A bygone age of TV cookery

PAV’S PATCH:

ONE of my lesser known traits is that I like cookery programmes and in December I was able to enjoy a real blast from the past — “Cradock Cooks at Christmas” from way back in 1975.

It must have been terrible 35 years ago because at the end of one show, dear old Fanny (real name Phyllis) toasts the great British housewife for doing so well in such hard times.

Later, this woman dripping with jewels tells how she’s using gammon because she can’t afford ham.

And that’s where I should begin — the jewels. But let’s leave that for a sec. The biggest difference with 2010 is that no television cook today would be allowed a Christian name like Fanny.

Surely she would have to be Frances Cradock now, if only to avoid the rude laughs.

But back to the jewels, or at least Mrs C’s appearance. Today’s chefs, like King Gino the Ratkiller of Jungleland, always wear some sort of embroidered and suitably badged white smock. None of that for Fanny.

She presents wearing something akin to a ball gown and with ribbons in her hair. In fact she’s done up like a dog’s dinner, caked in make-up, and with huge drawn-on eyebrows.

To be honest, she could have been appearing as the dame in panto.

As for Fanny’s food, none of it comes out quite right. But having said that, it does look edible. It’s not full of tiny portions in the middle of a plate, surrounded by strange squiggles of coloured sauce.

What I particularly like is that she’s always at great pains to point out how easy everything is. She knocks a Christmas cake together in seconds and makes a rolypoly in the twinkling of an eye.

Another thing I like about Fanny is the way she calls everyone “my darling”, even though it’s said she was a right battleaxe.

And she’s always telling the housewife how she makes her husband happy. Today’s women — and Gordon Ramsay — really should take a leaf from her book.

Unbelievably, given what people like Mr Ramsay do, Fanny got sacked for being nasty.

In 1976, she took part in a programme called “The Big Time” in which a woman was going to cook a meal for Ted Heath.

Fanny looked at the menu and said: “You could kill pigs with that. Do you have any friends in Devon, dear? Living?” And that was it.

Bit different to Ramsay being sick and effing and jeffing.