"I sometimes think the chef end of cooking is not the real end of cooking. Cooking is all about homes and gardens, it doesn't happen in restaurants." -- Delia Smith
Delia Smith CBE (born 18 June 1941) is a British cook and television presenter, known for her interest in teaching basic cookery skills. She is the UK's best-selling cookery author, with more than 21 million copies sold.
Smith is also famous for her role as joint majority shareholder at Norwich City F.C.. Her partner in the shareholding is her husband, Michael Wynn-Jones. Her role at the club has attracted varying media attention, from positive when she "saved" the club from bankruptcy, to negative, when making a controversial on-pitch announcement in 2005.
Already an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE), Smith was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) 2009 Birthday Honours, "in recognition of ... [her] contribution to television cookery and recipe writing".
"A cake is a very good test of an oven: if it browns too much on one side and not on the other, it's not your fault - you need to have your oven checked.""A measuring jug is also vital when cooking rice, as this is always measured by volume rather than by weight.""Although a food processor is not an absolutely essential piece of equipment, because you can certainly chop, grate, slice, knead and mix everything by hand, it does do all these things very quickly and efficiently and saves you time and energy.""But quite honestly I can't help being a passionate football supporter. If that's my sin, I'm guilty.""Food is for eating, and good food is to be enjoyed... I think food is, actually, very beautiful in itself.""Getting into the habit of switching a timer on will, I promise, save you from any number of kitchen disasters.""Good kitchen equipment is expensive, but most items last a lifetime and will pay for themselves over and over again.""I found in my whole career the best thing that can happen to you is that you hear what people want.""I have always read all the latest cookery books and magazines, from all over the world.""In 35 years of being in the media, I've had all this mud flung at me many, many times. It's not the first time. It's nothing unusual. I've been through it all before and the best way to deal with it is not to read them.""Memories are fallible and a timer can save a lot of hard work from going out of the window.""Remember, it's very simple to have an oven tested professionally, and it only takes about five minutes.""The chemicals in the dishwashing process tend not to be good for saucepans.""There are people who claim to be instinctive cooks, who never follow recipes or weigh anything at all. All I can say is they're not very fussy about what they eat. For me, cooking is an exact art and not some casual game.""There are three reasons why this book came into being. First, throughout the 33 years I've been writing recipes - although I'm not vegetarian myself - I have greatly enjoyed creating vegetarian recipes, and cooking and serving them at home."
Born to a Welsh mother in Woking, Surrey, Smith attended Bexleyheath School, leaving at the age of 16 without a single O-level. Her first job was as a hairdresser, and she also worked as a shop assistant and in a travel agency before starting her career in cookery.When Delia was 16, her boyfriend often complimented her, saying how good her food was. This was the nudge forward that made Delia take that step into cookery. At 21, she started work in a tiny restaurant in Paddington called The Singing Chef. She started as a washer-upper, then moved on to waitressing, and then was allowed to help with the cooking. She started reading English cookery books in the Reading Room at the British Museum, trying out the recipes on a Harley Street family with whom she was living at the time.
Smith baked the cake depicted on the cover of the Rolling Stones album Let It Bleed.
In 1969 Smith was taken on as the cookery writer for the Daily Mirror's new magazine. Their Deputy Editor was Michael Wynn-Jones, whom she later married. Her first piece featured kipper pâté, beef in beer, and cheesecake. In 1972 she started a column in the Evening Standard which she was to write for 12 years. Later she wrote a column for the Radio Times until 1986.
Smith became famous by hosting a cookery television show Family Fare which ran between 1973-1975. Her first television appearances came in the early 1970s, as resident cook on BBC East's regional magazine programme Look East, shown on BBC One across East Anglia.
Smith approached BBC Further Education with an idea for their first televised cookery course. Her aim was to teach people how to cook: to take them back to basics and cover all the classic techniques. Accompanying books were needed to explain not only how, but why, things happen. This led to her three Cookery Course books.
Smith became a recognisable figure amongst young people in the 1970s and early 1980s when she was an occasional guest on the BBC Saturday morning children's programme Multicoloured Swap Shop and did basic cooking demonstrations; she and host Noel Edmonds had a flirtatious way of interacting with each other back then. She purportedly phoned in during the reunion programme It Started with Swap Shop, though that particular "appearance" is debatable.
Her television series, Delia's How to Cook (1998), reportedly led to a 10% rise in egg sales in Britain, and her use of ingredients (such as frozen mash, tinned minced beef and onions as used in her 2008 TV series), or utensils (such as an omelette pan), could cause sell-outs overnight. This phenomenon — the "Delia Effect" — was most recently seen in 2008 after her new book How to Cheat at Cooking was published. Her fame has meant that her first name has become sufficient to identify her to the public, and the "Delia Effect" has become a commonly used phrase to describe a run on a previously poor-selling product as a result of a high-profile recommendation.
She created a stir in 1998 when she taught viewers how to boil an egg.
In 2003 Smith announced her retirement from television. However, she returned for an eponymously-titled six-part series airing on the BBC in Spring 2008. The accompanying book, an update of her original best-selling 1971 book How to Cheat at Cooking, was published by Ebury Press in February 2008, immediately becoming a number one best-seller. Items to have benefitted from the "Delia Effect" include the Kenwood mini-chopper, Martelli pasta and Aunt Bessie's mashed potato.
In 2005, Smith announced that she was supporting the Labour Party in the forthcoming election.
In 2009, Smith announced that in order to help Norwich City's finances, she has "been working extremely hard on another book and TV series." It is to be a retrospective of her 40 year career, "looking at how things have changed".
In 2010, Delia's latest television series, Delia through the Decades, was first broadcast on 11 January on BBC2 at 8.30pm. The show lasts for five weeks, with each episode exploring a new decade of her cooking.
Smith is also known for her spiritual books. She has had a varied church background. Having been baptised in the Church of England, she attended a Methodist Sunday School, a Congregationalist Brownie group and later a Church of England youth group. At the age of 22 she converted to the Roman Catholic Church. Her first two short religious books, A Feast for Lent (1983) and A Feast for Advent (1983), are readings and reflections for these seasons. In 1988 Delia took on the much larger challenge of writing a full-length book on prayer - A Journey into God.
Smith has developed other business interests outside of her culinary ventures, notably a majority shareholding in the Football League Championship team Norwich City Football Club, with her Welsh-born husband, Michael Wynn-Jones with whom she lives near Stowmarket in Suffolk. Both Smith and Wynn-Jones were season ticket holders at Norwich and were invited to invest in the club, which had fallen on hard times.
The editor of an Ipswich Town fanzine, Those Were the Days, alleges that Smith supported that team — local rivals to Norwich City — during the build-up to their 1978 FA Cup Final win. Smith explained, however, that she merely wore a blue and white scarf on the day of the Final for her appearance on BBC Television's Multi-Coloured Swap Shop, at the request of the show's producers.
On 28 February 2005, Smith attracted attention during the half-time break of a home match against Manchester City. At the time Norwich were fighting an ultimately unsuccessful battle against relegation from the Premier League, and in order to rally the crowd, Smith grabbed the microphone from the club announcer on the pitch and said: "A message for the best football supporters in the world: we need a 12th man here. Where are you? Where are you? Let's be 'avin' you! Come on!" Norwich lost the match 3–2. Smith denied suggestions in the media that she had been drunk while delivering the speech.
In July 2008, Smith rejected an offer from Norfolk-born billionaire Peter Cullum, who wished to invest £20 million in the club, but wished Smith and the other shareholders to relinquish their holdings.
From 1993 to 1998 Smith worked as a behind-the-scenes consultant for Sainsbury's. In May 1993 she and her husband launched New Crane Publishing, which produces the Sainsbury's Magazine and produced Smith's most recent books for BBC Worldwide. Smith was Consultant Director and contributed her own recipes. Although Delia and Michael sold New Crane Publishing in 2005, Smith continues to be a Consultant for Seven Publishing who now publish the magazine.
In March 2001 Smith launched her website, Delia Online. She uses the site to communicate directly with her fans, and offers a growing archive of her recipes. There is also a lively forum where contributors share recipes, offer advice about cookery skills and where to buy products. The website also contains information about Smith's latest venture - the very successful "How to Cheat at Cooking", such as where to buy "cheat" products, and a selection of some of the recipes from the book.
In 1996, Smith was awarded an honorary degree by Nottingham University, a Fellowship from St Mary’s University College (a college of the University of Surrey) and a Fellowship from the Royal Television Society. In 1999 she received an Honorary degree from the University of East Anglia and in 2000, a Fellowship from Liverpool John Moores University.
