The Great British Baking Show's Prue Leith Ghostwrote Recipes For A Royal

Before she replaced Mary Berry as a judge on "The Great British Baking Show," Prue Leith had a storied (and wide-ranging) culinary career, making a name for herself as a caterer before opening her first restaurant, Leith's, in 1969.

Leith is also the writer of several cookbooks and novels and worked as a food columnist for publications like the Daily Mail, the Guardian, and the Daily Mirror. In a 2018 interview with Cotswold Life (via Bustle), Leith revealed that she also ghostwrote a food column for Lady Elizabeth Anson (who passed away at 79 years old in November 2020), a cousin of Queen Elizabeth II. According to Anson's obituary, she was the royal family's official party planner for over 60 years.

Anson's food column was published in the Daily Mail. According to Leith, Anson told her editor at the newspaper, "'First of all, I can't write; secondly, I can't cook. But I know a woman who can.'" That woman turned out to be an at the time 21-year-old Prue Leith.

"So I said, 'Look, I will ghost her but only on condition that I can do her column one week, and the next I'll write a column under my own name,'" Leith explained to Cotswold Life. "The editor bought this, and the idea was that I would give all the posh recipes to Lady Elizabeth, while I did the everyday mince and tatties and bread and marmalade."

Prue Leith's ghostwriting stint for Lady Elizabeth Anson would not be her last run-in with the royal family. While appearing on an episode of "Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen," Leith recalled a time when she poorly made a cup of tea for Queen Elizabeth II.

According to Leith, the palace would not tell her how the queen liked her tea prepared: "They said, 'You must give her a choice.' So I said, 'Black or white, ma'am?' And she said, 'Black, please.'" Leith added a lemon, assuming it would be a nice compliment to the black tea. However, the queen apparently then clarified that she likes her tea without lemon. After fishing the lemon out with a cocktail stick (which led to a spill), Leith finally served the late British monarch her beverage.

"I topped up her cup with hot water thinking that people who like black tea usually like it quite weak, and she said, 'I like it strong,'" Leith said. "So this poor woman, she wanted strong black tea and she got weak, lemony tea."

We're just disappointed this tea debacle wasn't depicted on "The Crown."