Christopher Biggins My Life on a Plate

For everyone, there's a taste of food,

or a smell of cooking, that zooms you right back to childhood.

It's just like my mum's cake.

I'm Brian Turner...

It reminds me of someone I used to know at school.

I'm going to stir up the food memories of some much-loved celebrities...

Oh...

Look at that.

..going back to their early days before they were famous.

Oh, my gosh.

With recollections of Sunday roasts and school dinners.

-It's time for something to eat.

-Brilliant.

And celebrating food their home regions are proud of.

-Which way would you like to go?

-Er, this way.

I'll recreate a nostalgic family favourite...

Mmm, you can't beat a crumble.

And a tribute dish that puts my guest's life on a plate!

Magic, magic.

Today, actor and television personality Christopher Biggins

returns to the county where he grew up...

..Wiltshire.

He'll rediscover where he first got a taste for the high life.

We would order room service, we would order baked beans on toast

and it gave me the start in which I became so readily accustomed to.

And go back to the site where he first trod the boards.

I was so rich it wasn't true.

And I'll be creating dishes, to take him

straight back to those good old days.

If I knew you better I'd kiss you.

Biggins grew up in Salisbury, one of the smallest cities in England.

It's got a beautiful cathedral, lots of historic buildings and,

just moments from the city centre,

you can be out in the countryside.

But the beauty about this place is just lovely views whichever way you look.

Cathedral over there and just look at that there.

It is the most beautiful city.

I mean, it really is.

It has a lot going for it, Salisbury.

It's very special, it was a lovely place to grow up.

Salisbury has been a busy market town since medieval times,

with its different trades still remembered in its street names.

The Gothic cathedral contains many treasures,

including a copy of the Magna Carta.

And dating even further back, just up the road

is the prehistoric monument, Stonehenge.

Plenty for young Biggins to explore.

He was born in Oldham near Manchester in 1948, but when

he caught pneumonia as a child,

his parents decided to move down south.

I was wrapped up in cotton wool and put in the back of a Pickfords'

lorry and brought down to Salisbury and I still, to this day,

have an aversion to cotton wool, can you believe.

But we then came down to Salisbury and it was great.

Biggins is best known now as the Grand Dame of pantomime

and the King Of The Jungle.

But he got his telly break in the sitcom Porridge.

You're not going to escape, are you?

It's a good lunch today. We've got jelly.

So when was it in life that you saw that acting could be a career?

I suppose it must have been when I went to Bristol Old Vic School,

which were the happiest days of my life.

I was 18 and half and I...

It was the first time I was with my own age group.

Up until then I was always with older people, so it was

fantastic and it was then that I really knew what I wanted to do.

So what about food in those days, did your mum cook well?

Yes, she was, she did, she was a very good cook, but a very simple cook.

But her roasts were good and I mean, she was,

both my parents worked, in order for me to go to a public school,

so it was quite tough, but she would always make sure there was

something on the... in the oven or on the top.

We had a... I remember we had one of those plates, you know

-those square plates on top of the cooker.

-Yes, yes, yes.

And I came home one day from school and I said, "Is this on," and I

put my hand down on it and I brought it up and it was like an omelette.

It had all risen my hand.

I mean, I'm so stupid but I mean, they were good days, though.

I mean, you know, we did eat well

and Salisbury has a great market once a week, which is brilliant.

Obviously, a lot of agriculture goes on around about

but it's...it's a city-city.

And you still enjoy eating?

I still enjoy eating, I really do and I, I...

You know, there are so many wonderful restaurants now.

I mean, food has just taken leaps and bounds, hasn't it?

I mean, it's amazing.

-My belly's telling me it's time for something to eat.

-Brilliant!

-Let's go.

-Good idea.

But I'm going to be taking Biggins back in time,

to discover the memories he has of the food of his youth.

I'm going to try and find some fantastic local products I can use

to make a tribute dish to celebrate his amazing life.

Until he was 18, Biggins was an only child,

very close to his parents, his grandparents and Auntie Vi.

I've organised a treat for us

that I think should kick off lots of great memories.

Oh, Auntie Vi's sponge...

-That's it, and eat it here.

-Look at that.

-Thank you very much.

-Thank you.

-Did you make this?

-I did this morning.

Oh, good man, nice and fresh.

Did you make the coffee?

-Thank you very much, yeah.

-You're welcome.

Thanks very much.

Yes, Great Auntie Vi. She was my mother's father's sister,

and she was a real snob, and she was the one who insisted

I have elocution lessons and she hated the fact that we all

-WILTSHIRE ACCENT:

-..talked like that down here.

You know, we're all Wiltshire people.

So she insisted I have elocution lessons. That's why I talk

so proper now, as you've probably noticed.

Well exactly, it paid off, what.

And...

But Auntie Vi also used to do wonderful things, like I used

to go and spend holidays with her. She didn't have children,

her and her husband Arthur,

so I was like a surrogate child to her

and I remember she would run a bath for me,

and I'd be in the bath and she would bring me

a glass of ginger wine, which I thought was terribly chic.

I was about 11 or something, I thought this was the life.

So tell me about Victoria sandwich.

So the first thing that Vi, Auntie Vi,

taught me was how to make a Victoria sponge.

And do you still make one?

I can easily make one and I... In fact, funnily enough,

when I did Celebrity MasterChef I did my Great Auntie's Vi's trifle,

which was very delicious, and I was voted out in the semifinals

because they said it was too easy. So I think I was robbed.

-Yeah, I think you were, I agree.

-Absolutely.

And trifle, I think, is a great British dish.

Absolutely, and, of course, the trifle never had any fruit in it,

it was just sponge cake, strawberry jam, lots of sherry, custard

and I made my own custard for MasterChef,

and then cream and then decorate with walnuts and cherries.

It's interesting because I remember it when we used to have fruit in there.

We used to have fruit from a tin, we used to have biscuits from a packet,

we used to have jelly from a packet, custard from a packet

and then, if you were lucky, you had real cream from a cow but often

it was Carnation cream in our trifle. We couldn't find fresh cream.

Well, your trifle sounds very common.

We were very common, you're quite right.

So what was your taste in food those days,

what was the favourite thing you liked to have at home?

One of my favourites things was, I still...

-That's very good sponge, isn't it?

-Lovely, isn't it?

So my grandparents lived in Swaythling, outside Southampton,

and I used to go and stay with them and it was unbelievable.

This is why I am the figure of the man that I am today.

She would do the most delicious home-made mashed potato,

very creamy, very light, absolutely wonderful,

and then open a tin of Heinz tomato soup

and pour it into a saucepan, heat it up, and then pour it over the top.

It was delicious!

I hope you got the copyright for that recipe.

So what other kind of things did you enjoy

in your early days around here?

Ham, egg and chips was just a wonderful staple diet for me.

I mean, I loved it. Especially if you get really good ham,

and we do do ham in a very good way in this country, I think.

I think this part of the world also is particularly famous for its pork, its pigs.

-Yeah, its pigs...

-And its curing of bacon.

Yeah, we look after our pigs here.

-Mm, have a drop more cake.

-Thank you, I will.

The story of how Wiltshire ham became world famous can be

traced to one family from the small town of Calne.

Back in the 1840s, a butcher called Harris discovered how to cure

ham and bacon in salt water or brine.

This became known as the Wiltshire Cure.

Soon the small family business had become one of the biggest

employers in town and, by the 1950s,

the Harris family had over 2,000 employees

in their huge pork factory,

which was just one of many in the county.

But a slump in the industry meant the factories shut one by one.

When the Harris factory closed in 1984,

one in five people in Calne lost their jobs.

Also nearly lost was the secret of the Wiltshire Cure process...

Come on, then.

..until a farmer called Roger Keen decided to step in and rescue it.

And now he has over 350 pigs on his farm near Chippenham.

What are these ones, they're very distinctive?

Well, this is the Wessex Saddleback,

-the white being the saddle, I suppose.

-Right.

We keep it really for nostalgic reasons.

OK, does that mean they're not the best bacon or ham makers?

They make lovely bacon and ham but it's...

They're inclined towards being a little bit on the fat side for modern tastes.

People unfortunately now seem to buy with their eyes,

not with their stomachs.

If they bought with their stomachs,

they would know that flavour comes with fat.

You can't actually get flavour out of lean

because lean is primarily water, whereas fat is oil.

Absolutely right.

And what's the lifespan of these animals?

Well, we think in terms of litters.

-They'll have two-and-a-bit litters a year.

-Right.

And probably about eight litters, which is four years.

And what do you look for when the people are out in fields

seeing pigs? What...what shape is it? Is that the ideal shape?

-The length is the thing we're looking for.

-Straight back.

-Yeah.

Because again, the longer the pig, the more bacon we get.

Right, so the bacon comes from the loin and the belly.

Yeah, so your middle section, you get your back and your streak,

the hind leg is the ham, the forequarter is like shoulder bacon,

so you get your collar bacon or fore hock bacon from the front end.

-So it's all used?

-Oh, yes, yes.

-Nothing's wasted.

Well, they always say the only thing they can't sell is the squeak.

Yeah, I've heard that as well.

Well I think we should go and look at those little ones over there.

Why not?

Here you are, girls, you've had your lot now, look, bag's empty.

Good timing.

These lovely little piglets are various colours.

Are these different breeds, these brown ones?

There is. We cross some with a Duroc.

That's a breed that produces

that spotted pig that you can see round there.

Oh, right, yes, yeah. And those are what age?

About three weeks, they've been farrowed, yeah.

And they'll be bacon weight about five-and-a-half to six months.

And they live outside for most of the time?

Well, they are outside until they get to sort of pork weight,

and then we have to move them in the barn so that we can control them.

-Sure.

-I mean, you can see they're pretty ill-disciplined.

They certainly seem very happy at the moment, enjoying life as they can.

But when they get older, they're quite happy to do a bit

-more like their mums, lie about a lot.

-Lovely.

-So shall we go and look at the factory?

-Yeah, that would be good.

On the farm, Roger makes five different sorts of ham

as well as bacon and sausages.

Well, this is where it all happens.

-This is the brine tank.

-Right.

So how comes that you're doing this Wiltshire Cure?

We were pig farmers in the first instance

-who sent our pigs into a factory in Calne.

-Right.

It closed down and when it did, we faced the fact that there would be

no bacon produced in Wiltshire any more

and we decided we would quite like to produce

a good quality bacon that people could enjoy.

So we went to the factory with a view to buying some equipment,

bits and pieces and came away with the factory manager.

But one of the other things we bought was a gallon of the brine

from the factory and put it with our freshly made up brine

so that that could multiply and develop and what we know

is that we do have here the actual only original Wiltshire brine.

Brine is a mixture of salt, sugar and good bacteria.

If the ingredients are perfectly balanced,

it'll never go off and can be used indefinitely.

By adding some of the Harris brine to his mix,

Roger has a real link with the past in these tanks.

Roger also oak smokes his ham and bacon in the traditional way

and I'm dying to see how that's done.

This is Kevin who runs the bacon house.

-Hi Kevin, how are you doing?

-Nice to meet you.

And he can perhaps fill you in a bit on the smoking process.

Fantastic, that's very kind, Roger, thank you very much, yeah.

So you're the smokehouse expert?

Ah, yeah, amongst other things.

As you can see, Brian, we use natural oak and beech sawdust.

We get it from a local sawmill, purely traditional,

and we use a little bit of straw just to help light it

in the early stages.

And then we let it smoulder away for about 24 hours,

sometimes a little bit more, sometimes a little bit less.

How do you judge that, by smell?

-That's just...it's experience.

-OK.

Most of us have been here for a good number of years.

We know roughly what sawdust, you know, how it should look like

and we know the feel of the sawdust as well, so we know how wet it is.

And if it's very hot, we always tend to be on a bit more

-of the cautious side.

-You've got streaky bacon in there today.

We've got streaky bacon, we also have middles as well,

which we can break down into back and streak.

We have a few three-quarter sides in there

and we have a few gammons in there, as well.

-Oh, fantastic, and it's all ready to go?

-It is already to go.

I'm excited. Show us how it's done.

Right, Brian, what we are after is a nice consistent

amount of sawdust, evenly spread.

As you can feel, there is a little bit of damp in that sawdust

and that's perfect, that's just what we want.

We want it to be able to burn long and slow.

And we're all already to go.

-Fantastic, so let's, let's do it.

-OK.

-As simple as that.

-As simple as that.

That looks like it's burning quite nicely.

I think we ought to make a little bit of a retreat.

So that was really quite simple, that's it. It was exciting.

So how long is it going to be in there for?

I would say in two days' time,

it will all have died down and it will be ready to take out.

-Perfect.

-Perfect.

I've seen how it's brined, I've seen how it's smoked,

there's just one thing left to do.

Well, you know, what they say -

the proof of the pudding is in the eating.

That does look delicious, does that.

What I do like about it there is still a nice covering of fat on it.

-Yeah.

-And it feels moist.

That's where the flavour is, isn't it, as we both know.

-It's not over-brined.

-No, no...

-It's not salty.

We have reduced the content a little on the old days

because everybody has refrigeration.

If they didn't, then you would need to up the salt again.

It is a lovely flavour, is that.

It's not full of liquid and neither is it short of liquid.

That ham's given a bit of inspiration.

I'm going to put together a dish for Christopher Biggins

which, I think using Wiltshire ham

-will remind him of his Salisbury upbringing.

-That's good.

Thank you.

In Salisbury, both the schools that Biggins attended are long gone.

But there are two places in town that played a huge

part in his education as a bon viveur -

The Cathedral Hotel and, right opposite,

The Red Lion Hotel.

So this is the centre of Salisbury.

It is, behind is the market square,

which is through there and to the right,

and this is where my mother used to work in the cocktail bar

and she loved it, made lots and lots of friends.

And then over there, the Red Lion Hotel, that's where my grandmother

-paid to do silver service.

-Oh, really?

Because in those days the tips were so good that they would pay

to get the privilege of working over there.

I mean, it was very grand.

Well, I'm going to cook something that I think will take you back,

be nostalgic, take you back to those early days.

-Right, good.

-And you should go inside and have a look

and see what it stirs up, those memories.

-Enjoy the trip in there.

-Thank you very much. Enjoy your cooking.

Come on, let's go and have a look in here.

Wow, this has changed beyond all recognition.

I mean, this used to be the chicest hotel in Salisbury

and this area here was the cocktail bar,

which my mother, Pam, used to work in,

and it was certainly the chicest place in Salisbury

to come and have a drink.

It was marvellous.

And as a child, I was brought in with my mother

and the manger's daughter and I would go up to the manager's flat,

which was upstairs and we would order room service.

We would order baked beans on toast and a soft drink

and it gave me the start of which I became so readily accustomed to.

I think if I'm right, round the corner is a lift,

which we used to go up to the flat.

Yes, you can see, look it's all...

Oh, this is the lift that we used to take up to the

first floor to the manager's apartment

where I used to go.

So I'm going to go up now and I'll see you up there. See you later.

I've set up behind the hotel to cook a dish inspired by Biggins' nostalgia

for his hometown.

And he's already given me

a great big hint about one of his favourites.

Now, Wiltshire ham, egg and chips seems to me

like a great dish to cook.

We're not going to do quite that for Christopher,

but it will be very similar to that.

I'm going to marry together this wonderful Wiltshire smoked bacon.

I've got a pan on here.

I generally put a wee bit of oil in there, just to get it going.

Then we put some nice bits

of smoked bacon in there

and this is going to be smelling so good.

And the great thing about good bacon is it's not leaching water

all the time, which is perfect for us.

I'm also going to need some of Roger's Wiltshire ham

and some local cheese for my dish.

But first, I've got to get the bacon deliciously crisp.

Let's just turn this bit.

It's got a lovely colour, as I said earlier,

no water in it, so it's making it really nice,

crispy round the edges, with that bit of fat.

Wow, yes, this is the manager's sitting room.

His daughter and myself would come up here and we'd put

the television on, we'd sit, perhaps do a bit of homework,

have our room service and this is where I got the taste of the

good life, whilst my mother was working downstairs in the cocktail

bar and her father was the manager who was working downstairs as well.

So we got the life of Riley up here, which was very good.

This brings back so many memories.

It was so long ago.

Back in my kitchen, the bacon's looking great.

Time to reveal the dish I'm making, as a twist on an old favourite.

What I'm going to make is sort of a French Croque Monsieur,

but we call it a toasted cheese and ham sandwich,

but with a bit of egg as well.

So some really good, fresh, country bread,

as thin or as thick as you like,

but I think you need a little bit of substance to this

because it's a good breakfast dish, it's a really great brunch dish.

Then we take some slightly softened butter...

This is where you can be as frugal,

or not, as you like.

So there goes our buttered bread.

So we're going to take our pieces of wonderful Wiltshire ham on there,

as much or as little as you like.

We'll make this really nice and hearty, so plenty of ham in there.

And then we got this tremendous local cheese,

tastes fantastic, and put that on top.

We make a sandwich, not that difficult.

You might think this is a bit of a simple recipe so far,

but just you wait!

Biggins is on his way to taste my dish,

but he's got a bit waylaid over the road.

This is the infamous Mrs Thomas, who I remember vividly,

and she owned and ran this hotel with a rod of iron.

She was an incredible, very, very famous woman of Salisbury

and always has been and I'm thrilled to see this picture,

because this is exactly how I remember her.

She would sit in the corner of these rooms and I would come

in with my friend John Brown and we'd have coffee and cheese scones.

We always came here to be something special

and I think we owe a lot to this woman.

She was incredibly special

and very much part of my early upbringing.

I'm about to put the finishing touches to my take on ham and eggs.

I've cooked some fabulous Wiltshire bacon until it's perfectly crisp,

and prepared a sandwich of local ham and local cheese ready for the pan.

Now what I'm hoping is that this dish will have a bit of nostalgia.

It's not quite ham, eggs and chips.

-No.

-But I've got Wiltshire ham, I've got eggs...

-Yes.

-I've got some lovely smoked bacon in a sandwich.

-So it's healthy.

-Oh, yes. You see that little hole there?

-Yes.

I've taken all the calories out.

Believe that and you'll believe anything, dear boy.

So the idea is, just to make it a little more presentable,

I'm going to take a cutter and I'm just going to cut through there,

because it just looks that little bit smarter.

Let me put a bit of oil into this pan here.

Is that olive oil or just cooking oil?

-This is rapeseed oil.

-Right.

-Oh, look at those eggs.

-Oh...

Nice, fresh eggs.

Bit of salt and a bit of pepper.

Lovely.

This way, at least, you don't have to say, "How do you like your eggs?"

because you get them just as they are. So I'll beat it up there.

If you want to put a bit of cream in there, so be it.

So we get the whole thing.

-Careful not to leave it in there too long.

-No.

Because it'll get wet and soggy but, actually,

just make sure that you get some, all the way round there,

it'll hold the whole thing together.

-I'm salivating here, this is terrible.

-So am I!

Right, so now...

-Are you going to have a taste of ham?

-I can't resist that ham.

Well, I don't blame you at all. I think that's a good idea, is that.

-If I were you, I'd do the same.

-Mmm...wonderful ham.

-It's good, isn't it?

-Mmm.

-Just...

-Is this Wiltshire ham?

Absolutely.

That looks so delicious, Brian.

I do know some people, and I may be one of them,

who would actually cook this in oil and butter.

This is perfect for you and I because this is, you know,

we're hams and we're eating hams.

So a bit of bacon goes underneath.

I'm going to take this now

-and I'm going to put it in the middle.

-Look at that!

It isn't Wiltshire ham, egg and chips...

..but it's the next best thing.

This is my nostalgia dish for Biggins - ham and eggs transformed

into a mouth-watering Croque Monsieur with crisp Wiltshire bacon.

Good for breakfast,

great for brunch and I'm hoping perfect for right now.

Oh...

-Pregnant pause...

-Oh...

-It's heaven.

-Good man.

It's what I call real comfort food.

You can't go better than this.

And hopefully it's just brought you back to the days

when you used to live in Salisbury as a young man and this is the kind

-of thing you used to have.

-Absolutely, all the time.

Wonderful. Thank you so much.

If I knew you better I'd kiss you.

I think my version of ham and eggs was a great success.

Now, the ham and bacon may be the home-grown stars of this dish,

but I think this wonderful local cheese played a very

important supporting role.

Cheese-making in this country dates back 2,000 years.

It was a great way to preserve a glut of milk

and every region developed its favourites,

like Wensleydale and Stilton.

40 miles north of Salisbury is the village of Brinkworth.

Here, a young cheesemaker called Ceri Cryer has come up with the

brilliant idea of reviving a long lost cheese called Wiltshire loaf.

I started out my career as a teacher.

Through teaching I met my husband, Chad.

We came back to the farm and Chad saw the farm with fresh eyes

and he saw it as an opportunity and he said,

"Let's do something with the farm."

So I had been on a cheese-making course

so I said I could make cheese,

and so we set off on the path of cheese making.

Ceri now makes four different cheeses with the milk from

her family's herd of pedigree Friesian cows.

Today, she's making a batch of the traditional Wiltshire Loaf.

We make our cheese on our own dairy farm

so the cows are milked from the same farm where the cheese is made.

There's just a short distance from the milking parlour

to the cheese dairy.

So as soon as the tank's got that last drop of milk in,

it goes straight across to our dairy

and starts being turned into our lovely cheese.

This is the starter culture.

It's a freeze dried culture

and it contains bacteria

that will turn the milk sugars into milk acids.

So the lactose into lactic acid.

The next stage is to add the rennet.

We use a microbial rennet so that our cheese is suitable for vegetarians.

Traditionally the rennet came from the lining of the calf's stomach

and that makes the milk clot and go solid

into a big mass of curd.

Since we've started cheese making in the dairy,

this has been the tank we've always had

and it holds 700 litres.

With cheese making, you are really concentrating

the goodness that's in the milk

and it's a ratio of about 10 to 1,

so 10 litres of milk will make 1kg of cheese.

So from this tank, today we will make 21 Wiltshire loaf cheeses.

Wiltshire loaf was a very popular cheese.

It was mentioned in two of Jane Austen's novels

and I'm really proud to be reviving this traditional Wiltshire cheese.

When world war rationing came about,

people could only buy a few ounces of cheese per week,

so there really wasn't the market for cheese.

I think that might have been the key reason

why a lot of the regional cheese has died out.

So solid bits are the curd

and the liquid part is the whey.

Even right now this tastes quite nice, quite sweet and warm.

People used to eat curds and whey,

like Little Mrs Muffet on her tuffet.

I want to keep the curd

and I want to allow the whey to be released.

This is Kate and Kate's going to help me

with the stage of milling the cheese.

We need to get the cheese into small pieces

and to use that we'll use the peg mill.

The peg mill tears the curd into smaller pieces

so that when we add the salt, the salt will be evenly distributed.

This is the most physical part of cheese making.

You can probably almost hear my heartbeat.

The salt's added for three reasons.

Of course, it adds flavour to the cheese,

it also helps draw out more of the moisture

and it also stops any nasty bugs from growing.

Once milled, the curds are packed into cheese moulds before being

placed into a hydraulic press.

So in times gone by, cheeses might have been pressed by having

just a weight put on top of the cheeses,

or a screw press,

with a metal screw, like an apple press.

So you put the cheese on there

and then you can tighten a board pressing down on top of the cheese.

The cheeses will be pressed overnight before being transferred

to the ripening rooms, where they'll be waxed

and left to mature for three months.

The bigger a cheese is, the longer it can be ripened for.

Think of the big Parmesans that are ripened for years.

A small cheese can dry out too much if you try to keep it for too long.

I find that that three months is just about perfect

for the Wiltshire loaf.

I'm going to find a way to use a bit of Ceri's Wiltshire Loaf

in the final dish I'm cooking today -

my tribute to Biggins.

Back in Salisbury, we've come to the Queen Elizabeth Gardens

on the banks of the River Avon,

a gorgeous park, just minutes from the middle of town

where I'm going to cook my tribute dish for Biggins.

So this is central Salisbury.

You can still see the Cathedral spires.

You can from almost everywhere, can't you?

You can, and this is where, this is quite famous here, this park,

because this is where Constable painted

his masterpiece of Salisbury Cathedral.

-Oh, right.

-This is the park that he painted from, so it's rather clever.

And what reputation do you think Salisbury has in the world today?

Does it have... Apart from, I suppose, the Cathedral?

Well, I think, yes, I think it's a historical place

because we've not only got Salisbury Cathedral, we've got

Old Sarum, which is a very important historical mound.

And then a little bit further up the road we've got Stonehenge,

so it's full of history all around here.

So whilst I go and prepare another dish for you...

Yes, which I can't wait, because the first one was delicious.

Good man.

This is the perfect opportunity for you to go back and have a look where

you used to live, where the school was, where anything that you....

-Salisbury Rep...

-Absolutely right, yes.

-OK, I'll see you later then.

-Be good.

-Get cooking.

-Enjoy.

Salisbury is definitely a place steeped in history, as Biggins says,

but today, I feel like it's his own history that I've found out about.

I'm going to use some of the things I've learned about him to create

one very special tribute dish

using some more lovely, local ingredients.

So I am going to do a dish, which is going to have pork sausages,

Wiltshire pork sausages, some more Wiltshire bacon, beautiful stuff.

We've got some local cheese and as a tribute to his beans on toast,

I'm going to use chickpeas in tomato sauce.

So this is what we are going to do first. Pan on,

and it's a bit of oil in there.

Lovely colour, this is.

Smells wonderful.

I need to get a good heat

with a following wind.

Just look at these lovely sausages,

really are.

Delicious looking, nice and fresh.

Bags of meat, not too much rusk,

a good balance, really tasty.

I'm sure he's going to love these sausages.

So we put those into a pan.

Hopefully wants to be nice and hot.

It's just about hot enough, is this.

So here we are, this is where I was brought up.

I was 18-and-a-half years old when I left here, which is

a long time ago and it's fascinating.

It brings back so many memories.

The sort of front room is this room here.

At the back there was a kitchen.

We had an outdoor lavatory,

which I was terrified of going to the loo,

and there were three bedrooms.

It seems bigger somehow.

I mean, those houses are new there.

Those weren't here when I lived here.

Something must happened, they must have pulled down a whole street, I would imagine,

but all these houses are absolutely as it was

when I was here 40 years ago.

Yes, unbelievable.

Things don't change.

Biggins should be taking away some great memories of his trip

back to his old neighbourhood

and I do hope the dish I'm making will be a meal to remember as well.

So the sausages have got a decent colour on them.

Take them out at this stage.

I think six here,

four for Christopher and two for me.

I'm going to make a sauce in the same pan,

starting with chopped onions and bacon.

So the idea here is to just get flavour going,

we don't want too much colour

and I'm just going to put some garlic in there.

Shave the garlic.

Lovely flavours.

Now put the sausages back in.

Any juices there are there,

those go back in there, that's lovely.

I've got some fresh thyme here.

So chopped tomatoes go in

and then about a glass of white wine.

Give it all a bit of a swirl here.

Look at that lovely colour in there.

If Biggins doesn't like this I'm in real trouble,

but I'm sure he's going to love this.

It'll need half an hour in a hot oven.

Back on the street where he grew up,

Biggins is working up an appetite posing

with current residents, like Jan.

-There you go.

-Thank you.

-Lovely.

-Nice to see you.

-It's lovely to see you, yeah.

-How does it feel coming back?

-Very odd, very odd indeed.

It's such a long time since I've been here.

When did you leave?

When I was 18-and-a-half, so we're talking something like 50 years ago.

Yes, so it was before we'd even moved here.

Yes, so it was very different then.

Because your brother's quite a bit younger...

Yes, he's 18 years younger, so when I moved out

he was a baby because, you know, my mo...

My parents told me, my mother said to me, "I'm pregnant",

and I said, "Don't be so stupid!"

I mean, the thought of one's parents still doing it was appalling.

-I suppose so.

-I know differently now!

Not everything in the neighbourhood is the same as in Biggins' day.

Well I can't remember any cars, hardly, being here.

So it was a lot of playing, children playing,

and things happening and, of course, this was the way I walked to

school and I always remember we had a great view of Salisbury Cathedral.

Where these cars are, there were houses right up to that tree.

Actually, the school... No, I'm wrong...

The school was on this car park, that's right, the school was there.

It's all coming back, it's amazing.

Memories.

Biggins left school at 16 without any qualifications

but got a job as an assistant stage manager

at the local theatre, The Salisbury Playhouse.

So this really is a lot of memories

streaming back because this building was the site of the Arts Theatre

and Salisbury Playhouse from 1953-1976.

I mean, it was a fantastic building.

All this, of course, is new, but it was an old Methodist church

and it had steps going up to it and it looked very imposing, actually,

and in there we did the most incredible productions.

I mean, play after play - two-weekly rep.

I remember also, the end of two weeks we would take the set down

and we would put the new one up and so at two o'clock in the morning

I would walk up this street to home and I would be often

stopped by the police saying,

"What are you doing? Where have you been?"

you know, like I was sort of a robber or something, or a criminal.

But you know, it was a wonderful experience.

I mean, I was very proud to have spent two years here working.

Starting off at £2 a week, heavily subsidised by my mum and dad

and then in the second year I went to eight and then at the end

of that second year, I was on £14 a week.

I was so rich it wasn't true.

I hope Biggins has enjoyed his trip back here,

and I've taken inspiration from his memories, and from some

wonderful Wiltshire produce,

to come up with a dish just for him.

I've already browned sausages in a pan and made a sauce of onion

and bacon, with garlic, thyme and tinned tomatoes.

I've popped the sausages back in the pan

and left everything to cook together.

I've even cooked some mash which, I hope, is as good as his grandma's.

It's time to reveal all to Biggins.

I have to tell you, it's perfect timing, as this has been in the oven

for the last 20 to 30 minutes. Just look at that.

-Oh, my goodness, that's wonderful.

-Now that's the start of it.

-I've got some tomatoes here.

-Yeah.

I'm just going to finish chopping those up.

I've got tinned tomatoes in so that all goes in there now.

A bit of local honey.

-Wiltshire honey?

-Wiltshire honey, absolutely,

just to give those tomatoes that little bit of sweetness.

And I did actually think of, when you used to eat beans on toast,

-so they're not quite beans on toast, these are chickpeas.

-All right.

So the chickpeas go in there

and we give them a stir round and put it into another dish.

Now this is my take of a cassoulet,

-a great French dish.

-Oh, I love cassoulet.

And I think this actually works lovely as a dish.

So we just spread that over the top, that's perfect in there.

Then we get rid of that down there.

Now just one other thing.

-This is a "grate" cheese.

-Oh!

-Oh, yes, it is.

-Oh, no, it isn't.

Dear, oh, dear. The old ones are the best.

They do it and I have to say we're two of the eldest and...

-And, in my opinion, two of the best.

-Yeah, exactly.

I'm going to put that with some breadcrumbs.

So all we do now is we sprinkle the cheese,

the breadcrumb and the parsley mix over the top

and that goes back into a fairly hot oven.

It is cooked, so we just want to make sure it gratinates up,

it gets a really lovely colour.

That's on, in it goes.

The dish that we're going to see in just a couple of moments...

I just hope it encapsulates what I've learnt about you

from you and here about, about this wonderful place here.

-The tomatoes are meant to represent the tomato soup.

-Yes.

I've got some mashed potato to serve with this wonderful dish.

The sausages are local, the honey is local, the cheese is local.

It's really all about what Salisbury and Wiltshire say to me through you.

-Is that...?

-Absolutely perfect and I can't wait.

I love sausages so it's great that we're going to have sausages.

-Oh...

-Oh, that looks OK.

-That doesn't look bad at all.

-It's good.

-Oh, it's bubbling!

-Yes, you're surprised, aren't you?

-It's bubbling away.

-And look it's got some brown bits.

-Yes, excellent!

And it's nice to form a nice crust on top.

Now I'm just going to serve it up.

A nice bit of mash goes on the middle there.

-That looks good, does that.

-It looks very good.

And then we're going to take one...

Sausage?

Two. Do you fancy a third one?

-Yeah, go on.

-That's what I like to hear.

Be careful, it's nice and hot, is this.

And just put that over the top,

and I just love this fresh thyme.

It just makes it look...

Oh, look at that.

-There you are, sir.

-That's a good...

-Just for you.

-That's a good bit of Wiltshire.

My tribute to Biggins is a Wiltshire cassoulet

served with mashed potato.

Local pork sausages baked in a sauce of tomatoes

and chickpeas as a nod to that childhood favourite, beans on toast.

And there's a crunchy breadcrumb topping with some wonderful

Wiltshire Loaf cheese tossed through it.

I do hope he likes it.

Oh, this looks very good.

So what thinkest thou,

says he before...?

I'll tell you what, those sausages have got a lovely texture.

Mmm, and you can taste the honey.

-It is, it's quite sweet, isn't it?

-It's very nice.

-Mmm.

Local pigs, Wiltshire bacon, Wiltshire sausages

and, of course, mashed potato.

Yeah, mash is great.

Of course when your gran made it, to go with tomato soup,

she wouldn't have had lots of butter in there,

it would be margarine, wouldn't it? No cream in there.

-That's got a few extras in there.

-Mmm, it's very good.

Excellent, well done, I've really enjoyed that.

Thank you, that's very kind. I hope you've enjoyed the day looking around Salisbury.

-I have.

-It brings back a few memories.

-Yeah, absolutely.

-But life must go on.

-Absolutely, it's great.

-Thank you, sir.

-Thank you!