Ken Hom in the Vesper Bar at The Dorchester (Image: Jonathan Buckmaster for Daily Express) When Ken Hom's Chinese Cookery launched on British television screens 40 years ago, a nation salivated in appreciation. With his now customary relaxed charm, the Chinese-American chef served up exotic-sounding ingredients - soy sauce and root ginger weren't supermarket staples in 1984 - and made every dish in real time, in a British show first. "It was cooking unlike any other - even Madhur Jaffrey's," says Ken today of the Indian-born actress-turned-cook who had already seduced Britain with her curries.
"She would make something and say, 'Here is one I made one hour earlier'. It was the same with Delia Smith and Fanny Craddock." Ken's mouth-watering recipes translated to instant culinary success.
His book accompanying the series broke all records at the time for a non-fiction book, with 350,000 copies sold in 12 months. "I outsold Jeffrey Archer that year - a cookery book on Chinese cooking," he smiles with a twinkle in his eye. "It really took this country by storm.
" function loadOvpScript(){let el=document.createElement('script');el.setAttribute('src','https://live.
primis.tech/live/liveView.php?s=114945&playerApiId=v114945');document.
getElementById('ovp-primis').appendChild(el)}window.top.
addEventListener('primisPlayerInit',e=>{try{if(e.detail&&e.detail.
playerApiId==="v114945"){if(window.document.getElementsByClassName('jwplayer')[0]){e.
detail.float('disable')}}}catch(e){}});window.a.
