My Netflix subscription’s sole reason for being opened this past October with a hot pink tent, a floating Alison Hammond, and, of course, a few awful American accents. It was a play on Greta Gerwig’s Barbie, and it made me laugh.
And so began the 2024 season of the Great British Baking Show.
In the midst of my grad school applications and homework, I inhaled the season, joking with my friends about contestant’s flavors and Noel’s outfits, and rooting obsessively for a certain young man who flavored his rolls with gochujang during bread week. But when the season ended, followed by my college career, I found myself twiddling my thumbs and wondering one thing:
The first season of Bake Off offered on Netflix is season 5. Where are the other four, and how different are they from the Netflix production?
Lucky for you, I found them, and I watched the first season of the show to ever air (in one week). Here’s what I learned.
The only casting overlap between the first season and 2024’s is Paul Hollywood, boasting the same uber-dark tan and brooding, thumbs-in-his-belt-loops presence. Joining him was Lady Mary Berry, a tiny cookery writer with bright white hair and a kind smile, who, I soon learned, was not afraid to put the baking king in his place. (Without spoiling, the two judges argue for five hours during the final episode.)
Joining them are, of course, our two hosts Mel Giedroyc and Sue Perkins, and here is where things began to feel deeply different from the Netflix configuration. While I love Noel Fielding and Alison Hammond, with their brightly colored outfits and falling-off-work-bench shenanigans, I’ve always felt that the job they do is pretty minimal. However, though Mel and Sue do not disappoint for wild outfits (though perhaps that was simply the nature of the 2000s), they are more obviously important in a different way.
When the first bake—ever—in the the tent is announced (a signature cake of any kind) and the work of introducing each of the bakers is complete, imagine my surprise when Sue Perkins suddenly whisks the camera away to Oxfordshire to ask a scholar about what he calls “sexy bread:” cake.
But Sue doesn’t stop there. She visits a social historian to ask about why we feel bad eating cake, and off we go learning again about Great British history while the new contestants are baking away at their signature challenge.
And oddly enough, this sort of social historical exploration continues through the entire season. Mel and Sue teach us about making puddings in sheep’s stomachs, about how sugar trade affected biscuit production in Glasgow, and about Queen Victoria and her pride in her wedding cake.
Among other surprises from this show, this one impressed me the most. I expected a disparity in video quality, a lower level of competition, and a younger Paul Hollywood. I didn’t expect, however, to finish the season feeling as if Netflix has dropped a part of the show that may have been really quite good for its viewers.
Of course the educational asides are—maybe—a bit boring and, of course, that is a capital sin in our entertainment industry as it exists today. And, even without said asides, I loved 2024’s season of Bake Off. But how much am I missing by never getting pulled out of my entertainment? How much stronger of a baker could I be if I knew what the history of a ganache was?
Sorry, I am, a little bit, kidding. It’s not about the bakes at all. It’s about knowing our history and about how the church of the 17th century banned cake baking and caused food guilt in thousands of people for hundreds of years because they fell into some of the same pitfalls of legalism our churches fall into today. It’s about massive shows of wealth at the expense of the colonized and about monetizing that which used to be a staple of daily life for the poor.
I don’t mean to call the entertainment industry anti-progressive (though, maybe I do). I am simply surprised to say that I feel as if I missed out. And I’m glad I watched that first season, with all its outdated hairstyles, blazers over graphic tees, and messy home bakes. If nothing else, it made me try baking scones for the first time.
