One of Britain’s best-loved cooks, Nadiya Hussain, has opened up about how difficult it was for her to adjust to fame ahead of the release of her new cooking series.
The Great British Bake Off winner has said she was ‘quite delusional’, thinking she would finish the competition in 2015 and go straight back to finishing her degree.
But instead, the 39-year-old baker and TV personality, shot to fame — and in doing so, garnered attention wherever she went.
Speaking to the BBC today, she recalled going to the supermarket when the series was airing and being recognised by fellow shoppers.
She admitted it was ‘scary and destabilising’ to be approached by strangers wanting pictures, admitting, ‘I went in for bread and milk, and two hours later I was still at the supermarket.’
Nadia learned to cope with being recognised on the street, but subsequently faced a wave of racist abuse online.
‘There was constant pressure to prove how British I was, how Bangladeshi, how Muslim,’ She told the BBC.
‘And then I realised that by trying to please all these different groups, I was just displeasing myself.’
She added: ‘People are going to say I’m not British enough to do a trifle, or not Bangladeshi enough to do certain curries, but I just don’t really care. I’m quite happy in my grey area.’
Nadiya Hussain (pictured on the Graham Norton Show) has opened up about how difficult it was for her to adjust to fame ahead of the release of her new cooking series
Nadia (pictured) won the Great British Bake Off back in 2015 and has since then become a TV personality and best-selling author
Fast forward nine years and Nadia is now a best-selling author who is never too far away from our screens.
In her new series, Nadiya’s Cook Once Eat Twice — inspired by her early memories of cooking — she looks at finding delicious solutions to food waste.
Recipes include a carrot soup that transforms into a fish curry as well as a dish using banana peel.
Nadia said people are much more conscious of food waste now and want to save money — and ‘even a few pennies’ here and there ‘makes a world of difference’.
Her new show follows cooking series Nadiya’s Fast Flavours, travel show The Chronicles of Nadiya, and Nadiya: Anxiety and Me, where she opened up about her mental health struggles.
Nadiya has suffered from anxiety most of her adult life after bullies ‘flushed her head down the toilet’ at school.
She previously revealed her episodes are so bad she feels as if she is ‘going to die’ and something as small as a supermarket substituting a delivery ingredient can set it off.
In her new series, Nadiya’s Cook Once Eat Twice — inspired by her early memories of cooking — she looks at finding delicious solutions to food waste
Nadiya (pictured) looks at finding delicious solutions to food waste in her new series
Before her documentary aired in 2019 she had never had a diagnosis. But after seeing a specialist GP, she was told she had high levels of anxiety and was possibly suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder after the incident at school.
Now, Nadiya has revealed she has a ‘different handle’ on her mental health.
She told the BBC: ‘What I have accepted over the years is that it’s not something that’s going to go away. What I’ve done is really learn and understand what it is that triggers me.’
Nadiya won the sixth series of the Channel 4 programme in 2015, when the competition was still on BBC One.
The Great British Bake Off sees 12 amateur bakers battle it out over two months under a marquee and in the presence of professional bakers.
Because of Nadiya’s success on the show she was able to host cooking programmes of her own, write bestselling books, and bake the late Queen’s 90th birthday cake.
Since then, the show has moved to Channel 4 with all the central cast replaced bar Paul Hollywood.
The presenting team has also changed two times, from Noel Fielding and Matt Lucas from 2020 to 2022 and now Noel and Alison.