Showing posts with label "Great British Bake Off". Show all posts
Showing posts with label "Great British Bake Off". Show all posts

Wednesday, August 31, 2016

One Writer's Obsession

by Sybil Johnson

A discussion has been ongoing here on Type M about crafting a novel. I don’t have anything to add so I’m going to talk about one of my current obsessions instead: The Great British Bake Off. Or the Great British Baking Show as it’s called when it airs here in the U.S. I don’t really know why they changed the title for the U.S. market. I know what a “bake off” is. I suspect a lot of other Americans do too. Book titles are often changed when they cross the pond, so I guess this is another example of that.

I love, love, love this show. Can’t get enough of it. It’s great fun to see people engage in friendly competition, bonding over baking, creating tasty treats with all-purpose flour, cake flour, bread flour... But, wait! What’s this? They don’t mention any of those in the show. Apparently, in Britain it’s strong flour, plain flour, soft flour...

Since I’m a naturally curious person, I looked these things up. It seems here in the U.S. we talk about flour based on what it’s usually used for, baking cakes or bread or for general purpose baking, while in Britain they talk about how much protein or gluten is in a flour. In the following, what it’s called in the U.S. is on the right of the equal sign, what it’s called in Britain is on the left. Here’s what I learned:

cake or pastry flour = soft flour
all-purpose flour = plain flour
bread flour = strong flour or hard flour
self-rising flour = self-raising flour
whole-wheat flour = wholemeal flour

These are rough equivalents. I did see a discussion online where someone from the U.K. noted that the plain flour there which is available to the home baker is not exactly equivalent to our all-purpose flour. If these are wrong, feel free to correct me.

And then there’s sugar. They kept on referring to caster sugar and icing sugar. I figured caster sugar is what I call granulated sugar or just sugar. The web tells me that’s not totally correct. Apparently, caster sugar is superfine, finer than granulated. Icing sugar is powdered sugar.

And then there’s the kinds of things they bake, many of which I’ve either never heard of or only having a passing acquaintance with. I now know what Victoria sponge, spotted dick, plum pudding all are. Though it’s strange for me to see puddings that are sliced.

I’m also still a bit confused about terminology. Maybe some of you readers can help me out here. First, there’s biscuit. Based on what I’ve seen on the show, I get the feeling that what we call cookies and crackers here in the U.S. are both referred to as biscuits in the U.K. Is that correct? And what about puddings? Is that a general term for desserts in the U.K.? Inquiring minds what to know.

I like baking myself though I’m not nearly at the level of these contestants. My favorite thing to do is play around with cheesecake recipes. I also enjoy checking out new recipes and techniques on websites. One of the contestants from season 1 of GBBO, Ruth Clemens, has a web page called The Pink Whisk. Great fun to wander around in.

Well, that’s enough about my GBBO obsession. What about you all? What are current obsessions?