Happy Birthday Mary Berry

A Brit Talks Vintage TV

Hello there, and welcome to A Brit Talks Vintage TV, with me Jamie Dyer.

Now I'm going to ask you a question, and I want you to answer out loud. Like, state your answer in the air. Right? Got it? Good! Who would you say was your favourite all-time TV chef? Fanny Craddock? Delia Smith, Julia Child? Perhaps one of the younger contingents like Jamie Oliver or James Martin? I wonder how many of you said out loud the name Mary Berry. There has to be at least one.

Mary Berry has always been a fascinating figure to me. For my generation, she seemed to come out of nowhere. Like she was a nobody plucked from obscurity and placed as a judge on The Great British Bake Off. The truth is that she wasn't at all she'd had a career spanning many decades before she became known for pointing out soggy bottoms.

Aside from the many documentaries, cooking shows and fly-on-the-wall reality shows, nowhere is this more evident than in the many vintage clips that appear on social media and YouTube. Not long ago, the ITV Archive shared a clip of Mary Berry on Yorkshire Television's Farmhouse Kitchen discussing wine. She's also regularly seen cooking recipes in clips from Thames TV's Good Afternoon; Much of it is timeless and of use today.

Mary was born in 1935. She studied catering at college. At the age of 22, like Julia Child, Mary attended Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. Later, she became food editor of Housewife Magazine in 1966, then at Ideal Home Magazine from 1970-1973. She has published over 75 Cookery books. These are just a few of her accomplishments, there is so much more to discover. She was made a dame in 2021.

It was Mary's birthday this week, in which she turned 89 years old. Wishing Dame Mary Berry a belated Happy Birthday. And you, dear listener a Happy Easter.

So what else is there to say? I've said enough. If you have anything to say about the shows mentioned in this podcast, you can email [email protected], tweet @OldTimeReview on Twitter or check out the Facebook page, Old Time Review. This is Jamie Dyer signing off.