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Sunday Review: Cake and Bake Show live in Manchester

  • In our Sunday feature, Umerah Riyasat reviews the Event City Great British Bake Off spin-off, the Cake and Bake Show
  • Stars such as Nadiya Hussain, winner of Great British Bake Off 2015, Jane Beedle, finalist of GBBO 2016, Rav Bansal , contestant of GBBO 2016 and Rosemary Shrager amongst others attended the event

Last Thursday, 10 November, I attended the Cake and Bake Show in Event City, which promised to be a huge event. It definitely lived up to expectations! There were exquisite stalls everywhere for bystanders to have a nibble of the free samples of cakes, breads, biscuits and many more sugary delights.

I got to taste some lovely toffee crisp cookies and chocolate chip cookies, which still makes my mouth water thinking about! There were various different dipping oils to dip bread in, my favourite being the cumin and coriander oil which was simply splendid. I even tasted the goat's cheese, which I didn’t actually like, but had to try as not to as I didn't want to refuse.

There was definitely an atmosphere of excitement and a buzz despite the events of Wednesday's election results in the US. While not being the biggest fan of baking, the fact that the 2015 winner, and fellow Muslim Nadiya Hussain win the hugely popular baking show, The Great British Bake Off in 2015, drew me into the show and the culinary artistry. I genuinely love the show but never expected in my wildest dreams to see a woman, who is Asian as well as Muslim, win the show and be loved by the whole nation. It shows there is progress in this dark, twisted world. 

I attended Nadiya's class, which was the Baking and Decorating class, where she made berry muffins, as well as goat's cheese and onion tarts. She was very natural in front of the crowd and I was in awe of how far she had come.

It was such a great class, as Nadiya engaged well with her audience, and looked like she was genuinely enjoying herself. It was refreshing to see a famous person actually enjoy their work! I met her again at her book signing later in the afternoon with my darling Mother, and we actually got to speak to her, which was a massive fangirl moment for me. 

Overall it was a great day out, as I saw many cakes and tasted some wonderful bakes. I even saw a Gandalf cake which I was quite enthusiastic about! Just look at it! 

Whoever made this cake is a genius and an enormous credit has to go to her or him. It was wonderful seeing Rav, Jane and Nadiya. It was very well organised and executed. Definitely a day to remember.