The search for Britain’s Best Bakery is on again as ITV gears up to screen the second series of the popular show, starting next Monday (6 January).

Last year saw Hambleton Bakery, in Rutland, named as the top bakery in Britain, and now six weeks of competition are about to begin in order to find the next winner of that accolade.

Sixty bakeries have been selected from across Britain, and will be scrutinised by judges Mich Turner and Peter Sidwell. They will undergo a series of challenges, including baking a Bakers’ Table of their best produce, a Wild Card Bake, and the Bakers’ Dozen.

Bakeries from across five designated regions will compete against each other. From Monday to Thursday three bakeries from a particular region will go head-to-head, before the regional final on Friday, during which one bakery will be chosen to take part in National Finals Week.

During the regional final, the week’s four winning bakeries will be required to make an afternoon tea, comprising at least five sweet and savoury items, as well as producing the Judge’s Choice Cake, where the bakeries are handed the same ingredients and tasked with making the same technically demanding cake.

Week one will see the judges visit Yorkshire, Northumberland, Co Durham, Derbyshire, Staffordshire, Edinburgh and Perthshire.