Nadiya Hussain, the World’s Nicest Baker, Is Full of Surprises

Nadiya Hussain isn’t as sugary sweet as she appears on screen. Just kidding—that’s a bald-faced lie. The master baker, whom you may know as the winner of the Great British Bake Off series six, as well as from her own Netflix series, Nadiya Bakes, was so lovely over Zoom that she even managed to make this culinarily deficient writer think I could make any of the hundreds of recipes that are featured in her next book. But what may surprise you is that the world’s nicest baker can stand the heat in the kitchen.

When I asked Hussain how she feels about America’s less than cordial cooking competitions—which may not be as good for the soul as Great British Bake Off, but will certainly make you just as hungry—she lit right up. “Although I love the whole nicey-nicey, ‘Let’s not be competitive, and let’s love each other, and peace makes the world go around,’ I also like the competition too,” she told me, almost conspiratorially. “I love the American versions where it’s cutthroat and it’s dog-eat-dog.”

So yeah, the jig’s up! Nadiya Hussain is secretly a vicious competitor at heart. Okay, maybe not. In fact, much of what the mother of three was thinking about when we spoke in May is what she’ll serve her friends and family when she’s finally able to throw dinner parties again. In short, cake.

“It’s not about one cake; it’s about all of the cakes,” she says. “For me, that’s the best bit. I’ll do a lot of biscuits, I’ll do scones, I’ll do cake. I love to have a buffet of cake so everybody can dip and dive wherever they want.”

And that’s just dessert. “When I have everybody around eventually, it’s going to be barbecue-slash-everything in the middle of the table,” she continues, describing the scene in her head as “carnage, wonderful carnage.” Okay, but can I come?

If that all sounds amazing to you, you’ll be thrilled about her book (now available), Nadiya Bakes: Over 100 Must-Try Recipes for Breads, Cakes, Biscuits, Pies, and More, in which Hussain promises will take you back to the basics—but with her signature twists, of course.

“This is for anyone who enjoys baking, anyone who wants to bake something that’s a little bit different,” she tells me of her latest venture. “In the last year and a half, two years, we’ve really embraced being in the kitchen as a natural part of our lives, so I’m really hopeful that people will find recipes in there that will become their favorites and recipes that they will use time and time again.”

Nadiya Hussain dishes on her favorite recipe from the book, her favorite cookware, and more in Glamour’s latest edition of How I Eat at Home.

Glamour: Tell me about your favorite recipe from Nadiya Bakes.

Nadiya Hussain: There’s a really good savory section in the book, because we can still bake in the oven and we can cook savory meals. One of my favorites is teriyaki-baked noodles, which lots of people are like, “You can’t bake noodles.” I can prove you wrong; you can bake them.

What are four staples that are always in your pantry?

I have to have onions because onions are like the holy grail of anything that you cook, whether it’s a curry, a stew, a risotto—whatever it might be, it always starts off with an onion. How can you have life without onion? So for me, it’s onions, eggs, and I would say garlic. I will put garlic in everything.

I think the fourth ingredient would have to be vanilla. Everybody says that vanilla is plain, but vanilla isn’t plain. It’s probably one of the most recognized scents, whether it’s a candle or whether you’re cooking with it. I use vanilla when I’m cooking tarts, I use vanilla when I’m cooking cake. So again, versatile.

Despite being unable to cook literally anything, I find your show extremely comforting. Do you have a comfort show?

This is really tragic, but I love watching things that are a little bit depressing because it makes me feel really good about my own life. Right now I’m watching This Is Us, and oh, my goodness. All the tears. Some days I just can’t do it, but usually it makes me feel good because they’re so unbelievably miserable on that show that it makes me feel really good about my own life.

What about a favorite podcast?

I’m quite nosy—I’m the person on the train that listens to people’s conversations. I think that’s why I really enjoy podcasts. At the moment I am listening to Tell Them I Am and Fearne Cotton’s Happy Place, which I really enjoy.

What’s the tool that gets the most use in your kitchen?

I’m a big knife collector. I love beautiful, sharp, gorgeous knives, so my knife gets a lot of use. That and my dishwasher, but I think of all of the things, my knives get used the most. Recently I’ve just started using Katto knives. These are these gorgeous Japanese knives that look like battered steel. Absolutely beautiful.

Noah Knife Set

$495.00, Katto

What is an edible impulse buy that you can’t resist when you’re at the market?

For me it’s Marmite crisps. You know Vegemite? Our version is Marmite, and they do chips in the Marmite/Vegemite flavor. I’m telling you now, there’s definitely crack cocaine in them or something. It’s so addictive. When I start eating them, I have no control whatsoever.

Twists are kind of your signature. Do you have a twisty recipe from the book you really love?

One of my favorite bakes is making my croissant bread-and-butter pudding. It’s made with croissants and simple ingredients that we have at home.

It is made with defrosted ice cream. So, it’s ice cream that’s just been sat out because, essentially, ice cream is frozen custard, and to make a bread-and-butter pudding, you need a custard from scratch. So all I do is just reverse the process. You can do that! You can defrost ice cream, you can put things in a pan. We’ll make a cook out of you yet.

Emily Tannenbaum is an entertainment editor, critic, and screenwriter living in L.A. Follow her on Twitter.

Originally Appeared on Glamour