Delia Smith refuses to watch 'MasterChef'.
Delia Smith isn't impressed by MasterChef
The 80-year-old TV chef admitted she's never tuned into Gregg Wallace and John Torode's BBC cooking competition because she gets annoyed by their critical approach.
Asked if she's ever watched the show, she said: "No. I spent all my time telling people, ‘You can do this’ and they’re undoing it.
"They’re saying, ‘No, you’ll never be able to do this’. What?”
The 'How To Cook' host also hit out at the show's use of kitchen gadgets, including a sous vide machine, which warms water to a constant temperature using a metal coil, which allows the cook to keep the process gradual and controlled.
However, she told the 'How To Fail With Elizabeth Day' podcast: "How could anybody possibly ever want a sous vide machine?
“I mean it’s what Elizabeth David called ‘theatre on a plate’. She had it in one. That’s what it is. These little dots and foams, it’s theatre.”
And while she has read some of her rivals' cookbooks for some inspiration on occasion, she doesn't want to make a habit of it.
She explained: "Sometimes. I think some of them are over-complicated. Half of them 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 on the whole I think it’s really lazy. But I don’t really look at [them] so I can’t honestly say.
"I just see these plates and they’re always hanging on the wall. I call it overhead photography, you know. And there’s all colour everywhere, and I’m thinking, ‘Ooh, I don’t want to eat that.' "
When it comes to her own style, Delia suggested her success comes from being good at "communicating".
She said: "If I had another life now, I’d like to study literature. And I think that things get overwritten.
"What I’m trying to say is that communication is trying to reach people. And I think to reach them it’s got to be simple and direct.”