Bake Off viewers will think I either fancy or hate Paul Hollywood, says Nigella Lawson
Bake Off viewers will think I either fancy or hate Paul Hollywood, says Nigella Lawson
Jacob StolworthySat, September 5, 2026 at 8:48 AM UTC
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'Bake Off' stars Nigella Lawson and Paul Hollywood (Channel 4)
There was much excitement among Great British Bake Offviewers when Nigella Lawson was announced as the new judge, with many wondering what her dynamic with Paul Hollywood would be.
There’s been plenty of unverified reports about tensions behind the scenes since Lawson took over from Dame Prue Leith as a judge on the Channel 4 show, following the 86-year-old's announcement in January that she would be stepping down.
But Lawson, 66, said she isn’t fussed about these assumptions when predicting what she thinks fans will conclude when the first episode of the new series airs.
In a new interview with The Times, she said: “What will people say of us on the programme? I feel that half will go, ‘Oh, there’s clearly something going on with them,’ and the other half will say, ‘Oh, clearly they don’t like each other at all.’ And I feel like that’s fine.”
The TV chef said it’s been “a treat” to film something surrounded by people, as opposed to her BBC specials, which she mostly shoots online.
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“I’ve spent a lot of my professional life alone in a room, writing or pacing around thinking,” she added. “It’s actually really lovely to be with lots of people. For me, it’s a sort of treat. I love solitude, I need solitude, but it’s really good to have a working life that feels companionable.”
She said that she is judging contestants based on the taste of their bakes, while Hollywood is “Like the Terminator when he walks into a room and spots the middle layer is half a millimetre shorter than others”.
Lawson also rallied against the suggestion that she intentionally uses sexual innuendos, and is actually “embarrassed” by the firestorm her comments cause, stating: “I don’t get it. But it always looks a bit pathetic to go, ‘I don’t know.’ I mean, sometimes I’m aware just afterwards that there is something. I have, in the course of filming, sometimes said something and there is sniggering, and I just look amazed.”
Nigella Lawson claims she’s never intentionally used sexual innuendo: ‘I’m amazed’ (BBC)
Alison Hammond and Noel Fielding are back as hosts of the show, in which Channel 4 said viewers "can expect to see Nigella bringing her trademark warmth, wit and passion for flavour to the tent".
Speaking on ITV’s This Morning in January about joining Bake Off, Lawson said: “I am excited, but I take it very seriously.
“The thing about Bake Off is that it’s about the programme – which is an institution of national treasure status – and it’s about the bakers, and I just want to be there and be a part of it.”
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
