WENDY REAKES

After the life I’ve had, it's not easy to write a quick bio.

 

If you want to skip this part, scroll to… ‘Where I am now’.

 

If you’re here for the long haul….

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Born in 1961, Town Hill, Swansea! That makes me Welsh, born and bred. My family left there and went to live in England. Best thing we ever did! (Don’t repeat that to anyone Welsh).

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Mother was disabled, and I was her child carer, so missed a lot of school. Dad went to work as a salesman in the seventies, which meant he got a company car, a pension and huge bonuses.  While I spent my first ten years without elastic in my knickers., he spent all the money on whiskey and gin (one bottle of each, every day), except Sundays, when he threw in a few pints of beer for good measure. He was a vile drunk and I still hate Sundays.

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I was rubbish at school. A dreamer, a wonderer, always making up stories in my head. First year of Kennet Comprehensive, the entire school was tasked to write a story over the summer holidays. I wrote an entire novel and I won the contest. The Head Teacher wasn't happy because she wanted her kid to win. When I went up on stage to collect my prize, the boy was in the front row crying. Bitterly, the Head Teacher said “Wendy didn’t write the best story, but she won because she wrote a whole book.”

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I never wrote again. Not for 50 years. Thanks Miss!

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After that, I couldn’t get out of school quick enough.

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My dad was a crazy, often violent alcoholic. He messed with my head and I became a sullen child. Still am! Ha ha. I was an introvert, shy with strangers and scared of anyone in authority. In retrospect, my brother Steve, two years older than me, was my dad’s chip off the old block and a true entertainer. While I was Little Miss Cinderella, caring for my mum and stuck indoors cleaning and cooking, my brother went out and sowed his wild oats. Lucky bro.

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Now I am resentful of any man who thinks women are inferior. My brother and my dad’s fault. And my fault too, I guess. I should have been kinder to those insensitive and less adept mortals. I’m nicer now….but still can’t tolerate stupid people.

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I rebelled against a future in front of the sink and stove, but still used my early cooking skills to my advantage and went to Catering College in Reading. I nearly didn't get in.

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A panel of four people sat up on the stage. Me, down below, on a single chair facing them. Daunting. They said I had nothing to back up my application and that I didn't even have a GCSE in cookery. I didn't think it was a question, so I didn’t say anything.

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They looked at me as if I had the personality of a peanut and started talking among themselves and shaking their heads. I took umbrage at their dismissal of me, so I finally spoke up. “I’ve been cooking since I was seven years old. My mother and my nan taught me. We used only fresh ingredients, homemade stocks and sauces,  and we grow our own herbs. I can cook anything.” Naturally, I blew their minds. and was immediately accepted.

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It was the seventies, and celebrity chefs weren’t invented then, apart from Fanny Craddock and the Galloping Gourmet. Proper cooking was considered classy, and I could do that.  It never made me classy though. 

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Two years of college passed me by. My father sobered up when I was fifteen, but the damage was done. The only thing I could do was to go follow my own destiny and  leave the history of my father's drunkenness behind.

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So that's what I did. With fervour. 

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To be continued….

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*Where I am now?* Writing this blog

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Tomorrow. The eighties…My life as a female chef at the Savoy and Gleneagles, when females were considered incapable of enduring the top hotel kitchens. Could be interesting!