Maureen Lipman hits out at TV cookery shows

Actress Maureen Lipman has criticised TV cookery shows for “pandering to” the nation’s obesity crisis by serving up “uncookable food”.

The Coronation Street star, 73, switches off programmes with Nadiya Hussain, Prue Leith and Gordon Ramsay.

“I turn off Bake Offs, Hairy Bikers, Master-Chefs – indeed anything with a hint of a spatula in it,” she told Radio Times magazine.

“I don’t care if it’s nice Nadiya with a mini-whisk, personality-plus Prue with her dangly sherbet earrings or repeats of Gordon out-effing himself, I do not want to eat my frozen meal-for-one in front of any of them.”

She told the magazine: “The whole country is watching people pan-frying things and all I can think is: What in the name of sanity do you fry in if not a pan? A bucket? A colander? A chamber-pot?

“They’re dribbling stuff over plates like Jackson Pollock on a lost weekend,” she quipped in reference to the paint-splashing artist.

“They’re piling food on top of itself like edible Jenga,” Lipman said of the block stacking game.

“They’re mixing and blending in a machine that won’t go in the dishwasher and takes a week to clean, and for whom?”

The actress said that while TV chefs donned their aprons to cook highly-complex meals, the high street is packed with fast food outlets.

“As far as I can see every shop in the high street of every town is a restaurant or a fast food take-away, and every store, library, garage and North Face of the Matterhorn outlet has a sideline in sushi, so who is actually doing all this cooking? Other than certain bloggers, Nigella Lawson and career vegans?

“There’s an obesity crisis and television is pandering to it by showing all this uncookable food,” she said.

Lipman spoke of Second World War veterans who recently marked the 75th anniversary of D-Day.

“Look at those magnificent veterans in Normandy recently. All they had in their youth was Bovril and tinned snoek sandwiches and they’re still out there, parachuting and marching into eternity.”

The full interview is in this week’s Radio Times magazine.