By Matthew Mohan-Hickson

Copyright scotsman

Spoilers for The Great British Bake Off series 16 episode 2 and the season so far to follow. Don’t read if you haven’t watched the episode from September 9. The Great British Bake Off is back and unfortunately we’ve had to wave goodbye to yet another baker. Channel 4 pulled the latest season of the beloved show out of the oven last week and will be serving up a slice each week this autumn. After being introduced to a new batch of 12 amateurs a week ago, Hassan became the first to depart the tent. Recap what happened in last Tuesday’s episode here. Following-up cake week, it was crunch time in the kitchen this week as the bakers faced three biscuit-based challenges. Unfortunately, it was the last trip into the tent for one of the contestants. Recap what happened in The Great British Bake Off this week. Including the latest departure: Final warning: spoilers for The Great British Bake Off series 16 episode 2 to follow. Don’t read if you haven’t watched the episode yet. Nadia struggled in the signature bake, with her biscuits being under-baked and the judges felt she needed more matcha. Plenty of the other baker’s had struggles with their biscuits with Prue remarking that “most” were under-baked. Pui Man’s design left a bit to be desired, but the flavour came through. She also had a bit of a nightmare time in the technical challenge with her hobnobs looking a tad worse for wear, if we are being honest. Despite her feedback in the first challenge, Nadia bounced back in the technical, and came in second place. However, Pui Man was left in last place with Leighton in 10th place. Speaking before the showstopper, the judges identified Pui Man, Aaron, and Leighton as potentially being at risk. With Prue saying Pui Man would have to ‘nail’ the final challenge to save herself. She certainly had plenty of ambition for the showstopper, aiming to create a ‘floating restaurant’ inspired by her life in Hong Kong. Her design at least managed to keep its shape, unlike some of the others. Nadia suffered a biscuit disaster as one of her biscuit walls cracked, while Aaron also had trouble assembling it. However, despite that, her showstopper impressed when it came to taste. Leighton’s biscuits were called a bit ‘wet’ by the judges. Toby was told his biscuit was ‘boring’ and told it was ‘style over substance’ – eek. In the end, it was Leighton who became the second person to leave the bake off tent. The full list of bakers who have departed the show so far after week two includes: Hassan – week 1 Leighton – week 2 The first star baker of the season went to Nataliia, after she impressed across the three challenges in cake week. It was a blank slate once again, and the race was wide open after the signature challenge. Pretty much all of the bakers got the same feedback in the first challenge, as the judges found most of the biscuits to be on the under-baked side. Fortunately, there were still two more challenges to impress in. Toby once again won the technical bake, making it two out of two so far. He is becoming quite the technical king, at least in the early weeks. Nadia was second in the challenge, while Nataliia found herself in third place again. Would it be two star bakers in a row for the Ukrainian-born baker? Prue and Paul highlighted Jasmine and Tom as having impressed, prior to the showstopper. However, it was all to play for with the last challenge of biscuit week. Plenty of the bakers managed to impress, with Prue declaring that Jasmine’s future might be in ‘biscuits’. Jessika pulled off something the judges had ‘never seen before’. The judges labelled Tom’s design ‘faultless’ at least from a design point of view. Fortunately, he backed it up with the taste, and it was declared ‘beautiful’ by Prue. He also managed to secure the first Hollywood handshake of the season. Earlier in the episode, Alison Hammond had claimed the judge had ‘messed up’ by not giving him one the week before. Unsurprisingly he won star baker! It was biscuit week in the tent and unfortunately for the bakers that didn’t mean they could simply enjoy dunking a digestive into a cuppa. They had to take on the usual gauntlet of tricky tests set by Paul and Prue. First up was the signature bake and the amateurs had to come up with a ‘slice and bake’. It resulted in some pretty delicious looking creations – good thing I’d had dinner before the episode, or it might have been rumbling. The slice and bake biscuits had to feature an image inside, and once cut open it should have revealed the picture. For the technical challenge, they had to produce a classic chocolate Hobnob. Matt’s hot take corner: hobnobs are among the worst biscuits, F tier for sure. It was not just making the biscuits they had to contend with, they had to get the correct amount of caramel. Plus there was the challenge of feathering at the end. Finally they had to recreate their favourite mementos out of biscuit in the showstopper. It proved to be crunch time for one of the bakers, unfortunately. The Great British Bake Off will be back next Tuesday (September 16) with another episode. The show starts at 8pm weekly on Channel 4. If you love TV, check out our Screen Babble podcast to get the latest in TV and film.