North East Dessert Great British Menu

-This year on Great British Menu...

-The competition is on.

..24 of the country's top chefs...

I'm definitely really going for it with this dish.

..are competing to cook at a glorious Taste of Summer banquet,

celebrating 140 years of the iconic Wimbledon Championships,

the oldest and most prestigious tennis tournament in the world.

This week, battling to represent the North East in the national

finals are returning champion Tommy Banks,

who took the lead yesterday after scoring a ten for his main...

-It was a beautiful dish, congratulations.

-Thank you very much.

..newcomer Danny Parker, narrowly in second place after Tommy's triumph...

-A bit of bling, Danny.

-Yeah.

-Everyone loves a bit of bling in their life.

..and fellow first-timer Josh Overington,

in third place by just one point.

It's so close, and very stressful.

Today, it's the dessert course.

-There's just so much riding on it.

-It's going to go down to the wire.

But with the competition too close to call, which two chefs

will be going through to tomorrow?

What are you going to do if you get the panna cotta out and it's not right?

Cry.

The chefs have been tasked with creating outstanding dishes

that evoke a taste of summer and pay tribute to the

Wimbledon Championships.

Returning banquet champion Tommy Banks is currently in the

lead with 26 points, but with Danny on 25 and Josh on 24,

there's almost nothing between them.

Right, then, boys, last day.

It's going to be an intense, very intense day.

It's all about executing every element perfectly.

I think one mistake and that person's not going through.

I mean, you guys have cooked really well all week,

but I don't want to be the one going home.

Judging their dishes is veteran chef Jeremy Lee,

renowned for his stylish, classical British cooking.

-Gentlemen, good morning. How are you today?

-Very well, thank you.

Good. The pudding, the last course.

And miraculously, there's only a couple of points between you all.

So, for 140 years of Wimbledon, a British summer,

I hope very much to taste three absolutely sterling dishes

that will confound me as much as your other three dishes. Good luck.

Thank you, Jeremy.

It's a very close deal.

It's not clear who's going to go through to the final,

so this is going to be the Devil's own business to choose who will.

After scoring a perfect ten yesterday,

Tommy is hoping for another ace today with his dessert,

-Hay Time, recalling summers with his family on their farm.

-Hi, Tommy.

-How are you?

-Very well, thank you.

-What's your pudding?

Essentially, it is a hay custard with filo pastry,

cream cheese ice cream and raspberries.

Gosh, how does that all work?

So, the hay, I'm going to toast it in the oven so it's really nice,

so it brings out the flavour a bit more. Infuse it in cream,

-and then use that cream as the base of a custard.

-A-ha.

I've never had hay in a pudding before.

I've never had a hay pudding either, but I...

JEREMY LAUGHS

The smell of it is sweet,

and that's why I thought it really is something I want to do.

I'm going to make an ice cream from the cream cheese.

With the rest of the cream cheese,

I'm going to make a cheesecake with the meadowsweet.

The raspberries are going to be made into a puree.

And also, I'm just going to serve some fresh raspberries as well.

Well, raspberries are notoriously powerful.

-Is this slightly too delicate for that?

-Not in my opinion, no.

-No, indeed, really. I look forward to trying that.

-Thank you.

So, Tommy's pudding, Hay Time.

When he puts things that are from in and around his farm,

he is at his happiest, I've noticed. He seems on comfortable terrain.

And the problem with being comfortable is someone might

not push oneself that little bit more.

Newcomer Danny has impressed with his flamboyant presentation

all week, but yesterday lost his lead.

He's hoping to secure his place in tomorrow's regional final with a

dessert based on childhood memories, playing tennis in the garden.

-Hello, Danny, how are you?

-I'm good, Jeremy, how are you?

Very well indeed. What is the name of the dish?

Please Sir, Can I Have My Ball Back?

How on earth did you arrive at such a glorious name?

I remember when Wimbledon would come on the TV,

me and my friends, we would go out and play tennis.

And inevitably, someone would smash a window. Usually a greenhouse.

And someone would have to go over, knock on the guy's door and say,

-"Please, sir, can I have my ball back?"

-A-ha. What is the dish?

So I've got these lovely strawberries here.

-I'm going to make a consomme on top of a vanilla panna cotta.

-Ah.

So that's our strawberries and cream element there.

-On top of that, we are going to have a fizzy strawberry sorbet.

-Fizzy?!

Fizzy strawberry sorbet. I'm also going to make a strawberry meringue.

And I'm going to finish it with a dandelion and burdock and gin cocktail.

We're almost getting used to the daily firework display and

magnificence of your presentation.

You sort of exposed yourself slightly to a few hiccups.

Can you avoid them with this one today?

I think there's a lot of risks involved in this.

Some of it is in the presentation,

that we'll leave a secret right until the end.

I look forward to it very much indeed. Good luck.

I think with Danny's dish, his flavours are quite conservative.

He remains in a very safe realm

and then surrounds that realm with an awful lot of set dressing.

So I'm intrigued to see what he does with this course.

In third place, by just one point,

Josh has scored consistently well all week.

He's hoping his summer dessert, Walking Through The Hedgerow

Picking Berries, will net him the perfect ten he badly needs.

-Josh, how are you?

-Yeah, I'm OK, yeah.

How are you going to manifest this dish, then?

I'm going to make a panna cotta of wild herbs,

which I'm using meadowsweet and sweet woodruff.

And these work well together? Because they're quite disparate

characters, aren't they, in flavour?

Yeah, I think they really work together. You want the flavour of the hedgerow,

and that's what it's going to give.

So I'm also making a wild strawberry sorbet.

Then we are going to make a honeycomb out of buckwheat honey.

We're used to very delicate floral honey,

but buckwheat is a much denser...

I mean, that almost looks like a chocolate spread, doesn't it?

-Yes, it's a lot more intense.

-What are the risks on this, do you think?

Absolutely the panna cotta is going to be a huge challenge to get it set

perfectly and have the right texture.

Danny, panna cotta, strawberries. Panna cotta, strawberries.

Yeah, it's battle of the panna cottas, isn't it?

But I don't think what Josh is doing really bothers

me that much, because I need to concentrate on what I'm doing.

Well, I think you all do. You know, one of you is going to have to stumble and fall.

Josh's pudding, using both buckwheat and meadowsweet, one very floral,

the other very bitter.

But they might work beautifully together, they might not.

The three chefs have been friends for years,

but with the judging chamber in sight, it's every man for himself.

One of us is going home after this, so I'm feeling that pressure.

It's going to be emotional at the end of this round.

-There's just so much riding on it.

-Yeah, absolutely.

It's going to go down to the wire.

With the scores so close,

Tommy is pulling out all the stops with his dish, Hay Time.

He's using ingredients connected to summer memories growing up on

his parents' farm, roasting hay from their fields to flavour the

custard at the centre of his dessert.

I've got a little touch with my presentation.

I won't tell you exactly what it is, but my mum made it for me,

-so you can't be mean about it, all right?

-Oh, that old chestnut.

-You know my mum, you wouldn't mess with her.

-No.

-I'll say it's great no matter what.

-TOMMY LAUGHS

Both Tommy's rivals are hoping to take him on with their different

takes on panna cotta.

For Josh's dish, Walking Through The Hedgerow Picking Berries,

he's flavouring his with foraged herbs.

I really want to get this panna cotta going, so it gets set.

Nothing worse than it either being overset or being not set

enough and being all runny, that's my main worry.

I think everyone's just going to be running around mad for the next half an hour.

While Danny's making his panna cotta with vanilla,

which he'll serve alongside six strawberry elements,

on his dish, Please Sir, Can I Have My Ball Back?

But as well as different flavours,

both chefs have chosen different techniques.

-Danny, how are you making your panna cotta?

-I'm going to cool it down a little bit over ice,

-I'm going to get it in the blast chiller as soon as possible.

-Yeah, nice.

-How are you doing yours?

-Yours is a little bit different?

-I'm just going to whisk it over ice, so it gets nearly set,

and then I'm going to put it in the bowls and finish it in the fridge.

I need that security that it's going to set,

I don't have time to be standing and whisking something over ice.

Well, it's just these big arms, mate, it happens really quickly.

HE LAUGHS

Having infused his panna cotta mixture with his foraged herbs,

Josh sieves,

before whisking over ice, in the hope it will begin to set.

Oh, the panna cotta. Can you tell me why you've decided to take such

-a precarious avenue with this?

-Well, there's panna cotta, and there's panna cotta.

At the end of the day, I think a panna cotta should have a really silky, smooth texture.

And when I do it this way,

it lets me control exactly how that texture is going to be.

That is an extraordinary flavour. Mysterious stuff.

-Good luck with it.

-Thank you very much.

Tommy is working on the custard for his dessert,

which he's infusing with his roasted hay.

Next, he places filo pastry discs in the oven.

With the scores so close,

he's doing everything he can to make it to the banquet for a second time.

Wimbledon is such a prestigious tournament and full of

tradition, so that's what's really spurring me on,

the idea of being able to serve the last course at the banquet.

To find out how it feels to make it all the way to

Wimbledon, Tommy went to meet former British number one Roger Taylor,

who reached three championship semifinals in the 1960s and '70s.

-Hi, Tommy.

-Hi, Roger, pleasure to meet you.

Almost 100 years before Roger played here,

the first winner of Wimbledon was crowned in the summer of 1877,

when just 22 amateur players took part.

The first champion was this chap, Spencer Gore.

They had something like 200 spectators.

Here's a sketch of Wimbledon in the 1880s.

And you can see people in their finest attire there,

with top hats and long coats.

Is it fair to say that tennis was quite an elitist game back then?

Yes, I think so, there's no doubt it was for the rich and privileged.

It's only in the last 60 or 70 years that tennis

has been open to the masses of people that now play the game, yeah.

By the time Roger was playing in the '70s,

the atmosphere - and attire - was very different.

-Here I am, Tommy.

-Wow.

-Playing on Centre Court.

No wonder my nana fancied you, Roger. Look at them legs.

-Yeah, well, the shorts were a bit shorter...

-Yeah, a lot shorter.

-..in those days.

Roger triumphed against some of Wimbledon's greatest champions,

including a 17-year-old Bjorn Borg.

In 1970, he beat Australian Rod Laver,

regarded as one of the greatest players of all time.

When I played him, he had won 31 straight matches.

-COMMENTATOR:

-Laver reaches, but puts it in the net. Another point for Taylor.

You can imagine how exciting it was for me that I beat him.

You can't forget it these days, middle Saturday in Wimbledon, in 1970.

-That must have been some atmosphere.

-It really was.

-Yeah.

An amazing moment.

-Roger, thank you very much.

-It's been my pleasure, Tommy.

And any chance you can get me a ticket for the banquet?

-Well, if I get there, you'll be on the list.

-Great.

Back in the kitchen, Tommy is finishing his hay custard...

..and has begun work on his unusual meadowsweet cheesecake,

-which will be piped on top of his layered dessert.

-Oh, look at this.

-This is the...?

-Hay custard.

-This is hay that you baked in the oven?

Yeah.

-Biscuity.

-Yeah, I think so.

-And then this is the...?

I'm calling it a cheesecake, but it's some sort of cheesy,

custardy-type creation.

TOMMY LAUGHS

-Carry on. Good luck.

-Thank you.

I've just been to see Tommy and tried his

hay custard and his meadowsweet cheesecake.

I'm working quite hard to tell which one's which.

They're very similar in colour, look and consistency, and flavour.

Across the kitchen, Josh is working on his buckwheat honeycomb,

which he hopes will bring a bitter note to his unusual sweet and

savoury dessert.

Next, he moves on to his wild strawberry sorbet,

which will top his foraged herb panna cotta.

But with time running out, he's worried about getting the

different elements completed on time.

Boys, I'm feeling really nervous right now.

I need everything to be perfect to get a high score.

Yeah, I'm really feeling the pressure.

Danny, what are you going to do if you get the panna cotta out and it's not right?

-Cry.

-Cry?

Danny has moved on to the fizzy strawberry sorbet for his

-playful dessert...

-Danny, is this cool boiling, mate?

..which he must leave to set before adding the fizz later.

Right, meringue.

Next, he works on his strawberry meringue shards,

one of his many strawberry garnishes.

Pretty in pink.

So you're going to try and dry this out and then just make shards of it?

That's exactly the plan, yeah.

So, you're not a great fan of the soft-centred meringue?

I usually am, but in this instance,

the meringue is a completely different texture.

You seem quite stressed.

Yeah, I think, looking around, everyone is pretty busy,

no-one has got time to breathe, really.

-Well, good luck.

-Thank you.

I've just been into the kitchen and I took one look at Danny

and went, "Oh, no, you've done it again, haven't you?"

Got so many different parts to his dish that bringing them all

together at the same time could prove troublesome, I suspect.

Josh is first up to the pass with his dessert,

Walking Through The Hedgerow Picking Berries.

He starts by piping his aerated herb panna cotta into bowls

then adds buckwheat crumble, wild berries and wild strawberry sorbet.

-How's your panna cotta looking, mate?

-It's melting a little bit in the heat,

-so I need to really move myself.

-It looks like you're scared, Tommy.

-Yeah.

He tops with wild blackberries, wild redcurrants and macerated

compressed strawberries.

Next, strawberry powder and sweet woodruff powder.

Not too much, though, because I don't want it to overpower everything.

He finishes with nasturtium flowers,

and presents against a backdrop of a summer hedgerow.

Look at these. How are you feeling?

I'm feeling pretty good about this one.

-As ever, all stops out for presentation. Shall we?

-Yes.

-Good.

-Best of luck.

-Thank you.

-Summer in a bowl. Were you pleased with this?

-Yes.

-The herb flavour from the panna cotta is coming through.

-Mm-hm.

Which is nice.

That tastes of woodruff a lot to me and not very much of meadowsweet.

It actually has a savoury note to it, I like it.

And the buckwheat crumble, how do you think that's worked with the dish?

I think it's worked really well.

I think it gives it that nice earthy flavour, which I'm looking for.

I like the flavour of it a lot, I wish it was more, you know,

crumble with actual texture. Kind of quite sandy, isn't it?

Have you managed to get everything in here you wanted?

No, the buckwheat honeycomb isn't in there.

-What happened?

-Nothing, I just forgot to put it in.

He has forgotten the honeycomb.

I guess I kind of hope it does ruin his day, but at the same time,

I don't want him to be upset, he's my friend.

-Cut to the chase, battle of the panna cottas, is yours better than his?

-Mine wins.

-It wins, yeah? Hands down?

-Easy.

-Yeah? OK.

-What score would you give it?

If I didn't forget one element, I think this might have been my ten.

-Hi, guys.

-How do you think it went?

I forgot my honeycomb. Gutted.

Would probably have been what pushed me through, but, you know, we'll have to wait and see.

Unless one of you two make a massive mistake.

-There's time yet.

-Yeah.

Danny is next up to the pass with his strawberry dish,

Please Sir, Can I Have My Ball Back?

Before plating,

he finishes his fizzy strawberry sorbet using liquid nitrogen.

He places his panna cotta topped with strawberry jelly onto a garden display...

-How's the panna cotta, mate? Are you happy with it?

-Yeah, really happy with it.

Just out now, just to make sure it's at the right temperature I want

-to serve it at.

-Yeah.

..and tops with macerated strawberries.

-What's the point of having a strawberry dessert without fresh strawberries?

-Exactly.

Next, he mixes his dandelion and burdock and gin cocktail...

-Put your back into it.

-Do you want to do this?

..and pours into tennis-ball-shaped glasses.

-Sands of time running out here.

-I'll be on time.

He adds strawberry paper, strawberry sorbet,

strawberry meringue and lemon balm...

and covers in a greenhouse cloche.

Oh, so this is the greenhouse that you smashed, is it?

-This is the very greenhouse. That's it.

-Wow.

A modest little pudding.

DANNY LAUGHS

Hats off. I mean, how spectacular.

Wow.

-Really, ten out of ten. What a...

-Ten out of ten.

-Yay!

For effort.

THEY LAUGH

As ever, the proof, as they say, is in the pudding. Would you mind?

This is the ball that I smashed the window with.

Jeepers!

-It's not shy, is it?

-It works.

It works fantastically, and I absolutely love this cocktail.

-Wow, no.

-Yeah, I'm not a big fan of it.

Um, panna cotta.

Very good.

That's not sturdy, but it's quite a good set on it, hasn't it?

The panna cotta there is set like that on purpose.

I think it works for a banquet, it works for big numbers.

-I think that's an amazing panna cotta.

-It's packed with flavour, it's so tasty.

When it comes to that sorbet, there's smoke billowing everywhere,

is that particularly practical, or is that just for our benefit?

The sorbet is made with the dry ice for a reason, it adds a fizz.

-I quite like the fizz in the sorbet. I think it makes it interesting.

-Definitely.

This is a very generous portion for finishing

a very elegant summer banquet.

We need to show off, we need to have some fun.

And just end the banquet with a bang.

-That's what I'm going for here.

-What would you give it?

I wanted to say ten until you mentioned you thought the panna cotta

was maybe a little bit too firm, and for that reason, I'm going to say nine.

HE SIGHS

-How are you doing, mate?

-How are you doing, man?

Oh, I'm glad to get that out of the way with.

-What did Jeremy think of it?

-Your guess is as good as mine, mate.

There's a lot of work gone into that,

I hope it pays off with the score.

Tommy is last to the pass with his dish, Hay Time,

in tribute to the summer harvest on the family farm.

He starts by plating a hay reef made by his mum,

-and sprays with hay perfume.

-Did you make that yourself?

Yeah, I bought hay essential oil and just mixed it.

-So it's basically, like, fragrance by Tommy Banks?

-Yeah.

He pipes raspberry puree onto his heather and flower honey

filo discs

and adds more to the bottom of his bowl.

Next, meadowsweet cheesecake...

and fresh raspberries.

He finishes his filo discs with the wood sorrel leaves.

He adds his hay custard, aerated for a light texture...

..tops with the filo disc,

and finishes with cream cheese ice cream.

That's my dish done.

-Happy with the result?

-Yeah, I'm happy.

I want to evoke the sort of sweet smell of hay you get on

a balmy summer's evening.

That really sweet smell is what reminds me of summertime.

-And summertime it is. Well, without further ado, shall we?

-Please.

Bon appetit, chaps.

It looks like a little bonnet.

Be nice about this, because my mum made it.

Emotional blackmail has no rub here.

On the bottom of this is the hay custard.

It's really light because I've aerated it,

but I think it has a nice, sort of sweet, hay flavour.

Yeah, it's absolutely delicious.

It just has that lovely floral hay flavour.

Talk to me about cream cheese ice cream.

I wanted to bring a more plain sort of dairy element to it,

-just to bring it all together.

-Interesting.

-Cream cheese ice cream is excellent.

-Absolutely.

-And cheesecake.

One usually thinks of cheesecake having a certain density to it,

and the one thing not present in this dish is density.

Yeah, well, I was thinking, it's a summer banquet and I thought

we really want to end on something really light.

My one worry, whether it was going to be really heavy.

But it's completely the opposite.

I love it because it's everything that I like.

When I get an inspiration like the hay, which I've always grown

up with, then I feel like I cook my best dishes.

Well, we'll see.

-How was that?

-I was really pleased with the dish,

I just don't know if Jeremy likes hay or not.

THEY LAUGH

-Do you think you've done enough?

-I'm really not sure.

Very nervous now because there's one point in it.

I feel a little bit deflated forgetting one ingredient.

I really didn't want to trip up at the last hurdle,

but that's maybe what I've done.

-How are you all feeling?

-Nervous.

-Really nervous now, yeah.

Then let us proceed. Starting with you, Josh.

Your dish, Walking Through The Hedgerow Picking Berries.

The flavours of sweet woodruff and meadowsweet were really

interesting and came through wonderfully in the dish.

The buckwheat honey didn't overwhelm the other flavours,

and it was well balanced indeed.

However...

I wasn't sure about the fake hedgerow presentation.

You could have lost the strawberry sorbet from the dish.

It slightly overpowered the other berries.

Danny. Your dish,

Please Sir, Can I Have My Ball Back?

It had hilarity and great, good humour.

And it made us all laugh with sheer joy.

The strawberry sorbet was delicious, though perhaps a little too sweet.

The panna cotta was great, the texture was lovely.

However, once the great, cumbersome greenhouse was removed,

and a huge glass ball and a tennis ball of gin's revealed,

it was quite a daunting prospect.

I didn't like the dandelion and burdock cocktail at all.

Tommy.

Your dish, Hay Time.

I thought the flavours in your dessert were beautiful, interesting.

I liked the meadowsweet cheesecake, and it wasn't overly sweet.

The honey and filo disc shattered perfectly when you cracked into it.

I really liked that.

However...

..I wish you hadn't aerated the hay cream.

I liked the flavour of that, but not the consistency.

Overall, the dish felt somewhere between

a trifle and a cheesecake, somewhat confused.

So, to the scores.

With a score of eight,

and going straight through to tomorrow's regional final, is...

-..Tommy.

-Thank you.

-Well done, mate.

-Cheers, thanks.

-Well done, how do you feel?

Absolutely delighted to be through, thank you.

So that leaves you, Josh, and you, Danny.

There was only one point between you going into this course.

So, Danny,

I'm giving you...

..an eight.

Josh, you,

I'm going to give...

..a nine.

That means we have a draw.

TOMMY LAUGHS

It falls to me to decide, on the balance of your entire menus

throughout the week, which of you goes through to cook for the

judges tomorrow.

The level of cooking on each course has been really high,

and it's so difficult to choose between the two of you.

But only one can go through.

And that chef...is...

..Josh.

So sorry, Danny.

-Congratulations, Josh.

-Thank you.

-How do you feel?

-Overwhelmed.

Well, I hope the judges tomorrow have as much difficulty

-choosing between you as I did. Thank you, all.

-Thank you.

-Thank you.

-Congrats, boys.

-Thanks. I'm sorry, Danny.

-Thank you.

'I'm extremely emotional right now. I can't put into words how I feel.'

Yeah, it's incredible.

An unbelievable end to an unbelievable week.

We did say it was going to go down to the wire.

Having Josh leapfrog me in the way he did,

it's a massive shock, it's quite hard to take, actually.

This week's been an absolute fight. I've really worked hard this week,

so I'm sure Josh is feeling the same.

I think it could be a case of stamina tomorrow.