Gingerbread Tower #GBBO Bake Along

Gingerbread Tower

It was traybakes and biscuits on this weeks bakeoff. The technical challenge was tuile biscuits and they looked amazing. I'd like to try making those, they were so delicate and pretty. The long pauses and panning across the contestants faces while Paul and Mary tuck into the bakes are starting to grate on me a little, the shows has lots of tension with the baking alone and it feels unnecessary, I'd rather see more of the cooking happening and there was a lot of it this week. Christine was star baker again this week with her sensational alpine biscuit clock tower, Rob had to leave this week so that only just leaves Frances and Ruby from my week one predictions to make it to the final, Ruby had a bit of a shaky week too but her showstopper flavours saved her and her exams are done now so she will have some time to practice. Frances tower collapsed before the judging but she had done enough to stay. I think we will see Kimberly in the final too, she had overdone her tuile biscuits but they still had great snap.


Star shaped biscuit cutters

The signature tray bake was a great challenge, I do have a signature cherry bakewell tray bake which I probably should have made for this bake along but I wanted to make use of these great star biscuit cutters. You stack the stars together to make a Christmas tree and as the showerstopper this week was to make a biscuit tower I thought I'd have a go at this.
I've been pushed for time this week and I didn't give this tower the four hours that the constants had and it shows. I think I broke all the bake off rules, I baked the gingerbread biscuits on two shelves which meant uneven colouring and I had no plan for the decoration and after raiding the cupboard found I didn't really have very much that I could use. at just 13 biscuits hight my tower was a bit on the short side too. I bunged on some icing which came out rather pea coloured and stuck some Smarties on. These star cutters are great to use so I'd like to come back before Christmas and make a showstopper worthy tree.

When I bake gingerbread biscuits I usually like to freeze them overnight as it helps the flavour in them develop. I do always want to eat them straight away and often wonder if the extra time of freezing them is worth it, well this bake at least prove that it is. The gingerbread tree just didn't have the depth of flavour in the biscuits.

mummy mishaps

I'm linking up with the Bloggers Bake off again this week which is hosted by Mummy Mishaps and The Crazy Kitchen, they will be continuing the Bake Along next week but I am away in Belgium so rather than baking along I'll be eating along. It's sweet tea loaves and sweet buns and a technical challenge from Paul.