Mary Berry

by A. S. Dagnell

  But as is often the case with reality shows, that wasn’t the end. Critics were up in arms about Janet’s axing. It was, they suggested, brutal and unfair – she should have been given another chance.

  Sarah Rainey in the Daily Telegraph even admitted to shedding tears over Janet’s demise. She wrote that Janet had ‘become a big part of my life over the past eight weeks. Despite her best efforts to roll the sponge into a spiral, the unruly pudding fell apart, spilling whipped cream everywhere, leaving Janet – and me – reaching for a hanky.’ She added, ‘A crumb out of place, an over-baked pastry or a misshapen biscuit is enough for a contestant to be sent back to baking obscurity. Just look at what happened to poor Janet.’

  In the tough world of reality TV, no one, not even a kindly grandmother from the northwest, is safe. Mary herself admitted she was surprised by the reaction, not least from her own relatives. Mary, a grandmother of five herself, says the youngsters in her family were beside themselves when Janet got the boot. ‘They watch the programme, and I had one phone call from Gracie absolutely sobbing, Granny, why did you send Janet home?’ Mary told Desert Island Discs. ‘We love Janet. You’re wrong!’

  Perhaps Mary, the gentle middle-class mayor’s daughter, had a more cut-throat side than her public credited her with? Could she, in fact, have unwittingly and against all expectations become the latest TV cook to turn nasty on a reality show? Perhaps the producers had got her and Paul’s roles mixed up? Mary laughed off the suggestion. ‘Simon Cowell, watch out!’ she giggled, referring to the mogul behind the international TV singing competition The X Factor in an interview with the Daily Express. But while Mary may have achieved newfound fame thanks to her role as TV judge, she insists her principles still remain the same as when she first started out in the industry as a recipe tester for a string of London-based firms. Her judging style, she says, is as sickly-sweet as her treacle sponge recipe. ‘I don’t want to be unkind to the contestants, because it might put people off,’ Mary told the Daily Express. ‘The dramas happen naturally when people drop and burn things. We don’t want loads of tears and whatever. I’m there to comfort them and to say, “Come on, let’s mend it or do it again.”’

  It’s fair to say that the landscape of television has changed considerably since Mary first appeared on the box on Judith Chalmers’s teatime talkshow Afternoon Plus in the 1970s. Fierce competition, real-life dramas and fly-on-the-wall scenarios became the bread and butter of modern TV hits during the 2000s, something Mary had never been a part of … until GBBO came knocking.

  But it appears that the reason for Mary’s popularity on the show, agreed on by viewers and critics, is that Mary refuses to conform to any stereotypes of what a reality TV judge should be. Quite simply, she is herself – the same person the British public fell in love with when she released her first cookery book more than 40 years before the show hit our screens. Episodes like Janet’s dismissal aside, Mary maintains that her approach to the role of judging is very different to Paul’s. They are from different walks of life – Mary came from a middle-class family before studying at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris and domestic science at her local college in Bath, while Paul learnt from his father in the family bakery before setting up shop by himself. Mary says she’s more than happy for her colleague to take on the role of the tough-talking judge, while she continues to be more nurturing. ‘Paul is more exacting,’ Mary told the Daily Express. ‘I don’t care if it would make better TV for me to be unkind. We want people to be encouraged to bake.’

  And it appears that Mary’s kindly approach has achieved just that. Supermarket chain Morrisons claims that the Great British Bake Off has prompted millions of sweet-toothed viewers to get busy in the kitchen. Sales of baking trays have risen by 25 per cent since the second series began, while sales of ingredients are up 10 per cent. More than 23,000kg of flour and 2,200kg of marzipan were shifted in the space of one week. Shoppers have also bought 360 litres of vanilla extract and 15,000 bottles of food colouring. A spokesman for the chain said: ‘We thought the show would inspire the nation so we made sure our baking aisle was fully stocked. It’s a good job we did, given the sales increase.’ Meanwhile, during the second series of GBBO, John Lewis reported that since the show had begun that August, sales of cake tins and muffin trays had risen by 15 per cent, and cookie cutters and cake stands by 10 per cent. This wasn’t a new phenomenon, though. Supermarkets had long since become accustomed to what became known as the ‘Delia Effect’, where products used by much-loved celebrity cook Delia Smith on her programmes, such as limes and cranberries, had flown off the shelves. But the Great British Bake Off was the first time anyone could remember baking staples selling in such vast quantities, and so quickly. If ever there was a test of popularity for a TV programme, this was it.

  On top of that, for the third series, a record 7,000 amateur bakers applied to join the competition – up from the 1,000 who had auditioned for the inaugural series. The show itself had been extended to 12 weeks instead of eight for the second series after producers saw how popular it was becoming. More masterclass episodes were added, too, with Paul and Mary showing the nation how certain iconic dishes should be cooked. Britain, it seemed, had gone crazy for the Great British Bake Off.

  For her part, Mary is clearly enjoying the show’s success. While she’s been respected by her devotees for decades, she’s since been introduced to new generations of fans, who perhaps would only have known about Mary through their parents’ – or even their grandparents’ – cookbooks. And Mary’s success as a TV judge is set to continue. Junior Bake Off and Celebrity Bake Off to raise money for charity have also been commissioned. Spin-off documentaries from the Great British Bake Off, which Mary has hosted alongside Paul, have also been a hit. More books are in the pipeline and her product line is set to expand.

  But Mary insists that, despite her age, she’s far from done. ‘An awful lot of people who watch Bake Off are actually cooking, which is wonderful,’ she told the Daily Express. ‘I come from a strong stock of people who enjoy what they do. My mother was 105 when she died, so you’ve got me for a bit yet. I enjoy what I do and so I do it. I feel lucky to be asked.’

  Working is what Mary has always done best. Relentlessly, throughout her adult life, she has – perhaps almost inadvertently – grafted her way to the top of the cookery industry in Britain. She has never rested on her laurels, despite her success, and has been driven by her love of baking to keep on going. ‘I just love every single working day, whether I’m writing a cookery book, doing an Aga cookery demonstration or presenting cookery on TV,’ she said in 2007 in an interview with the Scotsman. ‘As soon as I left school I knew I wanted to pursue my passion for food and cooking. I was determined to take advantage of every opportunity that came my way. In college holidays I worked, hands on, for spells in a butcher’s, a baker’s and a fish shop. Along the way I did, and still do, try my very best, but I make sure that I enjoy it too.’ So while it may seem that GBBO has made Mary a star, the reality is that she was a force to be reckoned with long before the show was commissioned.

  After spending years working as a cook, Mary appeared to be in the right place at the right time as baking swung back into fashion the length and breadth of Britain. As the recession loomed and the doom and gloom of the economic crisis dominated newspaper front pages, people started looking for cheap, quick ways to cook up treats in the kitchen. Baking was the obvious choice. Rather than forking out hard-earned money on mass-produced cakes, biscuits and pastries, it seemed the obvious way to cost-cut while also continuing to enjoy the sweeter things in life. Handmade was suddenly back in vogue. Mary told the Daily Mail how important decent food is during hard times, and that it isn’t necessarily a difficult thing to eat well when times are tough: ‘People are a bit hard up now, with the financial crisis. Fortunately, home-made presents are appreciated so much more than flowers or chocolates. Everyone is chuffed to bits to get a jar of marmalade or a batch of buns. The other week, I was giving a t
alk to the Women’s Institute in Darlington and an elderly lady in the audience came up and gave me a box of biscuits she’d made. I could have wept.’ Other commentators suggested that the return to baking coincided with a return to the older values of bygone eras. While during the 1990s, many women embraced the concept of ‘girl power’ and rejected the usual stereotypes of staying at home, looking after the children and knowing their way around the kitchen, suddenly women appeared happy to play homemaker again.

  This return to retro values from the 1950s and 1960s gave baking a new lease of life that few could have predicted. Anne Harrison, chairman of Denman College, where the Women’s Institute cookery school is run, and vice chairman of the Women’s Institute board of trustees, told the Daily Telegraph: ‘Twenty years ago, baking was not popular – it was almost frowned upon. Now the craft of baking has come back into fashion. My granddaughter bakes, and recipes are being passed down through the generations.’ Mary has her own theories as to why baking has had such a huge resurgence in popularity in recent years. ‘Well, it used to be a bit plain, but since the fashion for cupcakes it’s become glamorous,’ Mary told Stella magazine. ‘But it’s also about the recession. How much does it cost to take your children to Legoland? You could spend the afternoon baking, which is very cheap, and you’ve taught them something, and you have a lovely quiche or some scones to eat afterwards.’ She added in an interview with the Daily Mail: ‘It’s a bit of joy in the middle of this recession. You watch a programme like this and begin to feel warm again. It’s what life is all about. Even if money is short, it doesn’t cost much to bake a scone. If you’re feeling a little bit down, a little bit of kneading really helps.’

  Whatever the reason for baking’s return to fashion, Mary couldn’t be more delighted that it appears to have been embraced by the British public once again. ‘There is tremendous interest in home baking,’ she told the Daily Telegraph. ‘And more people are realising that it is something that is enjoyed by all the family. Cook with the young on a rainy day, and it is educational: with all this weighing and measuring, it really teaches them something.’ But for Mary, baking is more than just producing cakes and pastries. It’s a way of life, and one that has been ingrained in her over decades. Baking transformed Mary from a wannabe cook into a household name, thanks to her cookbooks, product lines and TV appearances. But it has also taught her some of life’s most important lessons. She has long been an advocate of baking as ‘therapy’ and she freely admits it has helped calm her and understand the ways of the world during difficult moments. It’s also allowed her to connect with other people, she says. Most of all, it simply puts a smile on her face.

  She summed up the power of baking poignantly in a piece she published in the Daily Mail. Mary wrote: ‘Baking … keeps us connected with other people, which is terribly important as we get older. I’m always struck by how many contestants on the Great British Bake Off say they were first inspired to bake by their grandmother. There is often a deep connection there, and a treasured link to previous generations as family recipes are passed down. Older people often feel they’re not as needed or as useful as they once were, so to be able to contribute – by saying, for example, “I made this shortbread” when you serve it to visitors – is a huge reward. I have often been asked if other people bake for me, probably because they imagine anyone might run a mile from presenting Mary Berry with a Victoria sponge cake, in case I judge it. But I love to eat anything home-made. A friend gave me some jam the other day, and it was wonderful. She also brought along a few slices of her Christmas cake, which was still delicious, and I was delighted. For me, a home-baked gift is miles better than a bunch of flowers or a box of chocolates, because it involves thought, planning and time. And how can it be anything but good for us to indulge in something that brings such pleasure to the giver and to the receiver?’

  It is, therefore, easy to understand why Mary is so nurturing as a TV judge: in her view baking shouldn’t be divisive, but rather a uniting force. And whether or not she’s on television, baking will always be part of her life. While Mary Berry may be the latest cook to achieve TV stardom, it’s safe to say that baking has also made her the nicest. She has refused to let being a judge change her day-to-day life … and that includes her relationships with her closest friends, with whom she enjoys sharing the rich delights of baking.

  And with a philosophy like that, it’s no wonder that Mary is Britain’s best-loved baker. She is unrivalled in her knowledge of cakes, and loved by thousands for her kind, gentle personality. Mary is, quite simply, the undisputed Queen of British Baking.

  CHAPTER 2

  EARLY LIFE

  Mary Berry vividly remembers her childhood – and it’s easy to understand why. Despite partly growing up during the doom and gloom of the Second World War, it was seemingly an idyllic existence. ‘I remember during the war; I remember the house, the garden,’ she said to Kirsty Young when she appeared on Desert Island Discs in 2012. ‘It’s funny, even when I was very small, I can remember the three gardens that we had; I can remember almost every plant in them.’ Her parents Margaret and Alleyne worked tirelessly to make sure Mary and her two brothers never went without. Growing up on a large estate in Bath, Mary’s childhood consisted of great-outdoors adventures in the surrounding sprawling countryside, and opportunities that very few children her age were privileged enough to have.

  It’s fair to say that Mary’s parents wanted to give her the good upbringing they had both enjoyed. Both of Mary’s parents came from very comfortable backgrounds. Born in 1905 in Stanley Bridge, Lancashire, Mary’s mother Margaret was one of four children. She attended Harrogate College in North Yorkshire. Her parents ordered her to study elocution, so desperate were they for her to lose her northern accent and forge a career for herself away from the county, where they believed there were no prospects for her. They got their wish – after completing her studies, Margaret moved to Manchester and managed to get regular work as a jobbing actress in opera and theatre. Her charisma and love of fine clothes earned her a glamorous reputation and quickly made her a well-known name on the circuit. Eventually she got to the point where she took the lead role once a year at the Manchester Opera House.

  By the mid-1920s Margaret had met Alleyne Berry at a dance in St Albans, Hertfordshire. As was typical in those days, a relatively short courtship followed before Alleyne proposed. They married in 1929 in a lavish ceremony in Manchester Cathedral before moving to the pretty town of Otley, North Yorkshire, where the couple set up home. They only stayed there a short while before moving south to the Roman spa town of Bath in 1932, soon after the birth of their first son, Roger. The Berrys believed life would be more exciting in the West Country, and also felt there would be more opportunities for both themselves and their family than in sleepy Yorkshire.

  Bath, with its rich cultural history and exciting metropolitan atmosphere, seemed like the perfect place for them. A city on the banks of the River Avon in southwest England with a current population of around 84,000, Bath was established by the Romans as Aquae Sulis in around AD 43. The invading army was attracted by its natural hot springs – the only hot springs in Britain – which they believed had healing properties. The Romans built a lavish bath complex to take advantage of this precious water, which rose up naturally through the surrounding limestone, and their example was followed in Georgian times when Bath became a popular spa destination. The heritage of beautiful Georgian architecture built from the local Bath stone is evident throughout the city to this day. It attracts more than 4 million tourists every year, who take in the Roman Baths, as well as visiting the Fashion Museum and immersing themselves in the world of Jane Austen, one of the city’s other famous residents. In 1987 the city became a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

  It is easy to see what appealed to Margaret and Alleyne about the city, with its picturesque architecture and abundance of green space. They must have envisaged family outings around the town, perhaps relaxing on a Sunday afternoon wit
h the crowds in Royal Victoria Park, opened in 1830 by the 11-year-old Princess Victoria, which covers 57 acres and includes botanical gardens, golf courses and a replica Roman temple that was displayed at the British Empire Exhibition at Wembley in 1924. Or perhaps swimming in Beau Street’s public swimming pool, built in 1923. Between 1904 and 1939, the city even had a network of electric trams running through its streets, adding to the pleasant atmosphere.

  Bath was also a city with a sense of civic duty – thousands of wounded soldiers were rehabilitated in spa towns such as Bath following the First World War. During the Second World War, the Ministry of Defence’s naval department took over key buildings in the town from which to coordinate the war effort.

  When Mary was growing up, the city was recovering from the shock of being targeted by the Luftwaffe during a campaign known as the Baedeker Blitz. Between 25 and 27 April 1942, German bombers carried out three air raids in reprisal for RAF raids on the German cities of Lübeck and Rostock, damaging more than 19,000 buildings in the city and killing 21 residents. But civic pride and spirit meant that the damage was soon repaired.

  Once they had relocated to Bath, Mary’s parents were keen to give both themselves and their future family the best possible start in life. Alleyne, a trained surveyor, set up the business that was later to become Berry, Powell and Shackell; he ran it out of the back of an old post office in Bath. Despite its humble beginnings, his auctioneering and valuation firm grew to become one of the largest such firms in the southwest of England. As was typical in the 1930s, Margaret, a keen bridge player, was a housewife, but would often help her husband part-time with the business’s bookkeeping and accounts. But while the business eventually became a big success, in years when they were building it up times weren’t always easy. Mary recalls how her father, a keen photographer, won a £100 prize from a local newspaper after he sent in a snap he had taken of Margaret on a seesaw on the beach for Mary and her brother Roger. In 1938, when Alleyne won the competition, £100 was a princely sum, and Mary’s father would often tell her ‘You don’t know what it meant to us,’ for years after. Mary’s family understood the value of money and tried their best to instil this ethos in her from a young age.