James Martin Celebrity Chef
James’ father was catering manager at the stately home - Castle Howard and James was brought up in a farmhouse in Yorkshire. At 16 he began his formal training at Scarborough Technical College, where he was Student of the Year for three years running.
Antony Worrall Thompson noticed his work, and brought him to London to work in the kitchens of 190 Queensgate, followed by dell’Ugo. James toured France, working in the kitchens of some of the old chateaux, often cooking side by side with the mothers and grandmothers of the grand old families. Moving back to England, he then worked at Chewton Glen for two years.
In 1994, at the tender age of 21, James opened the Hotel and Bistro du Vin in Winchester as Head Chef, where he daringly changed the menu everyday. Such was the success of this venture, there was an eight-week waiting list for weekend diners!
His television career began in November ‘96 with Ready Steady Cook and he was a frequent guest on Saturday Kitchen. He’s filmed several of his own series’ for Carlton Food Network: Kid's Eat The Funniest Things, Fifty Ways To Feed Your Lover, For Better For Worse, Simply Fish, Scouting About and Entertaining With James. He was the co-presenter of two shows too - Use Your Loaf and Master and Servant with Antony Worrall Thompson.
James recorded Kitchen Invaders, broadcast on BBC1 from January 2001 and he was the resident chef on Housecall for 4 years, BBC1's successful daytime show, as well as occasional co-presenter on UK Food’s Good Food Live.
His first series was linked with his Delicious! Cookbook for UK Food and his second series was called James Martin Sweet. In 2004 he spent several weeks in Yorkshire filming his third series for UKTV, Yorkshire’s Finest, which showed James sourcing and cooking local produce.
James was the presenter of two series of Out of the Frying Pan for Carlton TV in 2003 & 2004. In autumn 2004 James was co-presenter of a number of programmes in the Too Many Cooks series for ITV1. In 2005 James made two series of Castle in the Country (BBC2) cooking at Glamis Castle and Castle Howard. Most recently his Digs Deep series on UK Food is all about producing and cooking your own produce and was filmed in James’s own garden.
James has guested on a number of programmes, including The Heat is On for UK Living, Surprise Chefs, Junior Master Chef, BBC2’s Food & Drink, Channel 4’s Light Lunch, The Vanessa Show, Blue Peter, Children’s BBC1, Songs of Praise, Weekend Watchdog, Food for Thought, BBC Breakfast News, Carlton Food Network Daily, Superchefs and The Great Escape and he has made 45 live appearances on the afternoon programme Sky 1 to 3.
In 1998 he and some of his fellow Ready Steady Cook chefs stripped to The Full Monty on BBC1 for Children in Need. He recorded a 70 part daytime series for Channel 4 Why Weight? as resident chef. He has written a regular recipe column for Ideal Home magazine, been a contributor to Fresh, Delicious and BBC Good Food magazines and had a cooking page in the weekly publication Garden Life.
James gives many demonstrations of cookery across the UK each year at events like the Derbyshire County Show, Malvern and the Yorkshire Food & Drink Show and was involved in the 2004 National Fish & Chip Shop of the Year Awards. This last year he was Chairman of the judges of the prestigious Nestle Toque D’Or Award which he is repeating again this year.
His first book, Eating In With James Martin was published in October 1998 and his second The Deli Cookbook in autumn 2000. Great British Dinners came out in 2003 with Easy British Food following mid June 2005. Great British Winter was published in 2006. James's latest book is The Great British Village Show Cookbook, published in Feb 2007 by BBC Books, to coincide with his forthcoming BBC 1 primetime series. Also to follow a BBC 2 primetime evening, cooking series on desserts with a book to follow the series called Sweet Baby James.
James endorses a range of small kitchen electrical appliances with Wahl and a range of saucepans with Stellar. He is also involved with Underwood kitchens – a design and manufacturing company and co owns Cadogan & James delicatessens in Winchester. James also has the bistro restaurants on Ocean Village 1 & 2 cruise liners.