Bake Off Crème de la Crème

The search for the creme de la creme of British pastry begins with Tom Kerridge welcoming three teams of expert chefs to the competition. Ahead of them lies a truly intense day of cooking in front of three of the biggest names in British pastry. Battling it out in the first heat of this intense bake off are three young chefs from a five-star hotel, a team which invents desserts for a leading supermarket and a trio of chefs who work in secret restaurants hidden away in the city of London. Judging and scoring their efforts are Benoit Blin, chef patissier at Belmond Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons, Claire Clark MBE, world-renowned pastry chef and consultant, and Cherish Finden, executive pastry chef at The Langham, London. In the first challenge, the teams must produce three different mouthwatering patisserie items - framboisier - a classic layered slice, paris-brest - a handcrafted miniature, and a cylindrical petit gateau invented by the teams themselves. They must make 36 perfect and identical items of each pastry and with just three hours to do it, the pressure is almost too much for some. In the second challenge, the team must transform an ordinary dessert into an incredible fine-dining experience with their showpiece. For this heat, it's apple crumble and custard which gets the five-star treatment, complete with towering edible showpiece sculptures that are simply unbelievable. With heart-stopping moments, frank and uncompromising judging and cooking techniques we've never seen before, which team will score the most points and earn themselves a place in the semi-finals?

The search for the crème de la crème of British pastry continues with Tom Kerridge welcoming three more teams of expert chefs to the competition. In the second heat of this incredible bake off, a team from the British Armed Forces meet the only all-women team in the competition and a team from a world-famous London hotel. To secure a place in the semi-finals, the teams must impress the formidable judging panel of Benoit Blin, chef patissier at Belmond Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons, Claire Clark MBE, world-renowned pastry chef and consultant, and Cherish Finden, executive pastry chef at The Langham, London. In the Miniatures Challenge, the teams are asked to produce 36 opera slices, 36 babka knots - a handcrafted breakfast pastry - and 36 petits gateaux in the shape of a sphere, invented by the teams themselves. Each item in each batch must be uniform in appearance, finished to the very highest professional standards and of course utterly delicious. They have just three hours to make all 108 pastries. In the Showpiece Challenge, the team are asked to reinvent a popular British dessert as a fine-dining experience and present it as a dazzling showpiece display. The humble dessert getting the five-star makeover this week is trifle. Two teams take gardens as their theme, one English, the other Japanese, while the third team performs a feat of chocolate engineering. The results are simply jaw-dropping but which team will please the judges?

The search for the creme de la creme of British pastry continues with Tom Kerridge welcoming three more teams of expert chefs to the competition for the third heat out of five. To secure a place in the semi-finals, the teams must impress the formidable judging panel of Benoit Blin, chef patissier at Belmond Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons, Claire Clark MBE, world-renowned pastry chef and consultant, and Cherish Finden, executive pastry chef at The Langham, London. Eager to please the judges this week are two teams of chefs who work in upmarket patisserie shops, while the third team hails from the kitchens of an exclusive Scottish hotel. In the Miniatures Challenge, the teams are asked to produce 36 petit antoine chocolate slices, 36 macaroons religious, and 36 pyramid-shaped cakes invented specially for the competition. With just three hours to make them and sky-high expectations from the judges, teamwork, time management and calmness under pressure are essential. In the Showpiece Challenge, the teams are asked to reinvent a popular British dessert as a fine-dining experience and present it as a dazzling showpiece display. This week, the dessert getting the five-star makeover is lemon meringue pie. There is no shortage of drama, with clouds of dry ice, a surprise hidden inside a lemon and a fragile swan made entirely of sugar. But which of the lavish desserts will get the highest score from the judges?

The search for the crème de la crème of British pastry continues with Tom Kerridge welcoming three more teams of expert chefs in the fourth heat out of this tense competition. Competing in this episode are a cookery school teacher with two of his former star pupils, a trio of pastry chefs from a five-star London hotel and the only all-French outfit in the competition who work in a high-end patisserie. The team with the most points at the end of the heat will earn their place in the semi-finals and awarding the points are three of the biggest names in pastry - Benoit Blin is chef patissier at Belmond Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons, Claire Clark MBE is a world-renowned pastry chef and Cherish Finden is executive pastry chef at The Langham, London. In the Miniatures Challenge, the teams are asked to produce 36 St Marc slices, 36 sfogliatelle, an Italian ricotta-filled pastry shell, and 36 small domed cakes invented specially by the teams. Identical batches of perfect bakes are what the judges are looking for so this is all about precision cooking in high volume with immaculate results. With just three hours to make 108 pastries, which captain will take their team to the top of the leader board? In the Showpiece Challenge, the team are asked to reinvent a popular British dessert as a fine-dining experience and present it as a dazzling showpiece display. This week, sticky toffee pudding gets the five-star treatment. The teams' extraordinary designs include a model of the Lake District and a brandy snap tower which glows in the dark. Ambitious and risky, but will the judges be impressed? And who will be back to bake again in the semi-finals?

Tom Kerridge welcomes the last three teams to the competition for the fifth and final heat. Chefs from a fine-dining restaurant in Liverpool are up against a team of chocolatiers from Leeds, and a side which will be competing for Wales in the culinary Olympics. In the Miniatures they must make dozens of tiny fruit tarts, coconut dacquoises and cubed cakes of their own design, and for their Showpiece they must reinvent chocolate cheesecake.

It's the semi-final stage, and Tom Kerridge welcomes back Liam's team from the Armed Forces, and the supermarket inventors led by James and Sajeela's Park Lane boys. The judges want more Miniatures - 144 perfect breakfast pastries, and for their Showpiece the teams must construct large and elaborate chocolate containers filled with three different types of confectionery.

Tom Kerridge hosts the second semi-final as three teams return, hoping to impress judges Cherish Finden, Claire Clark and Benoit Blin for a second time and secure a place in the final. For the Miniatures the contestants must make 144 bite-sized petits fours, sablé hollandaise biscuits, fruit tarts and Miserables. Their Showpiece involves building a decorative chocolate structure to display 90 items of confectionery, calissons, marshmallows and moulded chocolates.

The search for the best team of pastry chefs reaches the final, with the climactic challenge to prepare and present a fine-dining dessert banquet for 100 guests. Judges Cherish Finden, Claire Clark and Benoit Blin require the teams to create at least six different desserts, with their banquets designed to show off their unique personalities, as well as tasting and looking sublime. Tom Kerridge hosts. Last in the series.