You may be missing the Great British Bake Off already, but to keep you in the spirit, we interviewed Wakefield’s own Karen Wright and she is our new chef in our new HQ hub in The Ridings.
Our accessibility reporter Dan interviewed her on Friday 19th November 2021 and we asked her the following questions and she gave us some interesting answers:
Could you give us your name, what area of Wakefield you live in and what you do?
I’m Karen Wright, I live in the south of Wakefield in a place called Hall Green and I do lots, including zoom workshops, speaking, writes for paper, Tele work.
What’s your favourite thing to bake?
Pies is my favourite thing to bake, or savoury things e.g. sausage rolls.
Do you have any top tips?
One of my top tips is: if you’re doing pastry you need to ensure the kitchen is cool, as if you put warm pastry into a warm oven, it doesn’t work so pastry needs to be cool.
Why did you apply for the show?
“I applied for the show because my daughter sent me a application form via a link, it was interesting as I hadn’t got a lot of experience of different types of baking cakes, I could make scones and shortcrust pastry, I looked at the application and said “I cant do this, but I thought I could teach myself how to do the different challenges, I read books and taught myself the techniques, and as I did a bake I filled that bit of the form out, and strange things happened.
What was your life like before and how is it now?
â€I had a good education, good set of parents that life is what you make it after that, i made mistakes and I had a good life before Bake Off, she worked abroad, and just before Bake-off I worked in a supermarket, and my life now is more exciting.
What was your favourite Bake Off challenge?
“My favourite, favourite one was the 1st week where I did a cake selfie because they had to do a biscuit quite big and make it look like you had a selfie with it, I liked it cos it was fun and it worked so I didn’t have any stress over that, cake week, two of the judges loved it Paul Hollywood and Prue Leith, 1 of the most challenging ones were my melted chocolate dome as I thought I’d never get it right, worked out in the end, and my favourite in terms of being bizarre, I had to make biscuit chandelier and it was great but I went home that week.
What’s your best memory?
“My best memory of Bake-off was the whole experience, and just the thrill of getting that very 1st phonecall to say I was on the show.
What do you make of this series?
I am loving this series and I’ve identified with a lot of the bakers and my favourite went home this week in the semi finals.
What are your hopes for the future?
“I hope I can remain healthy, relaxed, I’m enjoying the ride of life now, and will adapt to changes in life as it happens.
I like to do a challenge every 10 years.
I would love to do Strictly Come Dancing but I think I don’t have the fitness for it.
FOOD STORIES? WHAT ARE THEY? AND WHAT’S YOURS?!
@thesparklecoach @sparkleupnorth at our new HQ hub @ridingscentre with Bake Off Star Karen Wright @karenwrightbake and me @mamameiblog
FANCY SOME BUDGET-FRIENDLY FEAST IDEAS for the whole family/community? Exciting news we’re serving up today
Plus some interesting facts about Rhubarb and more from our new cookery columnist Karen Wright as we build a new YFams magazine inside Our new studio @thesparklecoach @ridingscentre
