Delia Smith says she never watches MasterChef or read competitor cookbooks

TV chef Delia Smith says she doesn’t follow the BBC’s MasterChef with John Torode and Greg Wallace and doesn’t have time for other chefs’ cookbooks because they ‘infuriate’ her

Culinary queen and TV presenter Delia Smith revealed she never watches MasterChef and rarely watches other people’s cookbooks because they make her uncomfortable.

The connoisseur, 80, admits she has never even heard of many of the ingredients her competitors use in their recipes.

And she was successful at the BBC cooking competition – organized by Gregg Wallace and John Torode – because of criticism of the contestants, which she said undermined the style that encouraged home cooks. hers.

When asked if she had ever watched the popular show, Delia said: “No. I’ve spent all my time telling people, ‘You can do this,’ and they’re undoing it. They are saying, ‘No, you will never do this’. What?”

She also criticized the program for including kitchen gadgets such as a sous camcorder, which uses a metal coil to warm water to a constant temperature, allowing for a gradual and controlled pace of cooking.

Delia, whose simple How to Cook TV series was a hit in the late 1990s, added: “How could anyone want a sous camcorder?

“I mean what Elizabeth David calls ‘disc theatre. She had it in one. That’s what it is. These little dots and foam, that’s theater. “

Renowned author Delia also includes kitchen knives in her competitors’ cookbooks for their dishes and presentation.

When asked on the How To Fail With Elizabeth Day podcast if she’s ever watched them, Delia replied: “Sometimes. I think some of them are too complicated.

“Half of it, I don’t know what the ingredients are, I’ve never heard of it. Two tablespoons of what? I don’t know what they are.

“But overall, I think it’s really lazy. But I don’t really look at it [them] So I can’t honestly say.

“I only see these plates and they are always hanging on the wall. I call it aerial photography, you know. And there’s all the colors everywhere, and I’m thinking, ‘Oh, I don’t want to eat that. “

Today Delia has a new book called You Matter.

It’s the beginning of cooking, discovering human nature and how when we take the time to reflect we realize that we are all important, we are all unique. and we all play an important and responsible part in the universe.

When Elizabeth asked if Delia thought she was a good writer now after saying she wasn’t a teenager, she replied, “I’m not sure. I do not know. I think what I’m good at is communication.

“I think a lot of what I write has been edited, but I think I only had one intention, to reach people.

“If I had a different life now, I would like to study literature.

“And I think everything will be overwritten. What I mean is communication is trying to reach people. And I think reaching them should be simple and direct. “