“It is impossible not to love someone who makes toast for you. ”

“I understood that if ever one wanted to live with someone you cooked for them and they came running. But then it is my idea of hell these days, living with someone. The idea of sharing your life with someone is just utterly ghastly. I know why people do it, but it's never a good idea.”

“Well let's face it, who on earth besides antique dealers and gay couples actually still give dinner parties?”

“Believe me when I tell you that there is no lie quite so obvious as the one where you try to protest that you have washed your face ready for bedtime while you are still sporting an enormous ear-to-ear purple smile of dried Ribena.”

“I cannot go any further without mentioning my favourite biscuit of all time, now sadly, tragically, extinct. The oaty, crumbly, demerara notes of the long-forgotten Abbey Crunch will remain forever on my lips. I loved the biscuit as much as anything I have ever eaten, and often, in moments of solitude, I still think about its warm, buttery, sugary self.”

“Pamper a tomato, overfeed it, overwater it and you will get a Paris Hilton of a tomato.”

“I am a winter person, never happier than on a clear, frosty morning.”