Her wardrobe on The Great British Bake Off has earned almost as much praise as her culinary skills, but now the lengths that Mary Berry has to go to just to keep warm on the show have been revealed.
Mel Giedroyc, who presents the pre-recorded show with Sue Perkins in a tent in Somerset in the spring, told the Radio Times: “When we first started filming, in April, it was freezing so our main concern was to keep Mary Berry warm.
“She had four thermal layers on and two water bottles down the trousers. This year we discovered these marvellous heated belts called ‘hot trusses’.
“I was a big fan. They keep your stomach in as well, which is useful as the series goes on...”
Bake Off, which has returned to BBC2 with judges Berry, 78, and Paul Hollywood, 47, is filmed in a specially constructed tent. (AP)
Vintage advice from British vicars
A catalogue of bizarre, novel and sometimes downright offensive tips from vicars for achieving a better life has been uncovered by the British Newspaper Archive.
The catalogue of quirky tips includes advice to “thrash drunks” – be they man, woman or child – and to lie about your new wife’s cooking skills.
Keeping your mother’s “ripping tarts” a secret and “don’t be a mug”, are more of the gems of wisdom offered by Britain’s original agony uncles. Researchers at the British Newspaper Archive discovered the tips and hints once given by the nation’s vicars. (AP)
Drink driver eight times over limit
A drink driver caught by British police was eight times over the limit, a senior officer has said.
The 36-year-old woman was stopped at 7.25pm by Cleveland Police in Redcar and tests showed she had 275mg of alcohol per 100ml of breath. The legal limit is 35.
Ed Turner, the temporary Chief Inspector of Cleveland and Durham Specialist Operations Unit, said he was “shocked and astounded” by the reading.
Details of the incident last September were revealed by a Freedom of Information request and published by the Middlesbrough-based Evening Gazette newspaper. (AP)
Assange seeking Aussie Senate seat
In a departure from his public image as the ever-earnest fugitive, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has donned a blond wig to star in a video parody of an Australian singing legend filmed in the confines of the Ecuadorian Embassy in London.
Lip synching John Farnham’s 1986 Australian hit You’re The Voice, Assange made a pitch to Australian voters to back his troubled Wikileaks Party in national elections to be held on September 7.
Assange is the newly formed party’s star candidate and is running for a Senate seat in the state of Victoria, despite being confined to the embassy building for more than a year. It was filmed in London in July. (AP)
Modest start to drive-in ‘sex boxes’
Greeted by a press pack rather than prostitutes, the first customer to roll up to Switzerland’s sex drive-in on opening night on Monday took one lap of the facility before making a hasty exit.
The second car, a family vehicle driven by a man in sunglasses under cloudy evening skies, broke down and needed jump starting in front of a host of photographers, sniggering into their cameras.
Zurich authorities had said they expected a modest start to the country’s first so-called “sex boxes”, a row of drive-in wooden garages on a looping track where clients in cars can visit prostitutes, shielded from prying eyes and security cameras.
With an estimated annual turnover of around 3.5 billion Swiss francs, prostitution has been legal in Switzerland since 1942, with sex workers in Zurich required to have a special permit, health insurance and pay tax. (Reuters)