Roaring success for hairy bikers

Aug 18 2008 by Jane Hall, The Journal

SIMON KING is enjoying an all too rare sojourn back in his native North East. Since he and fellow Hairy Biker Dave Myers’s shared passion for cooking on the road turned them into gourmet TV pin-ups three years ago, Simon has spent precious little time at home in Prudhoe, Northumberland.

The duo return to our screens today temporarily transformed into the Hairy Bakers, taking to the highways to explore the nation’s love of bread, teatime treats, pies, pastries and celebration cakes.

Filming – which has taken Simon and Dave from Cornwall to Scotland’s Highlands and Islands – finished less than three weeks before transmission. But with another BBC2 series under his belt, Simon still hasn’t been able to relax with wife Jane and their three sons.

In the blink of an eye, Simon and Dave have zoomed from being a pair of anonymous bikers to two of TV’s most popular presenters. And that has taken their lives in unexpected directions.

On any given day the pair could be opening a village fete or appearing beside Babyshambles at T in the Park. Indeed, they have just returned from headlining at the Isle of Man’s Queenie Festival, a week’s celebration of Manx delicacy the queen scallop.

The Bikers had been enticed not just to support a mutual friend who runs a scallop distribution business on the island, but to spread the word that fresh, local food is best – a message the pair wholeheartedly believe in, whether it’s quality beef reared in Northumberland or a spicy Romanian sausage discovered on their global travels.

Which is why Simon and Dave are backing The Journal Taste 2 food and drink festival in association with Tesco, held on August 30 at Macdonald Linden Hall Hotel, Golf and Country Club at Longhorsley, near Morpeth, Northumberland.

About 100 of the region’s finest food and drink suppliers and producers will join with the Hairy Bikers, local celebrity chefs and wine and beer experts for what promises to be the biggest event of its kind ever held in the North East. For Simon it will be the second time he has supported The Journal’s Taste North East England Campaign to encourage shoppers, retailers and hoteliers and restaurateurs to buy, use and eat local.

Last April, he threw his weight behind The Journal’s first Taste food and drink festival, when 62 producers and more than 10,000 people descended on the National Trust’s Gibside estate at Rowlands Gill, near Gateshead.

Now the two straight-talking foodies will ride back into action for Taste 2. And Simon couldn’t be more pleased to be giving up a precious day at home to help spread the word with Cumbrian-based Dave about the wealth of food and drink between the Rivers Tweed and Tees. “I can say on behalf of both Dave and myself that we are really looking forward to being a part of Taste 2 and having the opportunity to meet so many producers and expand our knowledge.

“In the North East we aren’t very good at shouting about what we have, so it is going to be good for both Dave and myself to be able to have a look at who’s out there, see how we may be able to help, and have a bit of crack with the public and producers. Working in the food industry, the North East is massively under-represented. But the produce we have in the North East is bloody brilliant and we all need to get behind it and bring it to a wider audience.”

Simon’s travels for the Hairy Bakers has brought home how reticent the North East has been in the past in pushing itself to the top of food’s premier league.

While he admits local food can be dearer than mass produced, filming the Hairy Bakers has confirmed that paying extra can save in the long run.

“You might pay £1 over what you would in the high street for a cake, but what you are getting is something very, very special. It is worth it for the quality; you can taste that quality and because of that you won’t need to eat as much.”

The series touches on the credit crunch and the popularity of home baking as the UK tightens its belt. Each of the four episodes deals with a different topic.

Simon promises each 30-minute show will be a “freewheeling journey of discovery”, filmed in beautiful locations.

And of course, the Bikers’ legendary laughter and explosions of approbation will be to the fore. They commandeer a windmill in Lincolnshire, team up with the Women’s Institute and make a Cornish pasty down a tin mine.

But what Simon remembers most is the passion of the experts and artisans.

“Without exception, everyone was absolutely raving passionate about what they do, and the depth of knowledge is fabulous and should be celebrated.”

:: Hairy Bakers starts on BBC2 tonight at 8.30pm.