Thinking about a oneshot I promised to @lore_shark for their birthday and Im just going to start spitballing now while I am surrounded by chaos at my folks. So here we go . . .

Naturally #kiribaku, this is the normal GBBO AU . . . Baker Bakugou and crewman Kirishima. Mel and Sue and Mary Berry are here cause its my fic and I said so.
Also I will need a title at some point.

Officially, Kirishima was camera crew. Unofficially, everyone pitched in wherever they were needed in prepro. Setting up the tent, putting in the counters, making sure each bench had the same equipment. Mel and Sue and Mary and Paul would arrive tomorrow for opening shots.

This years bakers would arrive the day after.
In the meantime, ovens had to be tested, scenery made to look artfully/artlessly homey, aprons and gingham and tea towels washed.

Kirishima loved his job. It was fun and it was nice to be apart of something that so many people enjoyed.

All the cake tasting every weekend was nice, too.

Cake week started in two days and Kirishima could not wait

Mel and Sue are always fun to have on set. They read through the briefs on the bakers, with photographs to help them memorize their names, and they greet the veteran and the newbie crew alike.

They make the biggest fuss over test chef Aizawa's nephew, Shinsou.

Aizawa is responsible for testing the technical challenge everyweek, as well as making a few dozen Victoria sponges a day to check the ovens.

Years of complaining have finally given him his nephew as an assistant.

There are other people crowding in and around the tent; Hizashi and his assistant, Jirou, are checking and rechecking mics and equipment; Kaminari has sheafs of paper on different clipboards running down lists of ingredients and equipment, and Mina is prepping make up kits.

She complains the most about Paul's, insisting it would be cheaper to just dip him in bronze and half done with, but she immediately melts for Mary Berry who just wants some powder and some glitter around the eyes.

There are six people on cameras specifically, Kirishima, Tetsutetsu, Sero, Tsu, Inasa, and Awase. The director, Yagi, goes over the rules with them again and again before the bakers arrive on set.

Don't get comfy with the bakers. Keep moving - don't focus on one.

And the cardinal rule - NOTHING goes in the oven or out of the oven without it being filmed. NOTHING.

Yagi is very strict about this.

And finally it was time for the baker's dozen to enter the tent, and the crew to fade into the background.

Eight pages of written application, one fucking ridiculously long phone call, two bakes, three rounds of interviews, a technical in front of people, and one train south to Berkshire, and Bakugou Katsuki was ready to start baking.

Before the baking started, they needed shots of him and the other twelve bakers walking down the path from the house to the tent, half a dozen cameraman buzzing around, squatting by the stairs with the potted plant, or controlling a drone camera to get them from above.

Then they lined up, two rows of soldiers, before the tent, so Mel and Sue could welcome them all in for the cameras. The producer - or one of them - was giving them a few last minute repeated instructions. He tuned out, he knew the drill.

He didn’t talk quietly enough for people to need him to repeat himself, and if he needed a camera when his bake was ready to go in, he’d fucking go grab a cameraman himself before he let his schedule go off.

He was very exacting in his recipes, and he wouldn’t let anything go wrong because some shitty cameraman wasn’t fast enough on his feet.

It was Cake Week, and Katsuki Bakugou was going home with the title of Star Baker. His chili-chocolate cake was going to blow Paul Hollywood’s fat head clean off his shoulders.

Mel and Sue were telling everyone they had two and a half hours to make their perfect signature chocolate cake to present to Paul and Mary, and Katsuki stood at his station in the back, farthest from the entrance, right behind fucking Izuku Midoriya of all fucking people -

as if the little shit watching everything he had done to get through his A-levels wasn’t bad enough. They had gone to separate universities and the green twerp /still/ ended up in the same tent as Katsuki.

It didn’t matter.

Bakugou was going to blow their minds.

Kirishima was on walk-and-talk duty with Tsu, following the judges and one of the hosts around as they spoke to each baker about their cake. After this they would get a few shots of the judges watching, before they went back to the production trailer.

The judges couldn’t get /too/ cozy with any of the contestants, after all. It was a baking competition, not a popularity contest.

After Paul and Mary left, the crew would have a little bit more room to move, but not much. The first few weeks the tent was really crowded -

and the floor was never 100% level.

Really, Kirishima hated watching people cry when they got kicked off, but it was nice to have one less baking bench to maneuver around.

Mel, Paul, and Mary followed a weird serpentine pattern around the tent, speaking to each baker and scaring the absolute pants off some when they popped in front of them.

He learned about Yaomomo’s chocolate cherry cake, Satou’s quadruple chocolate cake (white, milk, dark, /and/ bittersweet chocolate), Inko’s chocolate and hazelnut cake, Shoji’s chocolate-and-strawberry-truffle cake, and Monoma’s white chocolate cake.

That had given Paul and Mary pause when they learned there was only chopped white chocolate, no cocoa powder or nibs or anything in the whole thing, and more of the same for the frosting. Tsu and Kirishima had exchanged looks.

It was rarely a good thing to have Paul and Mary questioning your choices this early in the competition. They went on and on, until there were only two bakers left.

Mel started them off.

“Izuku! Now, as I understand it, you’ve got not one, but two people quite close to you in the tent, is that right?”

The blonde baker behind him snorted as Izuku /saluted/ the judges with his spatula and said yes, his mom and his childhood friend were both in the tent with him, yes, oh, his cake?

His cake was chocolate and peanut butter, yes, both flavors in the sponge, and then a layer of chocolate mousse between, and then two sorts of frosting, yes, thank you, he’d do his best, his mom and his friend had taught him baking, you see, and he wanted to make them proud.

The blonde baker gave another loud snort.

Kirishima and Tsu exchanged another look. He was awfully shakey for the first challenge in the first week.

Finally it was the blonde bakers turn, Mary setting her hands on his bench and going a bit wide eyed at his ingredients. Mel started them off.

“Good morning, Katsuki!”

“Good morning, Mel, Mary, Paul.”

Kirishima couldn’t help but think that Katsuki looked really cocky for the first challenge - almost the opposite of Izuku, even as he did a slow careful pan over his bench. There were all ingredients he was used to seeing -

Double 0 flour, sugar, baking powder, eggs, cocoa, a mighty pile of chopped dark chocolate, salt - but there was also a collection of spice jars, and chiles being roasted on the hob.

“Now, Katsuki, and please forgive me if I seem rude at all, but you are aware that this is a /chocolate cake/ challenge, yes? Because it seems to me that you’ve got the beginnings of a burrito or something here, and I’m a bit confused.”

Kirishima kept his camera on Katsuki, as Tsu kept hers on Mel and the judges. They had a contest every season to who got the best footage of Mary reacting, and any time anything spicy was involved, that was a good get.

But it was his responsibility to make sure to get the baker’s reactions.

Besides, the blonde baker’s grin was savage and wild - not the sort of thing you saw a lot of in the tent.

Kirishima rather liked it.

“It’s a smoked chile chocolate cake,” he said. “And it’s going to blow you out of the fucking water.”

There would also probably be a lot of bleeping out at this bench, but that wasn’t Kirishima’s problem.

Paul took up the questions. “So, these chiles, where are they going to be, in the sponge, in the frosting?”

“Through the whole thing,” Bakugou said.

“Roasted and grated into the sponge mix, ground in the frosting with cream cheese to take out some of the bite, and the powdered ancho is going in with the cinnamon to decorate.”
“It’s certainly a unique idea,” Mary said, in the tone that meant she didn’t think she would like it

“Rather a lot of strong flavors, don’t you think?”

“It’ll be fantastic, I swear to fu- I swear, It’s amazing.”

“Well, we’ll be looking forward to trying it. Thanks, mate.” Kirishima followed after the judges to get some shots with the smell of roasting chiles in his nose.

Bakugou had his four cake tins lined, buttered, and floured, had checked his oven temperature, and was carefully weighing out his batter to make sure his layers were all even. He needed a cameraman, and he looked around for someone who was free.

The red head from earlier was panning his way around, getting shots of people’s stations.

“Oi! Shitty hair!”

He didn’t look up - fucking - “Hey! Red!”

That got him. He swung around and passed Deku’s bench, where the nerd was muttering about mousse.

“These are going in the oven,” Bakugou said. “You need to get the shot, right?”

“Yeah, dude! Don’t just shove ‘em in, though, you’ve gotta say something about it.”

“Like fucking what, the tins are going in the oven, what the hell is there to say about it?”

“I dunno, man, you’re the expert! Something about the tins, or the color you’re looking for, or how much time you need, or about the temperature or something.”

“Fine.”

The cameraman squatted down so he was closer to level The cameraman squatted down so he was closer to level with the oven as Bakugou opened the door, and grabbed something out of the oven with his mitt.

“There, what was that?”

“It’s my oven thermometer. I don’t trust ovens I haven’t baked in before, so I’m just double checking the temp’s right.”

He held it up before the camera. “See? 178, just a little off, that’s why I gotta check.”

He put the tins in with his mitt, two on the bottom and two on top. “I’ll rotate them half way through to make sure they bake evenly.”

“Why have you done four layers?”

“Quicker baking time, quicker cooling time, better to make layers with the frosting and make things nice and moist.”

“Alright, thanks man! Just grab me or one of the others when your timer’s about to go, yeah? I’m Kirishima by the way!”

“Thanks,” Katsuki grunted, and reached for his tea towel to wipe his hands.

Link to the top https://twitter.com/Good_Salt_Witch/status/1342612339976232960

Two and a half hours flew by in the tent as Kirishima and the others moved around the stations, watching Shoji scoop strawberry jam into his mixing bowl, Torino weighing out mascarpone, and Todoroki beating the absolute shit out of a bag of peppermints to crush them up.

He was enjoying hanging out toward the back, where Midoriya-the-Younger was still frantically muttering to himself even as he piped his layers with peanut butter on his cheek and flour in his hair,

and the ever scowling Bakugou carefully pouring colored and flavored isomalt into onto a silicone mat and shaping them into flames. He was intense, that one.

But the part coming up was the part he hated filming. Hagakure and Ryuko’s cakes were overbaked; Monoma got told off for bad flavors and an underbaked cake.

It wasn’t all bad; Uraraka’s space themed candy bar cake was moist and he couldn’t wait to taste it, and Midoriya-the-Elder’s hazelnut and chocolate cake was good enough that Paul ate a whole slice.

Midoriya-the-Younger’s cake tasted good, but was a bit too heavy, and then it was Bakugou’s turn again. Mary Berry looked a bit nervous as Paul cut through the candy hellflames into the cake.

Paul put his fork down after two bites.

“That’s amazing.”

Mary went in for a second bite.

“I was afraid, you know - that the whole cake would be too hot, but it’s not, really. The spice and the smoke is there, but it’s not too much, and you’ve been quite clever using the cream cheese in the frosting to help balance that heat, it comes through beautifully.”

Mel and Sue were having a spoon battle to get more of the frosting as Paul finished. “Bake is excellent, cake is moist, flavor is amazing, decoration works well - think the cinnamon and the chile in your hellfire is a bit strong, but the whole thing - really, really good.”

Paul extended his hand, and Kirishima moved to get Bakugou’s face. The first Hollywood handshake of the season!

The faint scowl that had covered Bakugou’s face for the entire challenge vanished as he shook Paul’s hand, and his grin was victorious and thrilling.

Kirishima /really/ wanted to try that cake.

The clean up crew scrubbed down stations and put the leftovers in the crew’s lunchroom after the bakers all got to taste everyone else’s bakes, as the camera crew got reactions after the judging.

Uraraka was bubbly, still not believing they liked it; Inko was blushing, still amazed that /Mary Berry/ had eaten her cake, and Bakugou’s smile cut right into him like a knife.

“I told you I was going to fucking blow them away,” he said.

It was too bad the crew couldn’t play favorites, because Kirishima would happily spend the next ten weeks filming him to catch that smile.

But first, lunch time.

As the thirteen bakers filed back into the tent and the crew took up their gear, the red-haired camera guy stopped Bakugou on his way to the bench.

“Dude, that chile chocolate cake was the best thing I’ve eaten in my life!”

“Course it was, I fucking made it,” Bakugou said, and he smiled a little despite himself when the crew guy laughed. Kirishima, that was his name.

“Good luck on the technical!” he said, and headed off to get in position for Sue announcing the next technical challenge and the bakers looking nervously at their gingham covered mystery ingredients.

“Our dear bakers, it’s time for your first technical challenge! Now, I know you’re all very excited to know what you’re baking, so I have a few hints for you. First off, it’s a Mary recipe. Second off, it’s a cake. Third off, I haven’t a clue of how to pronounce it. Guesses?”

There were some snickers and a few bakers looking like they might faint before Mel jumped in, while Bakugou tried to think Mary Berry cakes that hadn’t already been used in a challenge, wondering if he had read the recipe before.

“Not to fear, not to fear! Because I know how to say it thanks to some cramming back stage! You all will be making a Bienenstich! You know, a bee-en-en-stitch!”

“Oh, yes, of course, the Bienenstich! The German bee-sting cake, all covered with almonds and sweet honey, and just full to bursting with a vanilla cream center, pre-sliced for your convenience. Now, Mary, this is your recipe, do you have any words of advice for our bakers?”

Mary Berry gave them all a smile. “Be careful when you slice it!”

Mel and Sue (and most of the bakers) exchanged a look.

"Well, with that very helpful advice, I am afraid Ms. Berry and Mr. Hollywood must be off, kicked from the tent, because this challenge is judged blind. Off you go!”

As the judges exited, Sue announced the time. “Bakers, you have got two and one quarter hours to perfect your lovely Bienenstich! Ready!”

“Set!”

“Bake!”

Bakugou whipped out the recipe and ran through the ingredients - all pupose flour, sugar, honey, almonds, butter, milk - heavy cake, that - salt, and, oh dear. Yeast.

A yeasted cake, really? On the first challenge?

Well, fuck it, they were looking for the best bakers, not the wimpiest. Bakugou read through the recipe twice before starting his measuring. Sponge first with the yeast in to let it rise, topping while it rose, then the bake.

Only question was, did the topping go on before the bake or after? Was it supposed to be like a strudel topping, added just at the end to crisp?

Mary Berry had said to be careful when you sliced it. That could mean to make sure the cake was cool, or . . .

the topping would be too hard to slice once it was cool, so you had to slice the cake when it it was hot.

He’d bake with the topping on. Otherwise there was no reason to make it this early, when he could be whipping cream.

Bakugou kneaded the dough a few times, just to make sure it was smooth, and chucked it in the proofing drawer. He licked his teeth a moment before setting his time, and then moved over to the cook top to get the sugar and honey and butter melting, then stood, stirring over low.

This was one of those timing challenges. If the cake wasn’t in and out soon enough, it’d never get cool enough to assemble, so everything hinged on the yeast activating and the cake going in on time.

At least Mary had given them a temperature this time. It couldn’t be a very long bake, there just wasn’t enough mix. Maybe half an hour?

Tension was definitely higher in the tent this time around; the difference between a bake that you knew, that you had practiced, that you knew what it was supposed to look like and this was cutting.

People were double and triple measuring, carefully underlining and making ticks on their recipe sheets, even hyperventilating when they accidentally added the almonds to the sponge mix

(that was Monoma, who was too busy talking to Mel and Sue and Tsu about how his chocolate cake was really good, actually).

Bakugou watched the other bakers and the crew out of the corner of his eye as he buttered and sugared his pan, and laid down parchment strips to help him lift it out. Deku was muttering - fucking nerd - about creme pat consistently,

and Auntie Inko was rubbing Satou’s back when he realized he had to restart his sponge because forgot to add the egg.

Fifty minutes had passed, and his cake was in the oven, and he pulled up the stand mixer to work on his creme pat.