..to think that in the Bake Off semi final...

[SealSong]

There should be a better standard of baking. So much bad pastry!

I'm unimpressed.

Very silly but also quite fun... Selasi

Can't believe no one has mentioned candices gorgeous red dress!

There is only one question this week:

Where is Candices dress from??

Sealsong - - loving that link. Loving Selasi. not sure I'll even bother to watch the final

Candice is just irritating with the permanent pout. I presume some bloke told her it looked sexy once and it's become her default facial expression.
They had 4 hours to make 36 fondant fancies and they still looked rubbish. If you can't bake 36 small cakes in 4 hours you should stick to Mr Kipling.
They all tried to do too much with too many different flavours and exotic fillings rather than making them look and taste good. Faffing on is for when you have mastered the basics.
I didn't fancy making any of this week's cakes, they all looked more trouble than they were worth.

I just found Selasi irritating. He looked totally out of his depth in the bits of it I watched. I find Andrew the most interesting baker.

Four hours is ludicrous to bake and ice that kind of cake, even Mary admitted you need to leave them overnight. And there's no reason they couldn't have been allowed to leave them overnight (they've done similar before), it's just about artificially creating drama.

Article : waterfordwhispersnews.com/2016/09/13/great-british-bake-off-moves-to-hbo-will-have-grittier-tone-nudity/

Ah, I'm really surprised to see all the criticism of Bake Off here, this is the first year I've watched more than odd snatches of it and I'm totally hooked! As for them not being great bakers - I wish I was half as good. I was very sad to see Rav, Benjamina and Selasi go, now Andrew is my favourite, but I don't think he'll win.

Luckystars

I would DEFINITELY watch that!

Thing is Jane even pointed out that if you took 5 minutes decorating each one then that's 3 hours gone already. It was an impossible task to do to a high standard.

It's obvious Candace pouts to hide her teeth because she's self-conscious. Shame on the women shaming her for it!

But what about Candice's dress? Or should I post in S&B?!

"They had 4 hours to make 36 fondant fancies and they still looked rubbish. If you can't bake 36 small cakes in 4 hours you should stick to Mr Kipling."

So, given that they had to preheat oven, make the cake batter, bake the cake (40 minutes according to Mary Berry's recipe), let it cool (10 minutes and then either leave out to cool completely at room temperature or put in the freezer for several minutes according to MB) and cut it precisely into identical sized squares so that's at least an hour and a quarter gone, even if their ovens can heat up in ten minutes, which mine can't before they could even start decorating, how long would it have taken you per cake to fill them, coat them evenly and neatly with buttercream on four sides (after which you should chill them in the fridge for 20 minutes according to MB), put marzipan (or what ever you were using) on top, dip or pour evenly with fondant and then decorate the top, 2rebecca?

Plus Mary said that with fondant fancies, the sponge is best left over night for easier carving

I would have done less fancy ones, just one type of cake and fewer bits. they can still make stuff whilst the cake is cooking and cooling and fan ovens don't take long to warm up.

But that wasn't the rules rebecca

They HAD to do 36. They HAD to do two different types and if it was too simple they would have been laughed out

I bet Candice doesn't even know she "pouts", or at least didn't until several thousand people on the internet decided to point it out.

Lots of us have funny little facial expressions we're barely aware of, often rising from awkwardness or self-consciousness - as Zoe Turtle says, she might be trying to hide her teeth.

I wish people on Mumsnet could refrain from being quite so judgemental. I realise that this is as forlorn a hope as wishing the Daily Mail would stop attacking immigrants.

I was saying something similarto my Mum yesterday, I was wondering if they had been given less time this year. I would much prefer them to be given more time and to create stuff that makes my jaw drop! Hopefully with the extra 17.5 million quid, they can afford to film over three days in the future.

She has been less present this year because a family member passed away during the time they were filming.

It's obvious Candace pouts to hide her teeth because she's self-conscious.

I agree, but it's still bloody annoying! She's constantly licking her lips and gurning, it's distracting.

I don't like the Candice hatred either...I really like her. She is also fab at putting down some of the Twitter trolls abusing her. Go Candice I say.

In fairness, rather than "Candice is forever pouting/making double entendres" and so on we should of course be saying "the producers only ever show Candice when she's pouting/making double entendres".

I don't like her bakes. I didn't even like the gingerbread pub.

Okay, here's a non-gurning complaint about Candice: she always brings in some utter wankery to display her bakes on. Ornate mirrors, vintage scales, some grate you cook fish on over a fire which I thought was a wastepaper basket

It makes me roll my eyes.

"Okay, here's a non-gurning complaint about Candice: she always brings in some utter wankery to display her bakes on."

Lots of Bake-Off bakers do this, don't they?

It's obvious Candace pouts to hide her teeth because she's self-conscious. Shame on the women shaming her for it!

How about shame on the woman implying she's got bad teeth?

I think her teeth are fine!