Oven ready
Mix 12 chefs and 4 judges in a Covid-proof hotel for six weeks and the Great British Bake Off is...
GREAT British Bake Off judge Prue Leith says the bubble created in Essex for this year’s series was “the safest place” to be amid the pandemic.
For six weeks, Down Hall Hotel became home to all the cast, crew, judges, staff and cleaners, quarantined together in one big bubble.
Prue, 80, said the result was a programme that will look and feel normal when it airs later this month.
She said: “Honestly, I ended up thinking this is the safest place in the whole of England. All 130 people, which included the hotel staff... we all had been tested to death. So when we were in the tent, we were allowed to behave absolutely freely.”
This year’s contestants include a 20-year-old badminton ace, a 61-year-old retirement team leader, a sculptor who lost a leg in a motorbike accident and a music teacher.
Judge Paul Hollywood, 54, said he had encountered some of the best baking ever on the show.
He added: “For the first time, I put a bit of weight on this year.”
Executive producer Kieran Smith told the Radio Times that filming had been “hugely liberating” for new host Matt Lucas, who had “barely been out” before filming.
Of Noel Fielding, he added: “Noel felt a lot happier in the bubble than he did in the real world.
“He’d pretty much been shielding in one location for several months, so the ability to walk in a green space and be able to talk to people face to face was liberating.”