Great British Bake Off: trifle, floating islands and petit fours star in dessert week

Having survived cake and bread in the first episodes of the fourth series of , the remaining 11 bakers faced the not so small task of creating desserts on Tuesday evening. "Make your favourite trifle", they were told by judges Mary Berry, Paul Hollywood and co-hosts Mel Giedroyc and Sue Perkins, closely followed by the famous words: "On your marks, get set, bake!" 

In another impressive week of baking from Britain's best amateurs, contestants threw themselves into a trifle with the classical challenge.

A number of takes on the traditional dessert were on the menu, including an orange and ginger one, a tropical twist of Caribbean Pina Colada, and a coconut and raspberry trifle with a top layer of macaroons.

The technical challenge that followed was to make Ile flottantes – otherwise known as floating islands. For this, the keen bakers had to master a technique called "quenelling" – transferring meringue mixture from one tablespoon to another to create the desired oval shape, before poaching the meringue in crème anglaise.

The key, according to judge Paul, is in clearly defining the layers. "Letting the layers be seen is extremely difficult," he said.

In what Mary called the most difficult challenge yet, the bakers were tasked with making 12 biscuit-based and 12 cake-based bite-sized sweet delights.

Click here for Raymond Blanc's floating islands recipe

This week the judges said goodbye to Mark and Deborah, while Christine was named Star Baker Of The Week.

In a final effort to win the title of this week's Star Baker, the group went head to head for the showstopper challenge, in which they had three hours to rustle up 24 petit fours.

Financiers, fairy cakes, macaroons, bite-size chocolate cakes and shortbread were all created.

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