PORTRAIT: CHRIS TERRY
It’s hard to believe that having written five children’s books, four cookbooks, three novels and a memoir, Nadiya Hussain has only just released her first book on baking - the passion that launched her career five years ago as winner of the sixth series of The Great British Bake Off. Featuring her trademark imaginative recipes (matcha and kiwi swiss roll, earl grey sticky toffee pud…), Nadiya Bakes celebrates the special place that baking holds in her heart.
How does she find time to be a habitual baker? “When it becomes second nature, it becomes like doing the laundry or hoovering,” she says. “It could be just a stack of flapjacks or shortbread, but there’s always something in the house that I’ve baked, and I love that my kids know that. For them, baking is about feeling like you’re home.” It’s a timely sentiment. The nation’s appetite for baking has boomed in the uneasy months we’ve spent at home, with emphasis on its mental health benefits - something Nadiya, who has talked about her experience of panic disorder, is very aware of. “I often used to bake because I was anxious,” she says. “Now, I bake for work - but I also bake for calm.”