What can another trite, tropey, cliché-ridden Thai series centering around a cooking theme say that has not already been said? Both from a positive and negative perspective that seriously does not sound like a broken record (I know that dates me).

The story could have been an interesting one as it certainly did start out on an entertaining note. We have a struggling young man named Peach (Guide Kantapon) who developed a great understanding and finesse for baking from his Grandma (actress unknown). Both make a living by selling Grandma’s chiffon mini-cakes. Her chiffon mini-cakes have been instrumental in changing the direction of one individual in an orphanage where she has been delivering her cakes for many years. She gently dispenses, as a grandmother ought to, not just wise advice on baking but on how to live. She is pivotal to this whole story and is the fulcrum to Peach’s transition to fully realizing himself.

Shin (Ohm Thitiwat) was provided so much comfort by the eating these simple cakes when he resided in the orphanage that he decided to become a baker by profession. Along the way, however, he lost his humanity and began treating everyone with aloofness and dismissively especially if they in any way became or perceived to become disloyal to him. He has profound abandonment issues. His mental health concerns were more than merely idiosyncratic; they were toxic. He became arrogant, nasty towards others, and very mean tempered, and is hardly ever able to display even a simple smile.

Somehow, he along with two other very handsome young men form a pastry café with each having a specialty. Oab (Prame Nopanut) is the Manager of the café and has an unrequited love for Shin. The other baker is Guy (Poom Phuripan) who seems to have had conflict with Shin simmering for a while which boils over once Peach is introduced into the mixture. Peach gets employed in the pastry cafe because he is a good friend of Atom (Atom Nathaphop) who is Oab’s brother. With his domineering mother, Atom is forced to be involved in this family business but does so grudgingly and solicits the help from his close friend, Peach.

Initially, Peach predictably dislikes Shin because of his obnoxious personality traits, but learns to appreciate and empathize with him when he discovers that he now donates cakes to that same orphanage. They begin to understand one another. This then causes Shin’s glacial personality to melt. For some reason that is unfathomable, an attraction between the two begins. And when Shin finds out that Peach’s grandmother is the baker of those simple cakes he ate when he himself was in the orphanage, he transforms into something resembling a human.

Unfortunately, the story conflagrates from that point into standard cliché and trope storylines peppered with biting and caustic insults; painful jabs thrown around to make it an even more dysfunctional story.

However, let me list the positives first, so we can start on a good foundation:

1. The actors are astonishingly handsome, and the setting is breathtaking.

2. Grandma is adorable and literally ‘steals’ this series away from the main actors, which did not surprise me because at least she put in effort to make her part look real.

3. The desserts looked scrumptious, and I would be at that shop daily for its desserts and breathtaking eye candy.

4. Guide Kantapon as Peach is a complete scene-stealer. I find he is an endearing and remarkable actor. There is something about him that draws you into his characterization. He has an ‘it’ factor that is rare in BLs at least for me. What is that ‘it’ factor? His sincerity! He exudes it. He does not play act at it but displays a subtlety about his emotions that is so rarely seen. For example, when he is hurt, the hurt swells up in his eyes and deepens before he cries. That shows a magnitude of the depth to his emotions. And he does this throughout the series. For me, he is a BL actor to watch.

5. There is a happy ending if you like that sort of thing. And while it was kind of predictable, it also teased and hinted at a pending relationship between two others that is honestly still fun to speculate about.

That is it for the positives.

Unfortunately, while the story started out interesting, it seemingly did not believe in itself and resorted to using tried tropes, cliches and ugly ones at that:

1. Despite Shin’s sympathetic background, he is a first-class jerk and as such needed to be and should have been treated as such. Honestly, I am not sure that some of his behaviors or insults are worthy of forgiveness and sometimes there ought to be serious consequences of such childish, immature, and inexcusable behaviors as the ones Shin displayed. Sometimes reality ought to just suck, and he should have learned the lesson that his obnoxious and arrogant behaviors do have consequences. I wish the story would have taught him that lesson clearly.

2. While Peach is an understanding and patient guy, he even admitted that Shin ‘had no idea how badly he hurt him’. This could have been a serious and relevant question for review for two adults to discuss rather than making this series another Pollyanna one. At what point, does someone’s words and/or physical actions (i.e. shoving) become just too much and have crossed the line for forgiveness?

3. Oab and Guy are immature individuals and both their personality types and behaviors have been illustrated previously in other BLs ad nausea. It would have been refreshing if they had done something different with these characters rather than make them such a source of irritation. We all knew that at the end there would be redemption. That is how the story is supposed to be, right?

4. If you believe the love connection between Peach and Shin, then you have eaten way too many sweets that have caused the synapses in your brain to misfire. Again, the acting looked ‘cute’, more so on the part of Guide as Peach than the flat-affect of Ohm as Shin. The kissing scenes were laughable, honestly. Guys in love do not kiss like that. They kiss full on and with passion- not with lower lip touching upper lip of the other or vice versa. It is a clever camera ploy to me. I watched several times to see if this was happening as many of the kissing scenes seemed somewhat ‘off’ to me until I slow-motioned their actions and realized what was happening. I found that to be a cheap shot and that completely diminished any sense of sincerity in having us believe these two are in love. As a gay man, I found that an insulting portrayal of ‘love’.

5. This story overall is drab and dull. It is also not creative and uninteresting from the other variations of basic cooking themed series; many having been more entertaining because they made it ‘different’ or unique.

While I have great admiration for Guide as Peach, and he is a remarkable actor, I expected him to be good, and he was fabulous! However, who really is adorable in this series are two individuals who took their roles and made it their own. One is Grandma (unfortunately I do not know the actresses name). She gave warmth, humanity, and a touch of grandmotherly elegance and wisdom to this drab series. She refocused it on love rather than dynamics. She helps both Peach and Shin understand the value of taking care of one another and being with one another and the value of seeing the love within each. The other individual who is simply remarkable here is Atom Nathaphop as Atom. Often misunderstood, certainly by his dominating and controlling mother, he is astute, focused and fiercely loyal to both his brother and his friend, Peach. He displayed his inner conflict with not wanting to be where he is, but honestly not sure what he really wants to do. He showed us this internal struggle with great fortitude yet managed to not skimp or shirk on his responsibilities or duties at the pastry cafe. He took this small role and turned it into a big part of the story. He deserves a lot of credit for making this story feel more real than it otherwise would have been because he himself seemed so real and genuine. And honest. I would like him as a friend. Kudos to him for making this series feel like it was a ‘family’.

This series was disappointing. It could have been good but instead went down the usual path without any risk to storytelling to play it safe. I suppose many will find this enjoyable; I did not. The story moves too rapidly and is unnecessarily bitter to make any real sense; hardly any believable romance; a tease to a relationship that I would love to have seen extensively developed; and only spurious time for a character that deserved his own story as his conflict with himself as to what he wanted to do with his life and how to extradite himself from his controlling mother is worthy of a story. He was relatable at least.

Nothing felt original or relatable here and I felt cheated out of a promisingly good story.

Rating- 3 out of 5

Streaming on- Gagaoolala