Season 10 of the hit Netflix series "Great British Bake Off" is underway, and a local baker, Natalia Lima of Curious Cake Bakery, is hard at work remixing bakes from each episode. The Curious Cat Bakery isn’t your run of the mill bakery — it specializes in vegan baked goods.
So Lima asked her social media followers if they would be interested in following along while she vegan-ized a recipe from each episode of the "Great British Baking Off." They were all in.
“I proposed this to my followers on Instagram and they were all about it, so now every week I pick one of the bakes and try to recreate a vegan version of it. And since everyone was so excited about it, I’m filming it and posting the recipe and step-by-step instructions on how to make it on my stories,” Lima told CL.
Some challenges have been easier to substitute than others, but Lima says dairy week was a little bit of a pain for obvious reasons. She didn’t back down from the challenge, however and it ended up more fruitful than she imagined — two of the restaurants that sell Curious Cake Bakery treats have actually ordered the vegan-ized lemon poppy cake from episode four (pictured above).
“It’s made me think creatively about how to turn traditional bakes like cinnamon rolls into vegan-friendly recipes and challenged me to come up with solutions on adapting those recipes," she added. "It takes some tinkering but in my opinion with some research, the right ingredients, and just the right amount of stubborn will, anything can be made vegan and delicious.”
The most recent episode includes a 1920s challenge, and Lima has chosen to take on competitor Alice Fevronia’s chocolate orange custard tart.
These technical challenges may be worthy of a handshake from host Paul Hollywood.
All show stopping treats are available for purchase on curiouscatbakery.com until the current season wraps.
Want a behind the scenes look at how Lima reworks recipes into vegan delights? The Curious Cat Bakery’s Instagram (@CuriousCatBakery) has step-by-step videos in the “Baking” highlight.
“People keep asking what challenge I’ll pick as soon as the episode comes out, which is just fantastic," Lima said. "I feel like everyone is very invested in this, even if it’s just for fun.”
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