The Great Kiwi Bake Off Celebrity Treasure Island Special features media personalities who have appeared on the beach reality show. We asked some of these Bake Off contestants about their cooking skills and experience.
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Bree Tomasel says that “learning to learn recipes passed down from generation to generation are some of my best childhood memories”.
Bree Tomasel
Who taught you to cook?
My nonna (Italian grandmother) and my mother. I remember when I was young I was dropped off at my nonna’s house at 10am on Sundays and we cooked all day to prepare a meal for the whole family that evening. Loved it – learning recipes passed down from generation to generation are some of my best childhood memories. Obviously we’ve never baked much, haha. My mom was also a big influence on my cooking – she wasn’t much of a baker either, haha.
Tell us about your earliest baking memories.
One of my earliest baking memories would be making the Christmas cheesecake with my mom. It was a wet cheesecake, does that count?
Tell us about your worst baking disaster.
My worst baking disaster would definitely come from this episode of Bake Off – multiple failures, constant disasters.
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Cassie Roma’s dam was a Betty Crocker Homemaker Of The Year winner.
Cassie Roma
Who taught you to cook?
My mother. She is a great cook and even won Betty Crocker Homemaker Of The Year when she was young. Mom cooked dinners for her parents and four-year-old siblings, meaning the kitchen was a sacred space for our family. In fact, most of my favorite childhood memories are cooking in the kitchen with Mom or Grandma Roma. We didn’t bake much, but we certainly caused a storm.
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Tell us about your earliest baking memories.
Baking is a foreign concept to me. I grew up in the East County of California and in the hot, rural humid Missouri. So we did a lot of fresh cooking, grilling and stuff that didn’t require the oven to be on all the time to warm up an already sweltering house. When we baked, it was Betty Crocker funfetti cake out of a box. Add an egg and some water and voila – a cake. Baking takes time and finesse and scientific ability – so it’s not my forte.
Tell us about your worst baking disaster.
The show was my worst baking disaster. I have dyslexia and lost my place on the recipe page for the first cook and left out an essential ingredient.
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Lana Searle’s worst baking disaster ever set off all the fire alarms.
Lana Searlea
Who taught you to cook?
I come from a large family so I was taught at a young age to cook for all my siblings by mom and dad.
Tell us about your earliest baking memories.
Making a chocolate cake and the ants got there before us.
Tell us about your worst baking disaster.
I once tried to make cookies with almond sugar, but I used too much butter and it formed one big cookie that slid on the bottom of the oven and set off all the fire alarms. Then my sister caught me scraping it from the box in the paddock over the fence. Bad in general, haha.
TVNZ/delivered
Dancer Candy Lane never learned to cook.
Candy Lane
Who taught you to cook?
As you will see, unfortunately none. My mother worked in our shoe stores from 9 to 5 and never had time to teach me.
Tell us about your earliest baking memories.
I still remember her baking yummy banana cakes for my brother and me, and pink lamingtons for our birthday parties. And argue over who gets to lick the wooden spoon.
Tell us about your worst baking disaster.
I’ve never really tried baking before, so I have to say it was me trying to practice baking for the Bake Off. I went to my friend’s house so she could teach me a lesson. She was sure it would be fine until I asked her how to turn on the oven.
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Courtenay Louise was too busy playing outside to focus on cooking.
Courtenay Louise
Who taught you to cook?
Growing up, I wasn’t one to help cook or bake – I loved the outdoors. To help paint the picture, at Christmas, when everyone else helped in the kitchen, my cousin and I played outside in the mud and made mud pies for the Queen.
Tell us about your earliest baking memories.
When I was younger, the only thing I could make and enjoyed making was lemon madeira cake. We had fresh lemon trees in our backyard. Sometimes the cake was dry, sometimes flat and maybe once in a blue moon it tasted perfect.
Tell us about your worst baking disaster.
I haven’t spent much time in the kitchen, but my worst baking disaster would definitely be preparing for this show. I prepped by making muffins and they came out flatter than pancakes.
The Great Kiwi Bake Off Celebrity Treasure Island Special, TVNZ 1, Thursday (October 20)