Friday, January 13, 2012

Cake Boss: Next Great Baker: You Can't Go Right

by Amy K. Bredemeyer

When the customer doesn't know what she wants, it's very difficult to deliver something that will impress them. When I got married, I had an idea of what I wanted and it was fairly difficult to impress me! I liked the interaction between the competitors in this episode. I expect that we'll see Melo go home soon, then Megan. After that it may depend on the challenge, as I could see Marissa going toward the end, but she could also go next episode if there are problems on whichever team she's on next. I'm happy to see Heather G go, as she was originally pretty average, but became annoying and useless pretty quickly. At this point I'm afraid to latch onto Nadine, as I imagine that the camera is making us like her but she'll end up getting wiped at some point, even though her work continues to amaze. I guess we'll just have to wait and see!


Cake Boss: The Next Great Baker "Here Comes the Bride-zilla!" (S02E07): 
Baker's Challenge: It's a piping challenge, which makes Heather G happy, but Melo... notsomuch. Megan mentions that she's learned piping from watching Cake Boss. [well, me, too, to a certain extent, LoL.] Buddy demonstrates his work for a while, then says that they need to show off their techniques in thirty minutes. The best one will get an advantage - to decide which team they'll work with. We see Buddy watch the competitors throughout out eh challenge. [this is fun.] Heather G does frilly, over-piped wedding cakes... she's spent 22 hours on a single cake's piping before! Ryan's never done lattice work or drop lines, and his work isn't up to par. Melo cramps and shakes and nearly knocks over his cake. Buddy tells Melo that his is pretty bad, and it looks like it was done with his feet. [ouch!] Buddy says that he expected a lot more from Heather G. [agreed.] Buddy tells Megan that her cake needs work, especially with lattices. Chad showed different techniques that were neat, accurate, and clean. He tells Nadine that her work is really nice, too. Great accuracy and lots of different techniques. Marissa's looks good, nice and simple scrolls, a little more work needs to be done with lattice work. Ryan & Melo are at the bottom, and the winner is Nadine, who was expecting Chad to win.[I would have put Chad in second, personally. perhaps Buddy felt the same.]

Elimination Challenge: The two losers are today's captains. [this should be rich!] Melo picks Heather G. Ryan chooses Marissa. Melo takes Chad. Megan heads over to Ryan by default. Nadine chooses to work with Melo, Heather, and Chad. The person on the winning team who goes above and beyond will win a trip for two to Italy, sponsored by Fodor's. They have eight hours to create a wedding cake, where a bride (and her maid-of-honor) is the client. Each team's captain gets five minutes with the bride and MOH. Chad is uncomfortable with Melo being the only one who talks to the client. [I might be as well. it is an awkward position to be in, having to make a cake but not being able to speak with the client.] Melo starts by asking her her vision. Melo learns that the bride doesn't want round, no pearls, no traditional, no lace. She likes triangles but not pyramids, and fuschia is good... bright but not cartoony. Then, the girls talk to Ryan, who asks about the color of the bridesmaids' dresses first. She tells him that she doesn't want flowers, no pearls, no doilies, no circles. She likes "fun shapes," and wants the cake to be a story of the bride and groom's relationship of ten years. Neither guy is very happy with how the consultation went.

tlc.com
Team Ryan: Ryan [30, RI, former electrician] wants to do a design that is pretty busy and has satellite cakes as well. It's not long before he and Marissa [24, Pompton Lakes, NJ, culinary school background.] butt heads, which stems from the fact that Marissa isn't sure that Ryan is confident in what he's doing. [probably a good reason, though I'm not sure if that was the case.] We see Megan [38, Pittsburgh, a paramedic] working on the cake here and there, but she's not a focus of this team. The bride comes in and doesn't like the top part, so they trash it. [that's got to be so rough to hear!] Marissa asks the bride some questions, like what other colors she wants.They start working on a topsy-turvy cake, but Marissa and Ryan continue to clash. [where'd that purple come from? is it supposed to be the fuschia? because Melo heard that, not Ryan.] Megan really likes it the end result, and Ryan thinks it looks artsy, like the bride wants. 

Team Carmelo: Melo [42, Worcester, MA, retired cop.] comes up with the idea to do an off-set, striped, tall cake. They make about thirty pounds of navy fondant, even though Melo doesn't think that Chad [43, Dallas, HS basketball coach, works at a bakery] is good with fondant. The bride doesn't like she she's seeing, so Heather G. [31, Knoxville, pregnant, bakes cakes from her home] tries to figure out the problem. She asks if she likes stripes, and the bride says no. The bigger problem, however, is that the cake is the wrong color blue, which makes the bride cry. Nadine [27, NYC] gives some ideas to the group, and Melo goes with them, but he knows that he's losing control. Chad makes more fondant and Heather G is reduced to making tons and tons of triangles. Melo didn't like their cake, as it wasn't clean, but life goes on.

TLC/Walling McGarity
When the elevator is out of order, the teams have to bring the cakes up two flights of stairs. Frankie, Mary, Buddy, the bride, and the MOH are the only people there... turns out, the whole thing was staged - both girls were actresses! [I thought I saw this coming at one point, but I wasn't sure...] Ryan's cake has no triangles, but Melo's is saturated with them... to the point that it looked like a bag of tortilla chips was thrown on there. [I laughed at that comment.] Melo's cake looks sloppy, plus it was too traditional for that bride (according to Mary), who steamrolled Melo (according to Buddy). Mary says that Ryan's cake was better, in her opinion. Frankie liked the whimsy, fun, and cleanness. Buddy says that Ryan handled the bride better. [probably very true.] The side pieces (aka satellite cakes) helped fit what she wanted. Marissa says that Ryan was difficult to work with, and Ryan points out that she went against him, and he was the leader. Regardless, their cake wins in the end. [it was a neat cake, though really not what I'd imagine at a wedding!] Ryan gets to go to Italy, since Buddy felt he was a leader, read the bride, and had the hardest job. This leads to Marissa being a bit of a sore loser in the lounge. [omg, really? this isn't high school.] For the other team, Chad says that Melo was a shaky leader. Heather G says that Nadine rose to the occasion. Chad says Heather G was the weakest link. Melo agrees, as she focused on busywork. Heather G disagrees, saying she needed to step up to what the design required. [the design may have needed a thousand triangles, but she didn't have to be the one making ALL of them!] Chad and Nadine stay because they stepped up. Heather argues that she doesn't want to go home and be told that she "can't do this" because she's a mother. It becomes a case of bad leader vs. busywork, and although Buddy sees potential in both of them, he sends Heather G home, but not before she gives out a bunch of hugs. [that part was awkward to me.] She thanks everyone, as she was the one who was "voted in" to the competition. 

Next week, it sounds like TWO people are going home!
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