CHANNEL 4’s Come Dine With Me has whetted people’s appetite for discovering their inner Jamie Oliver and entertaining at home.
More and more people are being inspired by a cult Channel 4 TV programme to entertain at home. Emma Pinch reports
CHANNEL 4’s Come Dine With Me has whetted people’s appetite for discovering their inner Jamie Oliver and entertaining at home.
Leading from the front in Liverpool is the aptly-named Ian Cook.
He is the 44-year-old former BT customer services manager, from Allerton, who collected the £1,000 prize three years ago.
From entertaining just four people round his table, he’s gone on to feeding up to 70 people at a time – after he chucked in his job and began a new life as a chef.
“My days of clubbing were over, so what I tended to do with friends was see each other in each other’s houses. One of the greatest pleasures in life is having good food, good wine and good friends at your table.”
His TV guests were vegan Nikki O’Leary, fishmonger Dan Redfern and traditionalist Margaret Twemlow, who served her seafood starter on the beach in West Kirby.
Nikki is now one of his best friends.
“My dinner was later on in the week, so we had relaxed with each other by then. There was a more mature lady in West Kirby who was a true blue Tory, who normally wouldn’t be my type of person at all, but at the same time she was lovely.”
There was the added pressure of having a film crew at his shoulder – and being at the mercy of the editing process. The crew followed him shopping in the morning and prepping his vegetables in the afternoon. But, he said, he managed to stay relaxed.
“My advice is to enjoy every part of the process. When you’re chopping your vegetables, have a nice glass of wine and turn on some music.
“My meal was very, very simple and based around the fact Nikki was a vegan, so I did roasted butternut squash and red lentil soup with garlic croutons, followed by whole roasted seabass wih tartar potato cake and parsley and cream sauce. I love seabass and my advice is serve what you love. For Nikki, I did roasted tofu with a tomato reduction. I wanted to be as inclusive as possible and make less work for me.”