Joanna Page confessed recently that she cooked her husband of 10 years, James Thornton, raw chicken and tinned tuna on spaghetti when they first met, so expectations for the Gavin & Stacey star's fate on ITV's Cooking With The Stars were slightly reserved it has to be confessed.
But the Swansea-born actress defied expectations on the brand new series hosted by Emma Willis and Tom Allen, which sees eight celebs and their chef tutors attempt to create the winning dish in a series of intense cooking battles. Joanna and her celeb chef Michael Caines made raviolo and butternut squash with crispy pancetta in a VT ahead of the studio battle in which she faced off with Aussie pop star Peter Andre.
Ahead of meeting Michael, Joanna said it was 'embarrassing' and that she was 'ashamed' of her lack of cooking skills which boiled down (pun intended) to making things from jars and opening pasta packets. Now, there's nothing wrong with that but this is a TV cooking show and Joanna did admit she was 'terrified' of cooking the dish without Michael on hand. To be honest, we were too.
Read more: Joanna Page's incredible film career and the famous husband she almost divorced in lockdown
But the actress, who has recently joined This Morning as a presenter, was a complete hit, beating Andre and his gnocchi dish and impressing the line-up of other TV chefs who rated the meals cooked by the eight celebs and picked the winner of each round. Jo did fear she had burned her creamy sauce but it all came good alongside the handmade pasta and her plated-up raviolo looked absolutely banging.
Chefs Shelina Permalloo and Tony Singh agreed. "Tasting this dish it's really interesting how you've elevated those flavours." said Shelina, "it's a really refined plate of food you should be really proud of yourself."
An overwhelmed-looking Joanna whispered: "Thank you." And Tony added: "Fantastic bit of food there, pasta's lovely, sauce is great. I was a bit dubious about the pancetta but that on top for me was just lovely."
Ellis Barrie, who ran Marram Grass on Anglesey and the Lerpwl restaurant in Liverpool, said that Joanna had created a dish with layers of flavouring that he'd be 'happy to eat out in a restaurant'.
The professional chefs and celebrities also taking part in the challenge this year are British chef and TV presenter Rosemary Shrager (partnered with Peter Andre), chef director Jack Stein (partnered with Chris Eubank), Michelin starred French chef Jean-Christophe Novelli (partnered with Samia Longchambon), Scottish chef and restaurateur Tony Singh MBE (partnered with Claire Richards), restauranter and cookery author Shelina Permalloo (partnered with Matt Willis), chef and restauranteur April Jackson (partnered with Jason Watkins) and award-winning chef Ellis Barrie (partnered with Indiyah Polack). For more showbiz and television stories get our newsletter here.
Catch up with Cooking With The Stars on ITVX.
