MY life through a lens

Celebrities share the stories behind their favourite photos. This week it’s Bake Off judge Prue Leith, 79

1949

This is me with my brothers, David [left] and Jamie [middle]. We lived in South Africa where my mother [Margaret Inglis] was the country’s best-known actress and my father was a businessman. In my family, food was rather like money: you didn’t talk about it. It wasn’t until I moved to France to become an au pair that I found everyone took it seriously.

1967

All the girls who worked for my catering company had attended the renowned Le Cordon

Bleu cookery school. I was lucky because the

Queen’s cousin, Lady

Elizabeth Anson, regularly asked me to cater for her parties and I found myself cooking for royals and conferences of up to

5,000 people. I ended up having to hire 500 staff, but I adored it because I love logistics. You have to get everything right, from the teaspoons to the table linen. I should have been in the Army.

1970

You can tell it’s the 70s here – what was I doing cooking in heels?! This is at my restaurant Leith’s. An early review said, ‘If you could rob a bank and were happy to risk being mugged in the steamy end of Notting Hill, Leith’s is worth going to.’ People flocked to it after that.

1974

I’ve known Mary Berry for ages, as this picture testifies – we’re doing an egg-tasting test with radio presenter Jack de Manio. I’ve always admired her because she’s never lost her interest in cooking, and she’s busier than ever. We both took on Bake Off in our mid-70s. Before I joined the show I asked Mary what it was like working with Paul Hollywood. She was very sweet, but said, ‘You’ll have to stand up for yourself!’

1978

I gave these donkeys to my late husband Rayne when we moved into our house in Oxfordshire. We treated them like family pets. Occasionally, I’d take the children, Danny [left] and Li-Da, to school on one donkey, and then give all the schoolchildren donkey rides. Can you imagine that today? We’d all have to wear safety helmets.

1989

This was a lovely day, receiving my OBE from the Queen. I managed to persuade the Palace to allow me to bring both children as well as Rayne; usually you only bring two guests. The Queen asked what I did, and I thought she looked rather abashed when I said, ‘I’m a cook’. I don’t think she’d given an award to a cook before, so I added, ‘And I write books’. ‘Oh, you’re a writer,’ she said.

2017

This was at Prince Philip’s final Duke of Edinburgh Awards presentation ceremony. I knew him from my time as chair of the Royal Society of Arts, of which he was president. He could be good fun, but also got quite shirty if he was opposed. After I’d stepped down, the RSA commissioned his portrait, which was sponsored by Bernard Matthews of turkey fame. The artist, perhaps eager to make headlines, painted his neck like a turkey’s. The Prince was good-humoured about it, but did ask that it wasn’t hung in the main lobby.

2018

I hadn’t realised I was taking on something so special to the nation when I joined Bake Off. People assume Paul Hollywood’s as hard as nails, but he’s very soft-centred. Sandi Toksvig is like a mother hen; she clucks around, worrying if the bakers are unhappy. And Noel Fielding is like a big puppy – you never know what’s going to come out of his mouth. I don’t think he knows either!