A fine mess

I watch baking/cooking shows.  Sometimes I might make something I’ve seen.  This happened most recently with Tom Kerridge’s spiced orange cake and yes, I will put this recipe online because it worked well, and was gluten free.

The thing that annoys me about these programmes is that my experience is generally nothing like the one portrayed on screen.  The finished result never looks as professional and the my process of cooking whatever it is always lacks the finesse and skill of the chef on the TV.

But my main bugbear is mess.  Nobody ever seems to tidy up mess.

Paul Hollywood is always shaking flour and icing sugar all over work surfaces but I don’t think i’ve ever seen that mess cleaned up.  When I clean up flour I end up with wallpaper paste because that’s what happens when I mix water and flour.

My floor also gets covered in flour and sugar and that is not fun to tidy up.  Do the professionals have a particular tidy up technique that I could learn?

Then there’s dough whether it’s bread or pastry that gets stuck to the work surface.  If that’s not cleaned up quickly it sticks hard and needs chipping off.

Egg whites spilled by My Hollywood’s one-handed egg cracking technique also have glue-like properties.  This is why royal icing sets rock hard - it’s because of the egg whites.  He never cleans this up.

I would like a programme where the presenter prepares ingredients, makes everything, tidies up and does the washing up.  I want to see how messy their kitchen is because I can’t believe I’m the only one to create such a disaster zone every time I venture towards the hob or oven.