I nearly choked on flirty Mary’s sauce.. from laughing so much

ust say I was surprised by the way Gregg Wallace and John Torode were speaking to that young female cook on last night. What with Wallace telling her how much he loves a bit of sauce. And Torode saying how much he’d enjoy whipping her with tree branches at an intimate Swedish sauna.

Then the pair of them joking about how long it had been since they’d had a young lady on her knees in front of them. OK, none of that actually happened on last night’s this first episode of her new cookery show. For a start, I was too busy laughing.

And I was also more concerned that her lavishly lacquered bouffant ‘do might go woof if she stepped any closer to Niklas’s roaring wood fire.

Mary’s fruity talk was, however, another example of what I like to call The Loose Women Paradox – a current TV peculiarity that feels even odder when it happens on the po-faced, PC and preachy BBC.

To be fair, there was one thing that did offend me about Mary’s latest venture. The idea that dishes such as eggs benedict florentine and wild mushroom galette are “classics” that we all enjoy on a regular basis.

Her lamb shanks looked amazing, though. She can pop round and slow roast my meat any time she likes.