HAIR + MAKE-UP CARRIE JONES @CAROL HAYES
CHARLOTTE RICHARDSON ANDREWS MEETS FORMER GREAT BRITISH BAKE OFF STAR RUBY TANDOH AHEAD OF THE RELEASE OF HER NEW FOODIE BIBLE, FLAVOUR
PHOTOS LEZLI+ROSE
Ruby Tandoh has vacated Twitter, or so I discover some hours before our lunchtime Skype date. It’s an imprecise way to gauge someone’s wellbeing, sure, but quitting the micro blogging site when you’re prolific, high-profile and enjoy a follower count nearing the 100k mark is usually a sign something’s amiss. Particularly so when it comes to Tandoh; Twitter is where the Great British Bake Off star came out last year, signing off with a brilliant fuck-you to online trolls who’d accused her of flirting with judge Paul Hollywood to get ahead in the TV competition (“jokes on you, you massive shitting misogynists”). It’s where she dishes out breezy, emojifestooned food-as-self-care missives and shares her latest column pieces, VICE’s Eating Dirty with Ruby Tandoh, a gig that sees her reviewing the UK’s best-loved junk-food chains. I fire off an email, mildly concerned, but a reply just before our chinwag assures me all is well: she’s taking a brief break to “get some very overdue work done, I’ll be back on there within a week, I reckon”. Reader, she was.