tl;dr: Tonight was a new 1-hour Kids Baking Championship where a bunch of bakers returned. My fricking DVR cut off just as Duff said "And the winner isssssss-------!" I'm dying to know who won.

Tonight was one of those 1-hour rematches. They were giving away an enormous prize package. The returning bakers included Oscar the talented baker with 2 Moms from Berkeley with dyed blonde hair (but was weirdly arrogant--now has black shoe-polish hair and is a large diffident 14 year old) as well as Marcie(?) the tiny girl 7-year-old, who cried when she made myriad mistakes and had to have her Mom pick her up and rock her like a baby--who is no longer bright-eyed and bushy-tailed but now sardonic and jaded---and 2 other girls who were very nice but consistently made too sweet, sloppy cakes.

None of them made any masterpieces. Oscar was sort of half-assing it and rolling his eyes and pursing his lips a lot, Marcie vacillated between smart-assed, trying to be adorable, and frantic, and the 2 nice girls were nice and I was rooting for one of them to win--tho, like the others, their work was about C+ compared to other super talented kids in the past.

But who won?

Like in BBF and ToC for example. How is it possible that they make such complex dishes?

I dislike the baking competitions. They are a snooze fest. All other competitions are decent but the baking ones are always on during the winter months and they suck

im trying to find a show i watched about a month or two ago!! i don't remember the name of the show or the chef and its driving me crazy! it had a very 80s/90s vibe to it, i think the thumbnail for it had the 80/90s shapes and squiggles (if you know what i mean lol). its hosted by a black male chef on the younger side, probably early 30s is my guess and i think he wore glasses? the show had three recipes shown in one episode, it had a main meal big enough for a couple people and then the middle recipe was a cocktail and the last recipe was a meal for one sometimes made out of the leftovers from the first meal. im pretty certain i watched it on hulu but it could have also been netflix or peacock. i really liked the show as it was calming so hopefully someone knows it!

Was watching a repeat of S36 E4 - Winter’s Finest. Sunny is making an Upside-Down Plum Spice Cake. It originally aired in March ‘24

Katie Lee says “I didn’t know that plums were winter.” Sunny responds, “All stone fruits are really best in the winter.”

What? WHAT? 🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️

Katie, Geoffrey and Jeff were trying to keep their faces straight. They really should’ve figured out a way to edit that out

I can’t stand it when they revolve an entire episode around a sponsored “product”/ brand. For example, last week’s Holiday Wars episode theme was a “Moana Christmas Party”. My kids aren’t little anymore and they’re both boys so I’m not familiar with Moana and even if I was-I don’t care. Other shows have done this as well. Spring Baking had an episode with Trolls, Summer Baking had a Barbie bake and Halloween Baking had an Adam’s Family bake. I KNOW there’s more-I just can’t recall them all. I don’t like it when they do it-that’s the point of this rant.

This week's episode theme is to dream up Mrs. Claus's ultimate night out on the town. The tasting episode is a classic cocktail flavor (Assigned at random at their benches) The skill spotlight requires one specialty, cake sugar or cookie to be put front and center in the design. This week's spotlight is on the cookie artist. Each display must display one character entirely out of cookie.

Teams: Candy Cane Crushers does Mrs. Claus and her bestie at a bar riding a mechanical bull. They are the only team making Mrs. Claus out of cookie. Their flavor is the classic cosmo.

Mistle Toe Mavericks is doing Mrs. Claus at a spa day. Their flavor is the whiskey sour.

The Sleighmates does Mrs. Claus doing street car racing. Their tasting flavor is champagne.

Snow Good does Mrs. Claus at the casino. Their flavor is Espresso Martini. Their cookie artist is ill and cookie artist Mitzi Torgensen is filling in. She's making a giant cookie penguin.

Merry Mixers does Mrs. Claus at a wine tasting. They're coming off two wins in a row. Their flavor is a negroni cocktail. Jake on the team burns his hand on hot isomalt. Medic thinks it is a 2nd degree burn but he continues to work.

SPOILERS from here on out:

The top two teams are Snow Good and Candy Cane Crushers. The winning team is Candy Cane Crushers with the mechanical bull ride. The bottom teams are Merry Mixers and Sleigh Mates. The team going home is sleigh mates. Which is sad, as their cookie element I thought was gorgeous and that was supposed to be a big factor. I'm a little disappointed. I didn't care for the mechanical bull ride, and full expected the casino to win. What did you think?

They are always so supportive of each other, and rarely a negative comment is made. Clearly every dish isn’t worthy of the gushing they do.

I’m thinking it would be fun if just for one episode, the others actually JUDGED the dishes each one of them puts out? Like Chopped-type nitpicky judging.

That you’re actually made, is easy and can be made if a muffin pan?

Marked spoiler because I didn’t want someone to accidentally be spoiled from comments. I’ve been trying to figure out who’s going to be on Tournament of Champions 6 since I know it’s already filmed. If anyone has spoilers please comment them!

Used to watch a few episodes that were available on YouTube,but they have been purged.

Seems weird to me since the show was not that big? Plenty of shows like Kitchen Nightmares have full episodes available on YouTube.

Anywhere where I could get the show? Even Max doesn't have everything.

Please DM if that's your preference.

Did anyone else appreciate the blind judging during the preheat on Holiday Baking Championship? I’ve been hoping for a blind judging. I didn’t expect the critical feedback would be as candid as it was, since the judges usually try to help the bakers remain positive no matter what they present. I really do hope they do more blind judging.

That is all…

Check title card when Scott starts his battle in Bobby Flay Holiday

I've been binging cooking shows recently and saw the ads for harry potter. I was never really a huge fan of the books, but I tried watching some episodes and it's honestly really interesting. Maybe it's just the season, but seeing the fun cakes & sweets decorated to fit the whimsical vibe is rlly comforting for staying inside. I wonder what others think of the series?

I still despise his corniness & jewels but he got me in the feels on the Buddy show seen last night. My bff has a sister with Downs who I adore passionately. She’s been in my life since I was 10 & she 7. She’s the funniest person ever & we talk a couple time a week. She cons me into bringing her candy & whatever. I cannot imagine life without her. She watched the show too & told me; Nice for them but I’m too busy for all that.. Ok Mo.

You kids were right & I was wrong. ☮️

We are down to five teams, and they are competing in Diagon Alley. (The set of the alley is very cool). As part of the challenge they must pay homage to a particular shop in the alley. However, they must make 50 handheld creations instead of one big showpiece. The "design shop" will make their display table to each team's request. A dessert must have on interactive element.

In addition to feeding the judges, they will be feeding a diehard group of Harry Potter super fans. The fans will choose the winning team who will receive an advantage. They have six hours to make the 50 treats, and their assigned shop is found at their station.

Last week's winning team get their advantage. They can freeze out a member of all the teams for 10 minutes at any time.

Team Mitzi and Lisa get Weasley's Wizard Wheezes joke shop. They are making chattering teeth and a yo yo. Elizabeth and Juan, last episode's winners get Quality Quidditch Supplies. They are making 50 golden snitches with wings. Zoe and Jordan get Flourish and Blotts book store so they are making a variety of miniature edible books. Hemu and Ricardo get the Ollivander's Wand Shop. They are making an edible wand box. Miko and Chris get Potage's Cauldron Shop. They are making chocolate bubbles and logs petits gateaux.

Elizabeth and Juan use their advantage. They freeze one member of each team for 10 minutes. Pretty much all the cake experts sat out while the pastry chefs continued to work. The nice thing about this advantage is it was used to equally disadvantage all the teams at once, they weren't picking one team to penalize.

AFter time the chefs take their desserts to the Diagon Alley set. I must say some of the displays created by the show's design shop are really nice. I could see it being easy for a fan to be influenced by the display builds in addition to the food itself.

SPOILER ---- the fan favorites are Zoe and Jordan and Elizabeth and Juan. The team that won, won by one vote. And it was Elizabeth and Juan with the golden snitch. So that's two wins in a row for this powerhouse team. To be fair, I feel like they got the easiest assignment as a little snitch is perfect for something like this. But it still was pretty amazing. The fans selected the winner. The fans leave as the bottom teams are announced and Hemu and Ricardo are the team that are going home.

What did you think of the challenge?

Okay, so I'm rewatching TOC 1, and during B Dub and the Champ's duel, it seems like Brooke didn't get every plate where it belongs before the time ran out. There is also weird editing around that time. Am I crazy? Has this been discussed? Should she have been disqualified or penalized? I'm even a bit of a Brooke fangirl so I'm not pitchforking. Did anyone else notice this?

I kinda want them on a show competition together. They all suffer from overcomplicated dishes, far fetched ideas and time management issues

I’ll start the list with Chris Petroni and his cranberry carbonara monstrosity

The “cash” on Wildcard Kitchen is labeled “For Motion Picture Use Only”, is also labeled as “Copy”, and has identical serial numbers. I get they may not want to carry that kind of cash around, but maybe not make it so obvious?

Monday is the kids baking championship holiday special

I was greeted with Eric and Selina blending bananas to add to grits. What kind of f*ery is that?

She said her daughter wouldn’t share her recipe with her!

This one is Kardea’s grandma’s recipe plus some decadent additions 🔥🔥 including cream cheese!! I would love to see their reaction to it.

https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/super-decadent-mac-and-cheese-9831363

All I can remember is that I book marked a favorite on my food network app. It was a women chef and she talks about how she’s surprised that instant Mac and cheese is so popular that regular Mac and cheese is so easy to make also talks about using whole milk and not skimping by using 2% help please anyone ?

The third episode of BBF Holiday Throwdown is here with host Carson Kressley. Guest chefs are Tiffani Faison, Tiffany Derry and Scott Conant. Always my favorite show of the winter holiday season. What did you think of it?

The season is great but the prize amount (specifically the weekly challenge) seems relatively low and frankly insignificant. I think $2500 should be the bare minimum for a major network holiday show. Anyone else agree?

(edit: sorry for not using "too" above.) I've been catching up on The PW, and keep getting smacked in the face with how expensive her recipes are these days! For example, on a show about entertaining "for less," she made beef bourguignon. I was trying to do a running tally for that dish alone and came up to around $50, and I was trying to be generous in my estimates. Then the last few episodes I watched, she make two kinds of kebabs- one with ribeye AND strip steak, and a second with shrimp and scallops. For the same meal. The next episode she made a huge prime rib just for her and Ladd. Now I am aware they have a cattle ranch, but we don't, right? These cuts of beef are among the most expensive meats you can buy today. When I eat beef, it's of the ground variety, lol. Also, I know it's for flair but she puts fresh herbs in everything. That is something else I just cannot afford these days. Anyway, wondered if anyone else noticed the same thing, or if none of you expect Ree to be relatable anymore.