Prove It

With the autumnal TV season upon us, I really need to get into gear to wrap up and talk about the shows I watched over the summer. I've got one episode left of a massive cultural hit that I will have some...contrary opinions about. For today, though, let's talk about an old favorite. The other shows might get rolled into a single post, but something as special as The Great British Baking Show deserves a space of its own.

Any regular reader already knows how I feel about this show, but for the uninitiated, I think it's the best show in recent history, and when it entered my life, it skyrocketed to the top of my favorites list. There are metric tons of both food shows and reality shows on the air, but none of the others come close to capturing the warm, life-affirming tone this show does. You can even listen to a friend and I wax rhapsodic over it if you like.

If you follow the show at all, you know that nothing good lasts forever, and the better something is, the more you'd better treasure it while it exists. We'll get to that momentarily, though. For now, let's talk about this most recent season. As far as the general structure goes, it was as fantastic as ever. Beautiful photography, engaging contestants, good challenge design, fair judging, fun hosts... You've heard it all from me before, and nothing's changed. The initial contestant pool was perhaps not as stacked with intriguing personalities as in seasons past, but once we got down to the final handful, I was as in love with the bakers as I always am. Early standouts included Flora, who often sacrificed flavor for ornate decoration, Paul the prison warden who struggled in early challenges but consistently nailed the Showstopper, and Mat, the adorable fireman. The final three were also an intriguing bunch. Ian was inventive, Nadiya was intensely-focused, and Tamal was a wizard with flavors. Oh, and on a personal note...also super-hot.

So, everything was top-notch as far as the production went, but circumstances surrounding it impeded some of the joy I'd usually get out of my favorite show. Whoever is in charge of scheduling at PBS is clearly in the final throes of dementia. Episodes had no consistency in their airing, be it the day or the time. When it came down to the final two episodes, my local affiliate decided to take a few weeks off from airing it at all. The season's winner was spoiled online. It was as if people were actively trying to ruin a good thing.

And that's not even getting into what's coming next. News is still rolling in about this, so by the time I post, it may well have changed again, but here's how it stands now. First, BBC had the rights to the show bought out from under them by Channel 4. That means it's going from a station funded by governmental license fees to an advertising-supported one. If you're American, this would be akin to Masterpiece Theater going from PBS to NBC. That's not a good thing.

Know who else doesn't think it's a good thing? Hosts Mel Giedroyc and Sue Perkins, who quit the show when it was announced it was making the move. Know who else doesn't think it's a good thing? Judge Mary Berry, who quit shortly thereafter. Right after that happened, it was announced that Paul Hollywood is sticking around as judge of whatever the new version of the show will look like, and that Mel and Sue have already scored a new show of their own.

A new season of Great British Baking Show is currently airing in Britain, so we've got that to look forward to. Plus, there are the three initial seasons that never aired in America, so tracking those down could keep this amazing program in our collective consciousness for a while. But as far as what the future will bring in terms of this franchise? It would appear that the cookie is crumbling.

The Great British Baking Show - Season 3: A

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American Plate - Bite #91: Microwave Popcorn

And, the wave of knocking out the easier Bites continues! Part of my interest in the American Plate Project stems from an interest in not just the foods endemic to our culture, but how those ingredients of yore evolved into some of our more modern tastes. Corn is obviously an extremely important part of American food history - so important, that it's the only food to get multiple entries; O'Connell devotes three of the 100 Bites to it. One of those three entries is about the subspecies of corn that explodes into fluffy goodness when it's heated, but despite this Bite's title, popcorn has a history that extends to far before the microwave could even be conceived of.

Native Americans introduced it to Europeans, who heartily embraced it. People began thinking about different ways to enjoy it, whether it was by fashioning wire baskets to cook it over an open fire, sticking bits of it together with molasses or syrup, or stringing it together to use as decoration on their Christmas trees. After the Civil War, the technology of popcorn consumption kicked into high gear, and with each new invention, popcorn got a firm grip on a facet of American society. In 1885, the steam-powered popcorn maker was devised, which led to its popularity at stadiums and arenas. In 1925, the electric corn popper came along, and was immediately adopted by the burgeoning movie theater industry. As a cheap snack, the sale of popcorn kept a lot of struggling movie houses afloat during the Great Depression, and it's had a permanent home at the cinema ever since.

In the 1950s, overwhelmed housewives were delighted with the arrival of Jiffy Pop, which was an inexpensive and entertaining distraction for their kids, and required no clean-up. Finally, in the 1980s, microwave technology became affordable enough for the average American household to acquire, and it was only natural that one of the first foods developed for it was popcorn. Once again, it took over, and nowadays, a full 65% of popcorn consumed is by people microwaving it at home.

As you can see, a search of my pantry yielded a couple different kinds of microwave popcorn. There are a lot of flavors to choose from these days, but really, if you just avoid the fake butter topping, it's a pretty healthy snack. It's also fun to experiment with different seasoning blends. People tend to just dust popcorn with salt, but there are tons of things that liven it up, from cayenne to dill. It's found another natural companion in the rise of streaming media, and there's no better way to pass a snowy Thursday evening than by firing up the Netflix, settling on the couch with a bowl of popcorn, and going to town.

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