JANET STREET-PORTER: Why is the Beeb so in love with Gregg Wallace?

Gregg Wallace is REALLY UPSET as a result of lots of people appear to seek out the best way he spends his weekends relatively odd. After rising at 5am, the previous greengrocer and barrow boy reads a ebook a few Russian nobleman for an hour, heads to the fitness center (which opens early only for him), works out after which dashes off to the native Harvester to shovel down an enormous fry-up along with his PA at 10.30am. Ninety minutes later, the telly presenter and up to date way of life guru is again at dwelling consuming a wholesome home-made lunch along with his pretty spouse and her Italian mother and father. That’s rather a lot to digest.

I labored with Gregg when competing on two sequence of Celebrity Masterchef, and received to know him fairly nicely, from his noisy rants onscreen to his current obsession with health. You could discover it shocking that after years within the brutal world of telly, I’m not terrified of ANYONE, however any encounter with Gregg generally is a tough expertise. I’ll be treading on eggshells and offence can simply be taken.

He’s thin-skinned, a mix of bravado and strident self-promotion allied with low vanity and sensitivity. A person who goes on the assault along with his ghastly jokes and foghorn voice (I do know, pot and kettle) earlier than you will get a phrase in edgeways. When he sees me, he at all times will get a putdown in first. I can cope with that, however then begins blabbering on with out drawing breath about no matter he is making an attempt to flog. He clearly thinks my job is to present Gregg area and shut up! And do not ever criticise – he’ll all of the sudden morph into sarky imply Gregg on the drop of a hat. God forbid an interviewer is granted equal time in any encounter.

Gregg Wallace is REALLY UPSET as a result of lots of people appear to seek out the best way he spends his weekends relatively odd

This time round, the speaking tannoy is upset as a result of some nasty souls on social media criticised him for implying he solely had his cute son to please his spouse Anna, 21 years his junior. In the excruciating description of his weekend, he seems to put aside simply a few hours to play along with his cute son Sid who has been identified with non-verbal autism.

If you learn your entire piece, it is clear he loves his son, and a touching little bit of honesty about being the trials of being an older dad has been taken out of context.

Gregg is steaming (I believe) as a result of persons are poking enjoyable at his preposterous makes an attempt at self-improvement – the step-counting, the manifesting, the curiosity in historical past, the War Games. He clearly agreed to the article to advertise his enterprise pursuits, managing to plug his wholesome dwelling web site (annual subscription £89.99), the native department of Harvester, his upcoming sequence of BBC1’s Masterchef, his new podcast A Piece of Cake, and his native fishmonger. Fair sufficient.

Anyone silly sufficient to set out their day by day routine is certain to seem like a pretentious twat to the remainder of us loafers. Remember Hollywood star and former rapper Mark Wahlberg revealing he awakened at 2.30am to wish, lastly going to mattress at 7.30pm and spending more often than not when he wasn’t praying understanding within the fitness center or freezing in a cryochamber to struggle the ageing course of. It was hilarious. Mind you, he is value one thing like $450million now, so the praying labored.

I don’t rise up at 5am and by no means fall asleep until midnight. I actually do not head to a Harvester for something I could make myself however, in accordance with Gregg, his time is so valuable he prepares only one meal every week for the household.

My day is as random as yours. I shout at garbage on the telly and waste ages making an attempt to beat a pc at scrabble.

I moan at my cabbage crops for not rising, so I suppose Gregg and I’ve some little habits in widespread. Not sufficient to get me a job internet hosting a serious sequence on BBC1 although!

This unlikely Casanova has even managed to get a gig selling Valentine’s Day – posing bare other than hundreds of strategically positioned crimson roses

Here’s the astonishing reality: BBC bosses bloody love Gregg Wallace. He’s by no means off the display screen. No girl of his age may ever compete with the cheery cockney, actually not one carrying glasses with a bald head shouting on the high of their voice.

It does not appear to matter that many feminine viewers discover Gregg a bit bizarre – and his blokey humour can sometimes land him in bother. He left the extremely profitable BBC2 sequence Inside the Factory in 2023 (after presenting it for 5 years) following studies that he made some feminine employees ‘really feel uncomfortable’ when filming on the Nestle manufacturing facility in York.

Gregg was distraught, saying ‘I exploit humour to calm down individuals…I by no means got down to offend’. But his joking generally is a bit brutal, designed to place off the Masterchef contestants and anybody he thinks is a threat- that is undoubtedly a Marmite character. No feminine presenter would ever be tolerated for being so impolite, however have a look at Alan Sugar… double requirements!

Do BBC bosses lower Gregg some slack as a result of he is from the working class and so they’re terrified that critics see them as too center class: Hampstead speaking to Chiswick?

Could this obsession with attracting decrease earnings blokes to observe the BBC be the rationale Paddy McGuinness appeared on Question Time this week? Although there have been some complaints, Paddy didn’t come throughout negatively and attracted loads of compliments for his opinions on Labour’s possibilities of successful the subsequent election.

If Greg has had a weak spot prior to now, it is ladies. Like me, he is has been married 4 occasions. Wife primary left after simply six weeks. Wife two – Denise, a former pastry chef – is the mom of his eldest kids, Tom and Libby. How Gregg met his subsequent companions is considerably uncommon. Wife quantity three, Heidi Brown, a instructor, caught his consideration when she requested him a query on Twitter about celery (actually) and though they married a yr later, it lasted simply 15 months. Current spouse Anna got here to Greg’s consideration when she tweeted asking if rhubarb actually went with duck. Greg admits he was impressed by her photograph and one factor led to a different. They grew to become engaged and married in 2016, along with his co-host from Masterchef, John Torode, performing as greatest man.

Having failed in enterprise 3 times, Greg is clearly decided this time round his new ventures selling wholesome dwelling and weight reduction ought to succeed. But he does not have to inform us he is an newbie historian, a eager reader, an avid step counter and that he had shed half his physique weight.

This unlikely Casanova has even managed to get a gig selling Valentine’s Day – posing bare other than hundreds of strategically positioned crimson roses. Funded by Smarty Mobile, he’ll be handing out free bouquets tomorrow on London’s South Bank.

Don’t all rush.