Principles

One of my guilty pleasures is watching the Great British Baking Show. It’s delightful for a lot of reasons (British accents, pastry porn, etc.) but there are some interesting lessons, as well.

The contestants get advance notice of what they’re baking for 2 of the 3 challenges each week, and 1 of the challenges is unknown until the day of. So, for 2 of the challenges they can plan and practice. They can tweak their recipes and prepare special tools—really get things worked out ahead of time.

But something always goes a little wrong: maybe the tent is really warm that day and their stuff melts or won’t cool properly. Maybe they just get distracted and fall behind their schedule. Maybe they forget a step.

This is where it gets interesting. This is where you get to see who really understands the fundamental principles of baking and how well they understand their particular recipe and plan: How do you recover? Can you save the effort you’ve put in or do you have to start over? Do you still have time to start over? Can you ditch part of your plan in order to save the rest of it? Are there any shortcuts or substitutes that won’t ruin it?

And the first, deepest, most important principle of baking (and oh, I don’t know, everything else): don’t panic, see the situation clearly and formulate a new plan with what you’ve got.