The Big British Bake-Off

I'm a bit behind - so don't spoil the ending for me if you know who wins, but this has been my favourite telly programme of the year. Yes even better than Sherlock or a five-hour Chilean mine rescue marathon. Basically it's a competiton to find Britain's best amateur baker. There's no hint of celebrity or ego. No shouting or confesions. No diary room or sabotage. It's television for people who like cake and for people who like people who care about cake. Each week the contestants are housed in a marquee in some touristy spot and are let loose in a camping version of a Kath Kidson styled kitchen where they to work through a different set of baking challenges; cakes, scones, biscuits, puddings and pastry all feature. There was even an episode devoted to bread.

It manages to be genuinely tense - will the pudding come out of the bowl? Will the pastry have a soggy bottom? Will he notice he forgot the eggs? It also suceeds in being warm, sweet, funny and informative. Did you know that orignally puddings were made with meat? Or that the ideal Cornish pasty has between seventeen and twenty-one crimples?

The biscuit episode has to be one of my all-time favourite hours of telly. I learned about the history of the digestive biscuit (the undisputed king of biscuits) and was introduced to the world's most expensive biscuit. This was rescued from near the South Pole where it was found in a tent alongside Captain Scott's body. How could anyone possibly conceive a programme that was a more perfect marriage of my twin passions; Antarctica and biscuits? If only they could have found a way to include rugby union or a helicopter or snowboarding, that would be telly utopia.