Fanny Cradock

Fanny Cradock Cooks for Christmas is an archive doorway into an earlier television idea of impressive home entertaining. Cradock made presentation and transformation into a performance, supported by recipes viewers could return to in print. Her commanding manner is a very different experience from the reassuring teachers elsewhere here. She belongs as an influential figure in the history of televised home cooking, with the elaborate appearance of the food often as revealing as the method.