With the weather finally beginning to warm up at Welford Park, it’s with cruel but typical Bake Off irony that the tent and bakers need to keep their cool for the chilly hands of pastry week.
We start with a signature of four savoury shortcrust pies, individually decorated but linked by a theme. Julia is the only baker putting her filling in raw – sausage meat is spiced with smoked paprika and mixed with what appears to be a packet of sage and onion stuffing mix and some apples. Decorated with tree-themed elements of leaves, flowers and acorns she insists that grapes grow on trees too.
Kate garnishes her herby butter bean and vegetable pies with pastry portraits of inspirational people – Shakespeare, Einstein, Amelia Earhart and John Lennon. Struggling to achieve a likeness in time, she worries that her pies may be raw and the ex-Beatle may look a little anaemic.
Liam shapes shortcrust symbols from his favourite football video games and fills his pies with spicy chorizo, sweet potato and feta. Sophie is blind baking her crusts for extra crispness. Filled with roasted squash, blue cheese and spinach, she decorates them to represent the four seasons.
Stacey believes that ‘pastry can smell fear’. Hoping to woo it with affection instead she produces four loved-up pies of spiced minced meat and onion dedicated to her late grandma, Elsie. Decorative pastry hearts are brushed with egg yolk that’s blushed with red food colouring.
Steven surprises with an unpredictable taste in music – his Fleetwood Mac pies are finely tuned to reflect songs by the vintage band but their flavours sound more like a hasty bite at Ikea, with Swedish meatballs, mashed potatoes and lingonberry jam.