The Great British Bake Off/Baking Show – Week 3 – Bread Recap

October 14, 2023 by
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Biscuit week had Keith going home and Tasha being deemed star baker. Week 3 is bread week – my least favorite week. I think the other weeks, at least to me, are more creative.

Signature: A cottage loaf in 2 hours and 45 minutes.

A cottage loaf is a traditional type of bread originating in England. The loaf is characterized by its shape, which is essentially that of two round loaves, one on top of the other, with the upper one being smaller.

Seed & grain cottage loaf

Bread week means Paul’s poking finger is primed and ready and the words “under proofed” will be bouncing off the sides of the white tent. The only baker that was told that their cottage loaf was nearly perfect was Tasha. Dan was criticized for his mixture not being fully incorporated into the loaf – and he replied to Paul, “I should have belled you up before hand.” Belled meaning called you up.

Darcie: Bread week always seems to be a struggle for the contestants, mostly because of the time constraints. I think the bakers would benefit from letting the mixer do the bulk of the kneading because it takes less time. I understand the desire for hand kneading because it is wonderful to feel the dough change and come alive under your fingertips, but this is a competition and time is always short.

When I saw Dana’s dough threaten to jump out of the glass mixing bowl I wondered why they cut away so quickly, and then BAM! the bowl shattered. I’m glad no one was hurt! I think Dana had the speed set too high; KitchenAid makes it clear in its manual that you aren’t supposed to go above speed 2 for kneading. None of the loaves were really standouts, and no Paul Hollywood handshakes were awarded to any of the bakers.

Cottage loaf recipes:

Technical: 8 Devonshire splits in 2 hours and 30 minutes

Devonshire splits (Paul Hollywood)


Darcie: Underproving was the common theme here as all of the bakes were deemed to have needed more time in the proving drawer. Since the bakers appeared to be working up to the last minute (although the editing probably makes the pace seem more frantic), I am not sure this challenge is possible in only 2.5 hours because the buns needed time to cool before being filled. Dan faced every baker’s nightmare of forgetting an ingredient; he left out the sugar. I did the same once, but with a cake – the result was a rubbery disk.

You could see Abbi holding back the tears during the judging. She didn’t do well in the signature and came in the bottom three in the technical; she knew she was in trouble. It’s heart-wrenching to watch because you can totally empathize with her plight and because she’s such a sweet soul.

Results: The bottom three were Dan, Rowan and Abbi and the top three were Dana, Tasha and Saku taking first.

Devonshire split recipes:

Showstopper: Plaited bread centerpiece with two different flours in 4 hours

Another disappointing challenge as the baker’s creations were beautiful but most were underproved. Tasha and Josh had good bakes.

Darcie: I found it interesting that before the start of this segment, the judges emphasized the plaiting, with Prue stating they were looking for designs that were “intricate and amazing” and Paul saying he wanted to see something and be wondering “how did they do that?” When it came time to evaluate the bakes, however, they did not seem to give the design that much weight.

Once again, it seemed like the bakers who reached for the stars were the ones who crashed and burned and those who followed the KISS principle (keep it simple, stupid) fared better. While Cristy’s wreath-in-wreath plait did not come together as she had planned, her challah and babka were highly rated for flavor and texture. Josh also created a more modest design and both Paul and Prue were impressed by the breads.

Rowan, Abbi, and Dan had highly ambitious goals but struggled to get things completed in time, with Dan having to pull his last loaves out of the oven before they were fully baked. Rowan’s towering creation contained breads that were nearly inedible, according to Paul. All three were given poor marks, although the judges liked Abbi’s flavors. Prue told Dan “we know you can do better” like a mother who was disappointed in her child.

The baker who best combined an elaborate design with excellent texture and flavor was Tasha, who was once again named star baker. Abbi was sent home, and while I wasn’t shocked that she was eliminated, I thought Rowan was more likely to be the one packing his bags. Dan was likely saved by doing well in the signature.

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7 Comments

  • Fyretigger  on  October 15, 2023

    After Tasha received the high praise from Paul “…you really understand bread,” but no handshake, I wondered if he maybe now has a “no handshakes bread week” policy.

  • KatieK1  on  October 15, 2023

    The Devonshire splits intrigue me, but Paul Hollywood’s instructions in the linked recipe are totally confounding:

    “For the dough, tip the flour into a large bowl. Add the salt and sugar on one side, the yeast on the other. Heat the milk in a small pan until warm but not hot. Add the butter and ¾ of the milk to the flour, then turn the mixture round with the fingers of one hand.”

    This sounds more like some strange ritual than a way to make sweet buns. BTW, I was expecting Dan to go home. Abbi was using cool foraged ingredients and I’m sorry not to see more of her creations.

    • Jenny  on  October 15, 2023

      KatieK1 – are the instructions any better in the other two recipes provided? I didn’t have a chance to look. I’m adding another online recipe from Waitrose and will update the post in a few minutes.

  • Fyretigger  on  October 16, 2023

    KatieK1, I’ve run into similar instructions before, regarding the placement of the ingredients in the bowl, both in recipes and on cooking shows, and it does seem very incantation-like. Intrigued, I spent part of the afternoon doing research and this is what I found.

    I started with Harold McGee, On Food and Cooking, where there was nothing about the technique of separation of ingredients.

    An internet search about the separation popped up Paul Hollywood as the #1 result, which can be summarized as “don’t let the salt touch the yeast”, here it is in his own words:
    https://www.paulhollywood.com/techniques#:~:text=Always%20put%20the%20flour%20in,three%2Dquarters%20of%20the%20water

    Another top link was King Arthur Flour, which goes into some detail about “Does Salt Kill Yeast” and debunks the myth:
    https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/blog/2023/07/05/does-salt-kill-yeast

    I suspect the separation of the salt/sugar and yeast is largely passed down folklore, and the stirring with the hands is probably just a recurrence of Paul Hollywood’s oft stated preference for using his hands to mix dough.

  • Fyretigger  on  October 17, 2023

    KatieK1, I’ve run into similar instructions before, regarding the placement of the ingredients in the bowl, both in recipes and on cooking shows, and it does seem very incantation-like. Intrigued, I spent time doing some research.

    Harold McGee, On Food and Cooking, yielded nothing about separating sugar and salt from yeast. But if you Google “salt kills yeast”, the first resulting link is to a King Arthur Baking article that debunks the myth, but putting them directly together could slow things.

    I suspect the separation of the salt/sugar and yeast is largely passed down technique/folklore, and the stirring with the hands is probably just a recurrence of Paul Hollywood’s oft stated preference for using his hands to mix dough.

  • StokeySue  on  October 17, 2023

    As someone brought up with cottage loaves in southern England I was quite surprised that shape would be used as the vehicle for unusual flavours, they were 95% crusty white loaves, sometimes small individual ones are served as the bread for a Ploughman’s Lunch with cheese and pickle. I have seen granary cottage loaves.

    As far as separating yeast from salt and sugar is concerned – if you take block of fresh baker’s yeast and sprinkle it with salt or sugar and leave it, it will turn to a mess of dead yeast eventually, but if you just put the 3 into the flour and mix at once, there shouldn’t be a problem, I think it’s a bit of a superstition – but in the case of the Devonshire Split probably a bad idea to leave them in contact with each other while you measure the butter and milk and then heat the milk. Better safe than sorry.

  • babyfork  on  October 17, 2023

    In the future, could spoilers please not be put into the headlines here? I just logged on to look for a recipe and this flashed across my screen. Now I know who’s going home before I’ve watched Bread Week. My dough has been deflated!

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