Clarissa appears on the screen to champion British garlic in a green and white flowing extra large blouse which drapes her lumbering frame. Her hair is dishevelled, her eyes lined and her skin sags more than it should do for her years. She looks tired. Extraordinary to think she is little over a year older than Lulu.
When she speaks, there is no doubt she is the right person to champion a cause. Indeed as a trained barrister she has the skills to do so. ‘Garlic’ she tells viewers as she rolls her vowels, projects her voice and bellows ‘has been grown in the England since Roman times.’ Her exposition of the history, growing techniques and difference in taste between the varieties was excellent as were her first two recipes – a medieval recipe for chicken cooked with whole garlic bulbs and a prawn and elephant garlic stuffed and baked tomato.
Where I think Clarissa let the programme down was when she flaunted her love of butter, cream, cheese and sugar in the recipe for nectarine garlic tart. Yes there is controversy about the role of saturated fat and its relationship to death from heart and circulatory disease but there is no controversy about the role of energy dense food and its effect on the waistlines of the great British public. Indeed Clarissa is living proof of this.
I know Clarissa is a hard person to take on but her truculent attitude to diet and health should be checked. Clarissa conquered her alcoholism which she writes about movingly in her autobiography ‘Spilling the Beans’ but clearly tackling her morbid obesity is a step too far. A pity she talks down the role of food in health so publicly.
