Episode 22 Best Bakes Ever

The wonderful smell of bread out of the oven. The perfect pie crust, the

snap of a biscuit and of course cakes. Cakes of all shapes and sizes

and for every occasion. We have something for all the senses here as

we celebrate some of the Best Bakes EVER.

Hello and welcome. We've got some amazing bakes on the menu come

coming up for you today. A Bake Off masterclass on how to make orange

cake. It's different and has a wonderful strong orange flavour with

a bit of spice. A centrepiece to end on. It is used for every single

wedding. For every single birthday. I had it for my two weddings! It

could have been three, but it's only two so far. We start today with the

Hairy Bikers, they have been looking for inspiration in Germany. They

ended up in the black forest, you can guess what kind of cake they're

going to be making. Let's go to the black forest itself.

Get lost in the wood before baking a cake? Yep.

And, here it is. Our Black Forest Gateau. I love to go wandering. It's

brilliant. To think we can cook a black forest gadget owe in the

middle of the Black Forest. How many people have the opportunity in their

lives? Is the air is pure. This is it. Kingy! Si. Si.

Where are you? Well, just leave us, I would. Only stopped for a wee! Not

got a compass? No, I didn't bring it. You know where the kitchen is,

it's here. Forget the 1970s, version we are doing it proper. Like many

cakes you start with flour. Believe it it or not, Germans don't use

self-raising flour. You have to use ordinary flour and pepp it up with

baking sugar. Whilst I bash the sugar and butter into shape Auto

will addcocoa. Don't add drinking chocolate. Too much baking powder it

will collapse. Too little and it won't... It still will make you

pump. Six eggs. Look at that. Beautiful. As Dave puts the dry

goods in, what we will do is fold that in nicely with a spatula. This

is one bowl you will want to lick out. Grease and dust two cake tins

and divide the mixture accordingly. You can smooth it out easily with a

hot spoon. Maybe not that easily. Bung them in the oven for about 25

minutes. The Cherie filling. You do this, with some black Cherie jam.

Buy the jam that has a lot of fruit content. It's quite important this

because it's a Luke surious cake this. You don't want to skimp on any

of the ingredients. -- cherry. They will be complimented by our magical

ingredient. Earlier today we secured our very own forest spirit. There

are unhads of cherry other charreds around here. A double distilled

cherry spirit is vital. They leave the cherry stones in that gives it a

almond flavour. Alcohol and baking go hand and hand. Remember kids,

alcohol and biking certainly don't. Oh! We need to heat it up. The jam

will melt and the cherries will expand and soak up all the kirsch.

That's them cooling. They will set solid. We need whip cream and

chocolate. The building blocks of a BFG. We're going for an ambitious

four layer cake. Don't cut your cake until it's cold Or you will end up

with a pile of credit crunches. We also brought a cherry liqueur to

sprinkle over the cake to send our cherry flavours into overdrive.

Don't soak it. In Germany, you buy cream ready whipped. This is the fun

bit. They all come together. You can see sprinkles on the edge, all to

the good. It's easy to think of the Black Forest Gadget owe as a refugee

from the 1970s sweet menu. Is the BFG was a classic and ours is the

business. It is's ironic, isn't it, rescuing a cake from it is

wilderness years by making it in a forest.

The final finishing touches. More chocolate. There we have it.

That's what you call a cake. With all those cherries that's at least

three of our five-a-day. Now, we have Madelaines, light cakes from

France. These ones from Rachel are different because she's adding some

homemade lemon curd. This recipe is part of Parisian culture. A snack

for children and a childhood memory for the grownups. If you want to

impress your friends with a Parisian teatime treat I've got the recipe

for you. My moto is - butter makes everything butter. Take your time

and let 200 grams melt slowly. It's on to the sweet stuff. Plain caster

sugar, 130 grams. Three eggs. Let's do whisking, we will get a workout

here. You want to whisk it until it's pale and frothy. It's a great

workout to combat Bingo wings. I have a tired arm. If you have an

electric whisker you can do it with that. Otherwise, have a bit of a

workout. I think we're there. Oh, the butter has melted. Ah - it's

hot. When your fingers have cooled down, mix the dry sgreents. 200

grams of plain flour. Baking powder. I'm going to zest my lemon. You are

going for the top layer. It smells really good. We've got the honey

from a beekeeper. I need 60mls of milk. It's not semi-skimmed or

skimmed, it's full fat. French patisserie you do everything full

fat, nothing half measures. If you are going to do a cake, do it well.

Diet cakes out the window. Mix it in. I will add the flour. While

training I was taught a special technique when stirring. At school

you have to move with the bowl. Don't worry if you spot little lumps

in there. It's more likely to be little bits of lemon zest. We will

cover it and put it in the fridge. That's if there's any room of

course. Will it close? It does. They are always baked in shell shaped

moulds. If you don't have one, can you use a a mini muffin tin. I will

use a piping bag. I'm going to grab my cocktail shaker from up here. The

great thing about that is you have two hands to help put your dough in.

What we're looking to do to fill our tins is actually you are kind of

filling it just a little bit below the shell shape. You are not filling

it right to the brim. Raspberries go in the middle. They

sometimes dip it in chocolate. My raspberry and lemon version adds a

little bit to the classic. We will put them in the oven. Let's have a

look. Are they done? Lovely golden. Around the edges, pale in the

middle. To make them extra special I will pipe lemon curd into the

middle. So you take your madeleine and you you pipe it where the hole

is. You want to pipe it into the madeleines while they are warm.

Piping when it's hot will help the Kurd melt through the sponge and

make the cakes extra moist. Very, very yummy.

I can't resist Madeleines straight from the oven. Nor, it seems, can my

friends. For an English girl like me, afternoon tea doesn't get any

better. Good home cooked French food, like Paris itself, should

stimulate your senses and leave you wanting more. We are moving on to

another citrus pudding from Mary Berry giving us the Bake Off

Masterclass died to her sliced whole orange cake. If it was your

challenge, what would you do? I would make a whole spiced orange

cake. It's rather different and has aened woerful strong orange flavour

with a little bit of spice. Cook a whole orange by placing it in a pan

of boiling water for 30 minutes until soft. You put in a point of a

knife. When it comes out, easily, you know it's done. There's the

orange. All beautifully soft. To chop it up I use a processor. We do

not want a smooth puree. We want nice little bits in there. That

consistency is just perfect. It really does give it the most lovely

orange flavour. Smell. That little bit of kick to it as well. Then the

Swedeness inside. It's a good idea to use the whole thing. I will take

two table spoonfuls ready for the icing. That will give flavour to the

icing. This is ready to go back into the actual cake mixture. OK. The

cake mixture is a classic Victoria sandwich mixture with added spices.

Start by taking four eggs. If I do that, it goes all the way down the

side here. It doesn't really matter, does it. You like doing that. Add275

grams of self-raising flour and two level tea spoons of baking powder.

Why am I adding baking powder to the self-raising flour, I've added a

little baking powder. If you rise too much it will rise up and fall

down in the oven. It's not clever to add too much. Then add one tea spoon

of ground cinnamon, one tea spoon of mixed spice, 275 grams of baking

spread and 275 grams of caster sugar. Put that on and mix it until

it's blended together and don't go on and on because it doesn't make a

better mixture. Just until everything is smooth. Over working

the mixture will develop the gluten in the flour resulting in a heaven

sponge. Very quick to It's check, have a look. That's fine. If you

haven't got a processor, you've chopped up the orange by hand, you

could do it with a hand beater, all in one, or with a wooden spoon. Now

is the stage to add this brightly coloured orange. That took seconds,

didn't it? It did. You should have a thick drop batter

that holds the fruit in place. One splendid, divide the mixture equally

between two 20 centimetre cake tins and smooth out. They look fine and

the oven is set 160 fan, about 30-35 minute. You know your own oven at

home, it may take longer than I say. But both tins on the same shelf and

keep the oven closed until the cakes are coming away from the sides.

Other ways they may sink. The orange and spices are coming through, and

they? Most people get hold of that and put that... You have asbestos

fingers. That's what the children say. Most people would put that

straight onto the rack and then get the imprint on the top so if you put

that between like that, and lift that off, you can peel off the paper

at this stage or later but it lets you see the beautiful even colour.

You then take it and flip it over like that. I leave those to get

quite cold, put them on here and the icing is a butter icing with a

difference. To make the icing, cream 50 grams of softened butter in a

bowl until it is light, fluffy and pale. Then sift in 175 grams of

icing sugar. Will you put in 250 grams of full fat Musca --

mascarpone. If you get low fat it will be runny. Just have a smaller

slice. Doesn't work with me. So you can put all of that in now. Look at

it. I will get my own back. Whisk everything on together until you

have a smooth mix. The last thing that goes in is the orange, you can

mix it with a wooden spoon or like this. It then has this lovely bright

orange colour. There is the mixture, it is a good colour. It is obvious

that it is orange and it is spreadable and holding its shape.

Mary creates four layers out of the two Sandwich cakes. The bottom layer

can go straight onto the serving dish. Now you can look and see the

mixture. It is well risen, even aeration in there and little flecks

of orange. It smells fantastic. Doesn't it. Spread it fairly evenly

right to the edges. You want to see it. Then put the next one on top.

Dividing your icing into quarters will give an even amount of icing on

each layer. Press it down with your hands so the icing is just coming

out. Scrape every scrap out of the bowl. That is our cake, but it just

needs to be made more elegant. Right, the decoration I have chosen

to do is to take a slightly larger orange and crystallise it. Hold it

firmly, it doesn't matter which way up, and press that very hard and

Paul strips from it. This simple, tasty decoration of crystallised

orange zest is made by peeling thin strips of orange. It isn't difficult

to do and it's not really very wasteful because you can use the

orange in fruit salad afterwards. Place in a pan with 50 grams of

sugar, add water. I'm just going to shake that a bit, let it bubble up

and it will take about ten minutes. Keep an eye on it. Then drain, dry

off and place onto a lined baking tray. Then just sprinkle caster

sugar over the top and leave it on top of a radiator for about 12

hours. You can put a little design around the outside. Everybody gets a

taste. This is the sort of cake I have in the cake tin, one of my

favourite cakes. Would you be tempted? Yes, it is simple but it

has another element that has been added which is the orange. You just

want to eat it now. I think we will save it for later. You cannot wait,

can you? That's ridiculous. It is nothing if not fresh. It is supposed

to serve eight. It is most, a great sponge. That with a cup of tea would

be a marriage made in heaven. To think that our cake I made for you

is a marriage made in heaven is a compliment. Thank you. Now to our

final bake of the day, a marriage of pastry and architecture. It is from

Raymond Blanc, sit back and marvel as he creates his piece montee. This

is the quintessential French celebration cake. Piece montee Full.

This is the most loved, famous and celebratory dish in the whole of

France. It is used for every single wedding, birthdays. I had it for my

two weddings! The body of the tower will be made from 80 choux buns.

They go into a preheated oven for 30 minutes at 170 degrees. Now we are

going to prepare the nougatine. Raymond is using fondant and liquid

glucose. The beauty about this is it is very flexible. It doesn't

crystallise. Just a bit of butter. The caramel is heated until it is a

light blonde colour. Raymond stirs in 400 grams of toasted almonds and

turns the mixture out to cool slightly. Needless to say, it is

very hot, you have to be very careful. The nougatine needs to be

rolled to a thickness of 33 millimetres. This is about the only

time when you need strength probably. Because now it is too hard

and it is difficult. As it cools, it starts to stiffen so Raymond places

it back in the oven to soft -- soften. When it is the right

thickness, Raymond shapes into a lightly oiled pie dish. It is hot so

you can work it out. So now, this is going to be the base of the piece

montee. Raymond also uses the nougatine to make decorative shapes.

Crescents and tiring -- triangles. I am going to put them to one side and

do my choux pastry. For the filling, Raymond makes an orange flavoured

pastry cream. But in a big slug. With 80 to fill, he and lists a

little help. To create a sweet and shiny finish, Raymond dips the choux

buns into caramel heated to 180 degrees. It has a lovely, shiny

crust, which is very beautiful, appetising, and of course delicious

texture. For an added detail, he dips some of them in new sugar. It

is a labour of love, but if you have the pleasure to do it for your

party, your friends, your loved one, it makes it special. With all the

elements ready, Raymond can begin the real work, building the tower.

To cement the choux buns together, he is using caramel. My geometry is

so bad. I like it to be asymmetric, I hate symmetry. They are very small

actually. You should see some piece montee in France, they are this

tall, it is amazing. We have our first part of the piece montee.

There's a few sticking out but it is all right. With the tower built,

decoration begins. I'm going to do our moon shape. S shaped choux

pastry provides the support for the last tier. It is OK. Delicately

placed sugar almonds give a traditional detail. You can do sugar

roses as well, all sorts of different things. Finally, some

gravity defying royal icing ribbons. I know sometimes you can spend a

great deal of time cooking, but I think it is a lovely thing to do. I

think when you have created something beautiful and you give it

to your friend, what more can you give? You can give much more, but

certainly something that is special. Actually that's cake, I wanted to do

it for Adam, who has just got married a few weeks ago. That cake

is for you. Congratulations. I am so happy to have done it for you and

you are going to take it back home after work. How will I get that

home? We will find a way! Give me a big hug. I hope you have seen lots

to inspire and excite you, and do join me again for more fantastic

baking next time. Goodbye.