John "Johnnie" Cradock, cook, writer, broadcaster and former British Army Major; the third husband of the legendary and redoubtable Fanny Cradock.

Johnnie is probably these days best remembered as being the long suffering stooge for his demented wife in their popular United Kingdom cooking programmes which were shown from the 1950s to the 1970s. Wearing his trademark blazer and sporting a handlebar moustache he would lurk harmlessly around the back of Fanny's sets awaiting imperious commands from the great woman - and which, when they came, usually ended up in his being berated by her for being too slow. He took all of this in good heart and the two worked well together - with Fanny's appearance and utterances, not to say her cooking, becoming more and more eccentric as time went on.

With his wife, he wrote a number of cook books (see below), which were popular reading at the time. Johnnie and Fanny also wrote the "Bon Viveur" restuarant column for the Daily Telegraph newspaper from 1950 - 1955. This was one of Britain's first restaurant columns and it was this column that originally lead to their first television series in 1955.

At first they presented the BBC's "Kitchen Magic", but were soon poached by ITV's first cooking progamme, which they presented as "Fanny & Johnnie" - it was here that they soon became the country's leading experts on culinary matters.

After one episode of their famous TV shows, Johnnie turns to the watching fans and said without any irony, "Great cooking,is making doughnuts like Fanny's." The phrase has since passed into legend. It was this phrase that inspired the show "Fanny Cradock — The Life and Loves of a Kitchen Devil" by Julia Darling.

At that time Johnnie and fanny were not married, but she adopted his name for their writing and television work; they finally married in 1977 - she died in December 1993, whilst Johnnie pre-deceased her in 1987.

Publications

• Fanny & Johnnie Cradocks' cook hostess book
• Fanny & Johnnie Cook's Essential Alphabet
• Fanny & Johnnie Cradock's Freezer Book
• The Daily Telegraph Cook's Book by Bon Viveur (Johnnie and Fanny Cradock)

TV Series

• Fanny's Kitchen
• Chez Bon Viveur
• The Cradocks
• Dinner Party
• Fanny Cradock Invites
• Cradock cooks for Christmas