BAKE TO THE FUTURE! Great British Bake Off winner Rahul Mandal is AMRC’s winning ingredient
When you want a birthday cake to celebrate the University of Sheffield Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre’s 25th anniversary, there’s only one AMRC engineer for the job – Great British Bake Off winner Dr Rahul Mandal, as Graham Walker found out.
Forget popping to Greggs.
When the AMRC wanted a cake to mark a quarter of a century of innovation, Dr Rahul Mandal did what he has been doing for colleagues for years - he baked one himself.
A Victoria sponge covered in white chocolate ganache, complete with silver ‘2’ and ‘5’ candles, it was big enough to feed the first lucky 60 people at an office party.
But Rahul is no ordinary baker.The senior engineer in AMRC's materials team, within its nuclear manufacturing group, is winner of The Great British Bake Off 2018.
Millions know him as the shy, softly-spoken scientist who captured the nation’s hearts and returned to the famous tent to win again in The Great New Year Bake Off in 2021.
He went on to appear on TV shows from This Morning to The Jonathan Ross Show and wrote Showstopping Cakes: Mastering the Art and Science of Baking, bringing together his two worlds of recipes and science.
But rather than swapping engineering for celebrity, Rahul chose to remain at the AMRC, helping perfect the recipe for safer, cleaner nuclear energy, to keep us warm and the lights on.
His work involves researching and testing metals, manufacturing processes and critical components for nuclear reactors.
“I am a scientist who also happens to bake,” he says.
And ask Rahul which has made the biggest impact on his life – Bake Off or the AMRC – and his answer might surprise you.
“It's definitely AMRC. I probably wouldn't have been brave enough to apply for Bake Off if I hadn't been working here," he says.
It says much about the research centre, where workers often speak of a strong sense of belonging and being part of a family.
The 39-year-old, who lives in Rotherham with his wife and 21-month-old daughter, grew up in Kolkata, India, without an oven and only began baking seriously after moving to the Sheffield area and living alone.
He came to Britain in 2010 to study for his PhD at Loughborough University before joining the AMRC in 2015.
Rahul’s two worlds have collided.
At the AMRC he works with hot isostatic pressing – or HIP – where metal powder is heated and pressurised to create components.
“Think about if you're baking a meringue – you can't take the meringue out of the oven as soon as you finish baking, you have to let it cool down in the oven. Some bakes cannot withstand a big temperature change, same as metals,” he explains.
Even chocolate provides lessons in engineering, with Rahul using chocolate “welding” and tempering to help youngsters understand manufacturing.
It's basically about creating a uniform crystal structure throughout the material, which increases its durability.
“If you get a bar of chocolate and you break it, you hear a snap. That is because those chocolates are tempered as well," he says.
Despite Bake Off opening extraordinary doors, Rahul has deliberately kept baking as his passion rather than his profession.
"I'm most proud that every morning I get excited to go to work at the AMRC and do something new and learn something new.”
And there are lessons from both the laboratory and kitchen when things go wrong.
“You still learn a lot when things don't work. Which means that you just don't do that again or refine where the mistakes are. So next time when you do it, you correct it and it works," he says.
“There really is no such thing as a half-baked idea.”
As the AMRC celebrates its 25th anniversary, Rahul believes its impact reaches far beyond the research centre.
“I think the AMRC is a great place to work and it created a huge amount of job opportunities and corresponding development of the local area.
“it is basically making UK manufacturing stronger. We are doing all the research that will help UK manufacturing to do less mistakes, make more success.
“The development in this area because of AMRC is incredible.”
And after 11 years working there, from nuclear engineering to chocolate welding, with a couple of Bake Off trophies along the way, Rahul remains convinced that the AMRC has all the ingredients to keep winning in the future.
READ SPECIAL ANNIVERSARY SUPPLEMENT: View our 16-page AMRC 25th anniversary e-supplement below – or open it in a new window, in full screen – click here.
Find out more - visit the AMRC’s 25th anniversary page on its website at www.amrc.co.uk.
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