of your other dreams? I've

always wanted to do singing. Yeah, it's just I think being on stage

and singing in front of lots and lots of people and I've experienced

so many amazing things really, so yes. Nice question. Good answer.

Thank you very much. We've had loads of you in touch.

Thank you to everybody who got in touch. Now, I have to say, I'm

excited about your performance. How are you feeling? Nervous but

excited. That's all he ever says. That's what you are supposed to say.

Over to your piano and microphone. On tomorrow's Blue Peter, you can

find out how I got on when I went to Chester Zoo to feed the animals.

They're cute, but very, very fussy creatures. And, if you are planning

a Halloween party, then don't miss tomorrow's shows. We have got a

make-up artist with some fantastic top tips. She's going to teach you

how to make bruises, scratches, you name it, we've got it. But right

now, we have an exclusive performance for you, performing

live, two fantastic talents, very proud of them, it's Barney Howard

# Making my way downtown # Walking fast

# Faces pass # And I'm home bound

# Staring blankly ahead # Just making my way

# Making a way # Through the crowd

# And I need you # And I miss you

# And now I wonder.... # If I could fall

#Into the sky # Do you think time # Would pass me by # 'Cause you know

I'd walk # A thousand miles # If I could # Just see you # Tonight #

It's always times like these # When I think of you # And I wonder # If

you ever # Think of me # 'Cause everything's so wrong # And I don't

belong # Living in your # Precious I miss you # And now I wonder.... #

# And I, I, don't wanna let you know

# I, I, drown in your memory # I, I, don't wanna let this go

Irbgs, irbgs, don't # It's always times like these when

I think of you # And I wonder if you ever think of

# Cos everything's so wrong and I don't belong

# Living in your precious memory # And I need you

# And I miss you # And now I wonder

# If I could fall into the sky # Do you think time would pass me

# Cos you know I'd walk A Thousand Miles

# If I could just see you tonight # If I could just hold you

# Tonight... APPLAUSE

Amazing! Amazing! Ronan Parke. Congratulations.