The Splendid Table is supported by our friends at Sarah Nevada Brewing Company,

who believe that craft beer is a staple in today's kitchen,

and they're bringing it to yours. With a beer-infused recipe at the end of this podcast,

created by Sarah Nevada Executive Chef Jesse Massey.

I'm Francis Lam, and this is The Splendid Table from APM.

So if you're like me, you have spent dozens of evenings over the past few years

watching a great British baking show. It's such a sweet mellow hour, you know,

it's a competition show where the contestants are all regular people,

or just doing their best. They really seem to genuinely like each other,

and the stakes are never that much higher than a nice piece of cake.

It's a ball for these intense times, but it's not to say that the show doesn't have character.

A lot of that character comes from the judges.

For the past five seasons, Prue Leaf has been one of those judges, the one with the fabulous

sense of style, and who always likes it when the beggar's booze up their desserts a little.

She's caring, and supportive, and before you start thinking, though, that she's just a nice

lady on TV who likes rum cake, she's got a whole groundbreaking history as a chef,

restaurateur, and cooking teacher. She's got a new book called Bliss on Toast,

and she joins us now. Hi Prue, it's so lovely to have you in the studio. How are you?

I'm really well, and I'm loving New York, and it's such an honor to be on this podcast.

I really pleased to be here. Well, thank you for saying that, and New York loves you too,

so we're glad to have you. And, you know, you've flown quite a way to get here to talk about

something as important as we're going to talk about, so I want to treat it with the level of respect

...