‘The Great British Baking Show’: Paul Hollywood Makes Contestant Cry With Tough Criticism

[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for The Great British Baking Show, Collection 13, Week 9]

The Great British Baking Show‘s 16th season (labeled as Collection 13 on Netflix) moved into another gear this week as the four semi-finalists returned to the tent for a highly intense and emotional Patisserie Week.

As usual, judges Paul Hollywood and Prue Leith tasked the budding bakers with three challenges: the Signature, Technical, and Showstopper. For the Signature, the contestants had to make two batches of cream horns, and the warm weather added an extra layer of difficulty to their pastry creations.

Toby and Tom’s efforts were both praised for their flavors; however, Hollywood and Leith criticized the pastry itself. For Toby’s coffee-flavored and lemon horns, Leith said the pastry was “too hard,” while Tom’s raspberry cream cheese and chocolate creation was graded lower for using a short-crust pastry.

Aaron had the opposite problem, receiving credit for his pastry but criticism for his flavor choices, which included nectarine and cherry. Hollywood, who was particularly harsh in his judgments at this stage of the competition, told Aaron the flavors didn’t work together.

 

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Front-runner Jasmine, however, remained the judges’ favorite, with Leith and Hollywood praising her flaky pastry and the balance of flavors, which included coffee and chocolate in one batch and raspberry, pistachio, and white chocolate in the other.

For the Technical, the contestants had to create a Framboisier, a classic French dessert with a sugar glass dome. The task proved difficult for all four bakers, with the many elements tricky to perfect in the allotted time. The sugar domes were the major sticking point, with only Aaron managing to make one that didn’t crack or fall apart, though it didn’t quite resemble what the judges were looking for.

In the Showstopper challenge, the bakers had to create a macaron sculpture, depicting something meaningful to them. All the contestants put forward their best efforts, but the judges still weren’t completely pleased. Tom, in particular, received surprising criticism from Hollywood despite making a giant chocolate beehive hanging from a tree and covered in macarons painted yellow to look like bees.

 

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Hollywood slammed the creation, saying, “If it were chocolate week, I would accept it, but I can’t accept that when it’s a macaron challenge. The macarons look fairly flat. The painting is rudimentary, but the main thing… it’s very Tom. I understand that. You should have made [the hive] smaller and covered all of it.”

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“I feel chopped down like a tree,” an emotional Tom said before leaving the tent to cry. “It’s so lame, I can’t believe I’m crying. I just worked so hard this week on that.”

After Jasmine was awarded her fifth Star Baker title of the season, the elimination came down to Tom or Toby. And, despite Hollywood’s harsh critiques, Tom was given a reprieve. Sadly for Toby, his disastrous Technical followed by an underflavored Showstopper made him the latest baker to be eliminated from the competition.

Speaking after his elimination, Toby said, “It’s tough to comeback from serving a puddle of mousseline,” referring to his Technical blunder. “I had a good comeback today… it’s the good bits that I find hard to talk about. The best thing of being in the tent is definitely the people. The handshake was good, the Star Baker was good, but yeah, the people were the best bit.”

What did you think of this week’s episode? Did the right contestant go home? Who do you predict will win between Jasmine, Tom, and Aaron? Let us know your thoughts below.