Dame Mary Berry has had a lot to reflect on in the year of her 90th birthday. The baking star and author has candidly looked back upon her very traditional marriage to husband, Paul Hunnings, and shared the food "golden rules" she lives by to maintain her health.
In reaching such a milestone age, Mary has also been remembering her own mother, who died at the age of 105. She thanks her mum, Margaret "Marjorie" Wilson, for passing on "good genes," something she suggests is one of her secrets to living longer.
Mary has also revealed the one piece of life advice her mother passed down to her, that she's always remembered and been sure to live by.
In conversation with Cressida Bonas and Isabella Branson on their Lessons From our Mothers podcast, Mary was asked to share "the most valuable thing" she learnt from her mum.
"The one thing that I've learnt from my mother, is to be caring and calm," she replies, adding, "Also, not to make quick decisions."
"It's a very busy and noisy world," Mary says, continuing to suggest she's "very liable" to make decisions without taking enough time to think about them. When this looks like it might happen, she remembers her mother and will "leave it, sleep on it, and see how I feel the next day".
During the interview, Mary gave some fascinating insight into her mother's life. Even at the age of 105, the baking star says of her mother, "How lucky was I, that she still had her mind?"
"I rang her every morning at eight," Mary explains, adding, "She was quite ratty at the end because one of her bridge friends had died, and she kept saying, 'one of my bridge friends has died, how inconsiderate!'"
"She loved her bridge; it kept her going," Mary says. Her mother played the game for many years, but only in the mornings. When Mary's father died, her mother began playing in the afternoons also.
Until that point, she'd never play in the evening "because she wanted to be with him," Mary says of her mother wanting to spend that precious time with her husband.
"She always thought of other people and what she could do for them," Mary recalls, continuing, "She set a brilliant example to me."
She remembers a particular time when her mother was admitted to the Royal United Hospital in Bath, where she lived. Once discharged, she gathered the surgeons' wives to start the hospital's fundraising charity, Friends of the RUH - she is listed on their website as one of the founding members.
"That was so many years ago," Mary says, continuing to say that she's since been back to the hospital and now. "The coffee shop is huge - it's all what my mother started," she says, concluding, "She was a doer."
