Prue Leith

Early life

Leith was born on 18 February 1940 in Cape Town, Western Cape, South Africa.

Career

In 1960, Leith moved to London to attend the Cordon Bleu Cookery School and then began a business supplying high-quality business lunches. This grew to become Leith's Good Food, a party and event caterer. In 1969, she opened Leith's, her Michelin-starred restaurant in Notting Hill, eventually selling it in 1995. In 1975, she founded Leith's School of Food and Wine, which trains professional chefs and amateur cooks. The group reached a turnover of £15 million in 1993. She sold it and, in 1995, helped found the Prue Leith College, since renamed Prue Leith Chef's Academy, and Prue Leith Culinary Institute in South Africa. Odd Plate Restaurant was renamed Prue Leith's Restaurant.

The first woman appointed to the British Railways Board in 1980, Leith set about improving its much-criticised catering. The catering division, Travellers Fare, was detached from the hotels business in 1982 with outlets created, including Casey Jones and Upper Crust. Leith left British Rail in September 1985.

Concurrently with running her business, Leith became a food columnist for, successively, the Daily Mail, Sunday Express, The Guardian and the Daily Mirror. Aside from writing 12 cookery books, including Leith's Cookery Bible, she has written eight novels: Leaving Patrick, Sisters, A Lovesome Thing, Choral Society, A Serving of Scandal, The Food of Love: Laura's Story, The Prodigal Daughter, and The Lost Son. The last three form the Angelotti Chronicles or Food of Love trilogy. Her memoir, Relish, was published in 2013.

Her first television appearance was in the 1970s as a presenter of two 13-episode magazine series aimed at women at home, made by Tyne Tees Television. She was a last-minute replacement for Jack de Manio, and with no experience and a director who liked everything scripted, including interviews, she disliked the experience. Later, in the 1980s, she was the subject of two television programmes about her life and career: the first episode of Channel 4's Take Six Cooks and the BBC's The Best of British, a series about young entrepreneurs. In 1999, she was one of the Commissioners on Channel 4's Poverty Commission. She returned to television to be a judge on The Great British Menu for 11 years until 2016 and a judge for My Kitchen Rules, which she left to replace Mary Berry in The Great British Bake Off. In January 2026, She announced her retirement from the Bake Off in an instagram post.

She has been involved in food in education. When chair of the Royal Society of Arts she founded and chaired the charity Focus on Food (now part of the Soil Association) which promotes cooking in the curriculum. She also started, with the charity Training for Life, the Hoxton Apprentice; a not-for-profit restaurant which for ten years trained the most disadvantaged long-term unemployed young people. Until 2015, she was a member of the Food Strand of the grant-giving foundation, Esmée Fairbairne. From 2007 to 2010, she was the Chair of the School Food Trust, the government quango largely responsible for the improvement in school food after Jamie Oliver's television exposé of the poor state of school dinners. The Trust (now the Children's Food Trust) also set up and runs Let's Get Cooking, an organisation of over 5,000 cooking clubs in state schools, of which she is a patron. She is vice-president of The Sustainable Restaurant Association; a trustee of Baby Taste Journey (an education charity concerned with healthy food for infants); Patron of The Institute for Food, Brain and Behaviour, Sustain's Campaign for Better Hospital Food, and the Prue Leith Chef's Academy in her native South Africa.

She has also been active in general education, chairing Ashridge Management College (2002–07); 3E's Enterprises (an education company turning round failing schools and managing academies (1998–2006) and Chairman of Governors at the secondary school Kings College in Guildford (2000–07).

She has also been involved in many diverse organisations: she chaired the Restaurateurs Association (1990–94); she was a member of the Investors in People working group; she chaired the Royal Society of Arts (RSA; 1995–97); and Forum for the Future (2000–03). She was a director of the housing association, Places for People (1999–2003) and a member of the Consumer Debt Working Group that contributed to the Conservative Party's 2006 policy document Breakdown Britain (2004–05). She has also been one of the voices in favour of Brexit, defending her choice, although lately voicing concern over lowering of food standards.

While at the RSA, she led the successful campaign to use the empty plinth, now known as the Fourth Plinth, in Trafalgar Square to house changing sculptures or installations by the best contemporary artists.

Leith has been a non-executive director of British Rail; British Transport Hotels; Safeway; Argyll plc, the Leeds Permanent Building Society; Whitbread plc; Woolworths plc; the Halifax; Triven VCT; Omega International plc; and Belmond Hotels Ltd (formerly Orient Express Hotels) and is a director and investor in several start-up companies.

In July 2017, she was installed as the Chancellor of Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh.

In December 2021, she was the castaway on BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs.

In February 2024, Leith's ten-part cookery series Prue Leith's Cotswold Kitchen began airing on ITV1. Following a second series in 2025, a third series began airing in early 2026.

In 2025, Leith participated in the sixth series of The Masked Singer as "Pegasus". She was eliminated in the second episode.

Personal life

Leith holds dual South African and British citizenship.

Family

Leith was married to property developer and author Rayne Kruger from 1974 until his death aged 80 in December 2002. The couple had two children, a son and a daughter. Their daughter, Li-Da Kruger (a Cambodian adoptee), is a filmmaker. Their son, Danny Kruger, was a speechwriter and adviser to David Cameron, and is the MP for the constituency of East Wiltshire for Reform UK, having defected from the Conservative Party on 15 September 2025.

In October 2016, Leith married John Playfair, a retired clothes designer; the couple originally lived apart in separate homes, but have subsequently built a house together in Moreton-in-Marsh, Gloucestershire, where they both live.

Leith's brother, ex-restaurateur James Leith, is married to the biographer Penny Junor.

Political views

Leith voted for Brexit, saying she "dithered and dithered for ages because there were really good arguments on both sides".

In May 2020, Leith expressed support for the breach of the COVID-19 lockdown by Dominic Cummings and his wife Mary Wakefield, whom her son described as "old friends".

Campaigning for assisted dying

Leith's other brother, David, who had worked for the RAF and also for Prue Leith's Good Food, died from bone cancer in 2012, aged 74,) Sky News, Dylan Donnelly, 10 April 2024 After his death, Leith started campaigning for making assisted dying legal in Britain. In 2023, she filmed a documentary for Channel 4 with her son Danny, who has opposite views on the subject. She is a Patron of Dignity in Dying and, in 2023, spoke in Parliament on the subject.

Honours

Leith's honours include the Veuve Clicquot Business Woman of the Year in 1990 and thirteen honorary degrees or fellowships from UK universities.

She was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1989, Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2010 Birthday Honours and Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in the 2021 Birthday Honours for services to food, broadcasting and charity.

References

References

1. (16 March 2017). "The Great British Bake Off unveils new line-up". [[BBC News]].
2. (2026-01-21). "Dame Prue Leith leaves The Great British Bake Off".
3. "Debrett's - The trusted source on British social skills, etiquette and style". Debrett's.
4. (6 October 2016). "Celebrity chef becomes Queen Margaret University chancellor". [[BBC]].
5. "Leiths Academy".
6. Youde, Kate. (10 October 2015). "Caroline Waldegrave and Prue Leith: How we met". [[The Independent]].
7. "Prue Leith Chefs Academy".
8. "Prue Leith Culinary Institute".
9. (19 March 2021). "Prue Leith College Prospectus 2022 - 2023".
10. "Prue Leith College of Food and Wine, Centurion, Gauteng".
11. Gourvish, Terry. (2004). "British Rail 1974-97 From Integration to Privatisation". Oxford University Press.
12. "Relish: My life on a plate". W. F. Howes.
13. (14 Feb 2017). "Prue Leith: can the culinary legend fill Mary Berry's boots on Bake Off?". The Guardian.
14. (2026-01-21). "Dame Prue Leith leaves The Great British Bake Off".
15. (15 January 2019). "Prue Leith on food".
16. Lewis, Rebecca. (9 March 2018). "Prue Leith infuriates Great British Bake Off fans after revealing she voted for Brexit". [[Metro (British newspaper).
17. Murray, Graeme. (11 July 2017). "New Bake Off judge Prue Leith named Queen Margaret University chancellor". [[The Sunday Post]].
18. "Desert Island Discs - Dame Prue Leith, writer and broadcaster - BBC Sounds".
19. "Prue Leith's Cotswold Kitchen".
20. "ITV Announces Three New Weekend Commissions".
21. "Prue Leith’s Cotswold Kitchen: back with season 3!".
22. (2 October 2012). "SA POWER 100 — 2012: Prue Leith". [[The South African]].
23. "Prudence Margaret LEITH".
24. (1 January 2003). "Rayne Kruger". [[The Times]].
25. Leith, Prue. (4 March 2017). "Prue Leith: My Bake Off 'fake news' moment". [[The Spectator]].
26. Bowers, Mary. (20 April 2011). "My adoption experience: Li Da Kruger, 37, independent director". [[The Times]].
27. (3 July 2008). "Aide who wrote Cameron's hug-a-hoodie speech is attacked... by a Hoodie". [[Evening Standard]].
28. "Contact information for Danny Kruger - MPs and Lords - UK Parliament".
29. Maher, Kevin. (28 November 2016). "No, I don't want to live next door to my wife, thanks". [[The Times]].
30. Furness, Hannah. (25 November 2016). "Prue Leith: the secret to a happy marriage is separate houses". The Daily Telegraph.
31. Leitelmayer, Ollie. (2021-10-08). "Inside Prue Leith's beautiful Cotswolds home".
32. (6 April 1997). "Media families; 8. The Junors". [[The Independent]].
33. Wintle, Angela. (8 August 2015). "Time and place: Penny Junor". [[The Sunday Times]].
34. (27 May 2020). "Prue Leith defends Dominic Cummings over lockdown row: 'How about a bit of kindness and tolerance?'". [[The Independent]].
35. (26 May 2020). "John Glen, Danny Kruger respond to Dominic Cummings allegations". [[Salisbury Journal]].
36. [https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/05/01/prue-leith-brother-died-agony-ban-assisted-dying-laws
37. [https://news.sky.com/story/dame-prue-leith-bake-off-star-tells-of-brothers-absolute-agony-before-his-death-as-she-campaigns-for-assisted-dying-13111745 Dame Prue Leith: Bake Off star tells of brother's 'absolute agony' before his death as she campaigns for assisted dying] Sky News, Dylan Donnelly, 10 April 2024
38. [https://www.express.co.uk/celebrity-news/1731458/prue-leith-son-danny-kruger-assisted-dying-brother-death-cancer Prue Leith fears being ‘angry’ with son who shut down 'falling out' claim amid family loss] The Express, Michelle Marshall, Feb 7, 2023.
39. [https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/prue-leith-parliament-mps-dignity-in-dying-matt-hancock-b2344311.html ‘Take action’ and change law to legalise assisted dying, Prue Leith urges MPs] The Independent, Cameron Henderson, 23 May 2023
40. "Prue Leith receives honorary degree from City University".
41. (25 May 2005). "Article about Leith's honorary degree from the University of Warwick".
42. {{London Gazette. (12 June 2010)
43. {{London Gazette. (12 June 2021)