Nigella Lawson's Cook. Eat. Repeat. is the Christmas tonic we've been waiting for

This evening, the nation will be treated to the final episode of Nigella’s pre-Christmas cookery series.

Only, it’s not really a cookery series. Cook. Eat Repeat. is an exercise in storytelling, masterful communication, and finding the divine in the everyday.

Nigella doesn’t ‘cook in the kitchen’; she finds a ‘balm in troubled times…in what is both a sanctuary and a pleasure palace’. She doesn’t use ‘a loaf of bread’; she favours ‘a sandwich maker supreme’. She doesn’t ‘pour on anchovy sauce’; she summons ‘the rasping deep salinity of the elixir’.

It’s this linguistic wizardry that has the nation spellbound. Nigella weaves a narrative into every aspect of her dish – from the choice of pasta shape (dependent on the mood she’s in) to the specific liquorice to use from her internationally-refitted liquorice box (whatever that is when it’s at home).

She maintains a laser-focus on the ingredient at hand while sharing its unfailingly evocative associations – usually when she first discovered it on a clifftop in Italy while serenaded by Pavarotti or the like. She is never just cooking; but at the same time, she is only ever cooking.

So why has it been such a hit this year? Ask the nation why they tune in and it won’t be for the recipes. In episode one, she cooks fish fingers. From a packet.

In another particularly memorable scene, Nigella – award-winning chef and bestselling culinary author – cooks toast. And we’re riveted.

To explore this a little further, Nigella favours ‘the two-stage buttering approach’. Three primetime television minutes later, it transpires that what this means is she butters it twice. But it’s not so simple. The butter must be spread in ‘golden patches’, and it – critically – must be unsalted. Having spread her unsalted butter, all you ‘need to do is sprinkle some sea salt flakes over’. Let that digest.

Only by doing so can she achieve what she – with inspired imagination – dubs ‘the platonic ideal of toast’. Are we watching someone cook a dish that 1 in 10 people have for breakfast every day, or are we rewriting the ancient Greeks?

Nigella is always a success. She’s been a regular on our screens and in our newspapers since the 90s, displaying a longevity that today’s foodie influencers would sell their following for. She’s reliable (if not to everyone’s taste), fruity, fun to watch. The Christmas pudding of TV chefs, as it were.

But as the world descends into chaos around us, this year, more than any other, something about Cook. Eat. Repeat. has spoken to the nation. Despite the fact it is, of course, pure marketing genius - do we really think Nigella pronounces microwave ‘meecrowahvey’? - there’s more to it than that.

As COVID rages; Brexit discussions stall; and Europe closes its borders to the UK, Nigella graces our screens with a serenity that makes the Dalai Lama look like a junkie in need of his next hit.

Cook. Eat. Repeat. is an immersive, consuming experience; escapism in its purest form. This is enabled by, at heart, the brutal simplicity of the show’s premise. Nigella is going to tell you a story about some food, cook it, and then eat it. Or rather, luxuriate in its deliciousness.  

In a year when we haven’t been able to see our friends or go to the theatre, we’ve had to find joy in simple pleasures. During lockdown 1.0, puzzle sales were up 300%; banana bread became the most popular searched for online recipe; and it was hard to find someone who didn’t have a view on whether Carole Baskin did it.

In comparison to ‘Stay Home. Protect the NHS. Save lives.’, ‘Stay alert. Control the virus. Save lives.’, ‘Wash your hands. Cover your face. Make space.’ – while simultaneously eating out to help out and getting Brexit done – Nigella has kept it simple.    

Cook. Eat. Repeat. is about food and a love of food – aside from carrots cut into rounds which are labelled ‘infinitely depressing’. Not once in this series does Nigella mention COVID; not once does she acknowledge that she’s alone in every episode, whereas usual seasons would see her feeding a large party to conclude. She just is.

The show’s premise is that Nigella will share the ‘rhythms and rituals of her kitchen’. While most of our kitchen rhythms are probably more: ‘peel back, pierce, ping’, Cook. Eat. Repeat. provided a welcome distraction from the chaos of 2020. Escaping into a world in which the most important issue is finding the perfect pasta shape to go with your ‘jaunty mood’ or the sauce you’re cooking (from a jar) is just what the nation needed.

Written by Imogen Beecroft, Head of Client services at Audley