A PEMBROKESHIRE bakery has risen from the ashes to be in the running for the title of Britain’s best bakery.

The Welsh Bakery, which has branches in Haverfordwest and Milford Haven, and a bake-house on the Thornton Industrial Estate, will be appearing on the ITV1 show Britain’s Best Bakery.

Run by father and son team Brian and Rob Davies, the family business suffered a blow last summer when a fire devastated its Haverfordwest shop.

On top of renovating the shop, the pair have had a busy year, attending the Pembrokeshire County Show, running a weekly stall at Haverfordwest Farmers’ Market, and being filmed for the second series of the ITV1 show.

As well as being visited by TV crews, the duo also travelled to ‘bakery HQ’ in England for a series of culinary challenges.

The first task was to create a ‘speciality bake’ – a unique product that “tells the story of that bakery and represents their region”. For this, Brian and Rob decided to celebrate their Welsh roots and create Dragon bread - a fiery loaf made with chilli, coriander and coconut.

Using coconut, mango, vanilla and shortcrust pastry, the pair also came up with the exotically-named Preseli Tropical Tart as their offering for the ‘wild card bake’.

The final challenge saw bakers go head-to-head to make a baker’s dozen of calzones. All following the same method, the task was designed to see how individual bakers would put their own ‘stamp’ on the Italian treat.

“It was quite strange having a camera in your face and having to do 15 different shots of everything,” said bakery co-owner Rob.

“Me and dad were both quite relaxed, and all the staff got into the spirit of it, despite being nervous.”

Between them, Brian and Rob have 70 years of experience, and Rob said the pair wouldn't have entered the competition if they didn't want to win.

But, he said he had been sworn to secrecy over the over the result.

Scrutinising their creations were judges and baking experts Mich Turner and Peter Sidwell.

To find out how Brian, Rob and the team got on, watch Britain’s Best Bakery on ITV1 this Wednesday (tomorrow) at 4pm.