What sitting bull

HIGHLIGHTS from Great British Bake Filth Off’s debut Botanical/ It needs to be Week. Candice: ““I would nice and thick.” Rav: a bit stiffer.” have liked it to be so wet.” And Andrew: “Mine is put Benjamina: “I wouldn’t No, steam in my focaccia.” up don’t. You can end in an STI clinic. FORGET the perennial non-event that is Judges’ Houses.

There was still a bitter taste in the mouth last night lingering over from Sunday’s Six Chair Challenge.

In fact you’d have to look long and hard in X Factor’s archives to find anything more unedifying.

Act after act was made to beg for a seat, a grossly unacceptable way to treat people, and it needs to be ditched to spare contestants the ritual public humiliation.

Not least because they’ve started choosing singers for Judges’ Houses behind closed doors anyway.

Dithering Louis Walsh was practically ordered by Simon Cowell to reverse his decision and reinstate talentless fame-cravers Ottavio & Bradley as this year’s “comedy” act. It’s not just Louis, though. Each judge has been handed a wildcard from the reject pile, decided off-camera of course, including Yes Lad, who Simon Cowell told: “It’s feeling very old-fashioned boyband,” which, it won’t surprise you to hear, was followed immediately by Louis: “I am going to give you a seat.”

And rapper parody Honey G replaced Ivy Grace Parades, who couldn’t attend Judges’ Houses because of visa issues, despite not getting a chair in the first place and ahead of more deserving cases, like Marianna Zappi.

It’s cruel, unfair and crudely engineered. Everything, then, that cockle- warming Strictly Come Dancing isn’t.

I can’t think of a TV moment I’ve ever looked forward to more than former Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls dancing the Charleston last night.

Between him, Judge Rinder and Tameka Empson we have a vintage series in the making.

Not that it’s without its faults. The continued presence of the Tess “They’re on their feet” Daly parrot is a mystery.

Unfortunate X Factor habits are creeping in – Daisy Lowe’s dead grandad sob story and the ITV show’s vocabulary: “It’s a journey.” “You’re what Strictly is all about.” And everyone is at pains to stress how none of the celebs have relevant dance backgrounds, when the presence of so many career performers like Anastacia, Louise Redknapp, Will Young and Danny Mac expose the very obvious lack of an equal starting point.

In fact the biggest surprise is that the one ex-dance teacher among the line-up, Melvin Odoom, seems unable to dance.

But it’s the little touches that really make Strictly, such as Claudia Winkleman giving baby-faced AJ Pritchard toddler toys and colouring books. Genius.

So let’s hope the X Factor moments are consigned to ITV, where desperate Rebekah Ryan was last seen being asked by Sharon Osbourne: “Are you ready to deliver for us?” Rebekah: “I’ve got to do it.” Great. So that’s one Pepperoni Passion for Simon, a Hawaiian for Louis and the Meat Feast for Nicole. SPARE a thought and light a candle at this difficult time for JLS’s Aston Merrygold, who completely wimped out of Celebrity Island With Bear Grylls. “I’m better off in a studio writing songs and