Spooky Helena Garcia is the Most “American” Baker Ever to Grace ‘The Great British Baking Show’

Helena Garcia is already one of the breakout fan favorites of this season of The Great British Baking Show on Netflix. The 40-year-old “mum” and jewelry designer has bewitched viewers with her obsession with all things Halloween. Already she’s baked a “furry” fairy garden cake, bright green witches’ fingers biscuits, a sculpture of a spider emerging from an egg, and a caldron full of pumpkin-shaped loaves. Helena is also, ironically, the most American-style baker we’ve ever seen on The Great British Baking Show. This means that finally there’s someone in the tent to stand up to Paul Hollywood‘s completely wrong takes on American bakes.

Now The Great British Baking Show has never been great at celebrating American-style bakes. After all, it’s not the “Great American Baking Show.” (That’s a different show hosted by Baby Spice.) Still, every so often, a challenge involving bagels or churros comes up, and as an American viewer, I have to scrunch up my face when judge Paul Hollywood gets the technical aspects of these popular stateside treats wrong. Then there’s his disdain for peanut butter, his incredulity over the idea that peanut butter and banana are a flavor profile, and of course, the way he thinks dry biscuits are superior to ooey-gooey cookies.

For years, American viewers have just had to put up with these assaults on our national tastes on The Great British Baking Show, but finally, there’s one contestant who might actually stick up for all that is sweet, wacky, and delicious about American-style baking. It’s “spooky” Helena Garcia, the Halloween-obsessed Spanish ex-pat whose days as a professional poker player in Las Vegas made her a devotee of American bakes.

According to The Sun, Helena Garcia was born in Ceuta, an Spanish city in North Africa, and raised in Lanzarote, one of the Canary Islands. After studying in mainland Spain, she went to Las Vegas as a part of an exchange student scheme, and that’s where she fell in love with baking. She specifically likes American flavors — like cinnamon rolls — and therefore brings an American flourish to the tent. You can see this in how she bakes bread in a cast-iron pot (the preferred method of most of my American baking pals, thanks to Jim Lahey), and even in her obsession with Halloween. Helena now lives in Leeds with her husband Will, infant daughter Flora, and dog Cato.

Nevertheless, she is still bringing an American flourish to her bakes in the tents. We see this in the way she went for those gross witches’ fingers and in her explaining the joys of microwaving cinnamon rolls for breakfast. That’s not what you usually get from British bakers, who tend to whip things up the day of, and who rely on old European flavors. You also don’t get a lot of sass from the British bakers when it comes to judging, and Helena has already joked to Paul Hollywood that her over-baked cinnamon rolls are his fault. (Because she was terrified of him saying they were raw.)

Of course, what makes Helena so darn likable might also spell her doom in the tent. After all, the show is The Great British Baking Show, and not The Great American Halloween Baking Show. Helena might have to rein in some of her own preferences to placate the judges.

Nevertheless, she is already a favorite this season. Not only are fans swooning over her spooky ways, but she’s also having sleepovers with her adorable cast mates.

View this post on Instagram

Sleep over party 🦇🛏🦇 @henryfabird @mschakraverty #GBBO

A post shared by Helena Garcia (@helenagarciafp) on Sep 16, 2019 at 2:05am PDT

A new episode of The Great British Baking Show premieres this Friday.

Watch The Great British Baking Show on Netflix