Simon Rimmer aims to boost the nation’s confidence in the kitchen. Andy Welch reports

SIMON RIMMER is one of those TV chefs who has been around for years, consistently appearing on a host of TV shows but never really breaking through into the limelight.

But now he’s finally got his own self-titled series, and he couldn’t be happier about it.

Simon Rimmer’s Dinners sees the 46-year-old chef, from Wallasey, solve the culinary problems of different families and groups of friends. While he loved helping out, his reasons for enjoying the series so much are far less altruistic.

“The best thing about it was having people cooking for me,” he says. “I never get invited to dinner parties, because no one wants to cook for a chef, but I had 10 people cook for me on this series. That’s more than have cooked for me in the last 10 years.

“They were all nervous, but I’m actually a really easy dinner date. If someone else is cooking for me, I don’t care if it’s beans on toast or an elaborate gourmet meal, anything you put in front of me is brilliant.”

Unlike some food shows that make you feel guilty if you don’t have time to prepare a fresh meal each day for your family, Simon’s series accepts that food, no matter how much we enjoy it, might not always be at the top of our list of priorities.

“Most shows don’t allow for life getting in the way,” he says. “Hopefully the people I visited will come out of it the other side with changes for the better, and they’re all problems viewers can identify with.

“The contributors fell into one of two camps really – they’d have a repertoire of five, six or 10 dishes that they’d cook really well, and they’d constantly fall back on those dishes. They just needed some inspiration to take it to the next level or to make things easier for themselves. The other group were people who had dietary requirements.

“We had one little girl with coeliac disease (a reaction to gluten found in wheat) and her parents were finding it hard, as there’s an incredible number of things on the supermarket shelves with hidden wheat in. Soy sauce, for example, has wheat in but you’d never imagine it did.”

As Simon discovers, the mum of that family was cooking three separate dishes each night: one for her and her husband, another for her son and another – wheat-free – meal, for her daughter.

“This lady was spending her entire day cooking, and while she liked it, it’s not what she intended her life to be, so I tried to find things that were kid and adult-friendly, and suitable for someone with coeliac, too, so no one felt like they were eating someone else’s food.

“We did a chicken pie, but with mashed potato instead of pastry, and chocolate meringues for dessert, so no worries about gluten there.

“In doing that, we reduced the lady’s cooking time by 75%, too, giving her back her evenings.”

Another problem faced in the series came in the shape of three master builders who live together in a small Devon village, but arrive back from work after the local shop has shut. “They were driving 15 miles to the nearest supermarket all the time, so that was no good,” says father-of-two Simon.

“I gave them store-cupboard recipes, like fishcakes that use tinned salmon, for example, or used more frozen stuff to make good dishes.

“None of the dishes in the series take longer than 35 minutes either. If you’ve been working all day, you object to standing over a hot stove for two hours for something that is fundamentally just your tea.

“I won’t spend longer than that cooking for myself and I’m a chef.

“You want something that’ll go from raw to in your mouth in about half an hour, and that’s a big premise of the show.”

Simon has been on TV for several years now, having started out on now-defunct digital channel Granada Breeze.

He’s also appeared on This Morning, CBBC’s Xchange, Gloria’s Open House, and Great British Menu and has been the resident chef on Something For The Weekend since it began in October, 2006.

“We’re coming up to three years on air now, and we’ve been commissioned until 2011,” he says of the BBC Two show.

“It’s a fantastic show to do, I’m so lucky,” he says. “I do think it’s the best job in telly. On a Sunday morning I get to mess about, cook some nice food, speak to the fantastic guests we have and I get paid! What’s not to like?”

Part of the weekly magazine show has Simon cooking a dish with one of the guests. Some are good, competent cooks and can follow instructions. Others aren’t quite so gifted in the kitchen, however.

“I think Joe Swash, from EastEnders, is my favourite guest so far,” says Simon. “He’s barking mad, and has this idea he’s a good cook. He really isn’t.”

So who would be his dream cooking partners? “I’d like to cook with Kenny Dalglish, because he’s my ultimate hero,” says Simon, a lifelong Liverpool fan.

“I might not get much out of him but I’d be in awe of him. Equally, I’d like to cook for Cheryl Cole, but that’s probably for slightly different reasons.

“I’ve got this vision of her just wearing an apron. I think I work on that level for dream cooking partners, football and girls. I can certainly think of worse ways to spend a Sunday morning.”

SIMON RIMMER'S Dinners is on Good Food on Mondays