Mary Berry
Mary Berry | |
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| File:Mary Berry BBC Good Food 2011.jpg | |
| Born | 24 March 1935 |
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| Culinary career | |
Television show(s)
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| Website | www |
Mary Berry, CBE (born 24 March 1935) is a British food writer and television presenter. After being encouraged in domestic science classes whilst at school, she went to college to study catering. She then moved to France at the age of 17 to study at Le Cordon Bleu school, before working in a number of cooking related jobs. She has published over 70 cookery books (her first being The Hamlyn All Colour Cookbook in 1970) and hosted several television series for the BBC and Thames Television. Mary is an occasional contributor to Woman's Hour and Saturday Kitchen. She has been a judge on the BBC Two television programme The Great British Bake Off since its launch in 2010.
Early life and career
Aged 13, Berry contracted poliomyelitis and had to spend three months in hospital. This resulted in Berry having a twisted spine, a weaker left hand and thinner left arm. Berry has said that the period of forced separation from her family whilst in hospital "toughened [her] up" and taught her to make the most of every opportunity. [1]
Berry attended Bath High School, where she described her academic abilities as "hopeless" until she attended domestic science classes with a teacher called Miss Date who was particularly encouraging of her cooking abilities.[2] Her first creation in the class was a treacle sponge pudding which she took home, and her father told her that it was as good as her mother's.[2]
She went on to take a catering course at Bath College of Domestic Science,[2] and a qualification from the French Le Cordon Bleu school at the age of 17.[3] She recalled that the temporary move to France came as a culture shock; she couldn't help but cry all the way through her first meal; it was horse meat, reminding her of the pony she had left behind at home in Bath.[3] She worked at the Bath electricity board showroom and conducted home visits in order to show new customers how to use their electric ovens. She would typically demonstrate the ovens by making a Victoria sponge, a technique she would later repeat when in television studios in order to test out an oven she hadn't used before.[2] Her catchment area for demonstrations was limited to the greater Bath area, which she drove around in a Ford Popular supplied as a company car. Her ambition was to move out of the family home to London, something which her parents would not allow until she turned 21. At the age of 22, she moved to London to work at the Dutch Dairy Bureau while taking City & Guilds courses in the evenings.[2]
She left the Dairy Bureau to become a recipe tester for a PR firm and began to write her first book. She has since cooked for a range of food related bodies, including the Egg Council and the Flour Advisory Board.[3] She became a magazine editor by the time she had children, and only took five weeks leave on each occasion as there was no set maternity leave at the time and each time she risked her post being filled by someone else by the time she was scheduled to return.[3] She was cookery editor of Housewife magazine from 1966 to 1970 and of Ideal Home magazine from 1970 to 1973.[4]
Her first cookbook, The Hamlyn All Colour Cookbook, was published in 1970.[5] She launched her own product range in 1994 with her daughter Annabel. The salad dressings and sauces were originally only sold at Mary's AGA cooking school, but have since been sold internationally around Britain, Germany and Ireland with retailers such as Harrods, Fortnum & Mason and Tesco each stocking the product ranges.[6]
Since 2010, she has been one of the judges on BBC Two's The Great British Bake Off alongside baker Paul Hollywood who specialises in bread and Berry says that since working together, she has learnt from him. However, some viewers were outraged during the first series when a decision was made to make the contestants use one of Hollywood's recipes for scones instead of one of Berry's.[2] Her work on the show with Hollywood has led to the partnership being suggested by The Guardian as being the best reality TV judging partnership ever.[7] She has also appeared on a BBC Two series called "The Great British Food Revival".
In her own kitchen, she uses a KitchenAid mixer which she describes as being the one gadget she couldn't live without.[8] She has always had an AGA cooker,[9] and used to run cooking courses for AGA users.[10] She describes Raymond Blanc's restaurant Le Manoir aux Quat' Saisons as one of her favourites as well as the Old Queen's Head, local to where she lives in Penn, High Wycombe.[8]
She was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2012 Birthday Honours for services to culinary arts.[11][12] In July 2012, she was given an honorary degree for her lifelong achievements in her field by Bath Spa University which incorporates the former Bath College of Domestic Science.[13] A few days later, on July 29th 2012, she appeared as the guest on the long-running BBC radio programme Desert Island Discs.
Personal life
Berry's father, Alleyne W S Berry, was a surveyor and planner who served as Mayor of Bath in 1952 and was closely involved in establishing the University of Bath at Claverton Down. Her mother was a housewife, who on occasion helped Berry's father with bookkeeping.[3] Mary married her husband Paul in 1966,[3] a retired seller of antique books. They have three children, Thomas who has become a tree surgeon; Annabel who looks after three children of her own and who went into business with Mary aged seventeen to market her eponymous salad dressings and William, who died in a car accident at the age of nineteen whilst a student at Bristol Polytechnic[2] Mary and Paul own two dogs, Millie and Coco.[3]
Publications
Mary Berry has written more than seventy cook books since her first book was published in 1970,[3] and has sold over five million cook books.[5] She regularly works with Lucy Young on her cook books, her assistant for over twenty years.[14]
References
- ^ Berry, Mary (26 January 2013). "'My childhood polio helped me survive the darkest days of my life': Mary Berry reveals how she coped with her son's tragic death". The Daily Mail. Retrieved 26 Jan 2013.
- ^ a b c d e f g Pownall, Elfreda (11 September 2011). "Mary Berry: queen of cakes". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 31 March 2012.
- ^ a b c d e f g h Foster, Jill (8 October 2011). "All rise for Mary queen of cakes! Great British Bake Off judge shares a few slices of her wisdom". The Daily Mail. Retrieved 31 March 2012.
- ^ "Mary Berry". UKTV Food. Retrieved 31 March 2012.
- ^ a b "Mary Berry". Quadrille Publishing. Retrieved 31 March 2012.
- ^ "Mary Berry's Salad Dressings & Sauces". Mary Berry.co.uk. Retrieved 31 March 2012.
- ^ Heritage, Stuart (7 September 2011). "Mary Berry and Paul Hollywood: the best reality TV judges ever?". The Guardian. Retrieved 31 March 2012.
- ^ a b Montgomery, Hugh (14 August 2011). "Mary Berry: 'I freeze leftover wine so I can add it to gravy and cheer it up'". The Independent. Retrieved 31 March 2012.
- ^ "Mary Berry and her blue 4-oven". AGA. Retrieved 31 March 2012.
- ^ "Aga Workshops". Mary Berry.co.uk. Retrieved 31 March 2012.
- ^ "No. 60173". The London Gazette (invalid
|supp=(help)). 16 June 2012. - ^ "Mary Berry receives CBE".
- ^ "Bath Spa University announces honorary degrees for 2012". Bath Spa University. Retrieved 20 July 2012.
- ^ "Cook up a feast". The Press and Journal. 18 December 2010. Retrieved 31 March 2012.