WWhen Prue Leith announced she was leaving The Great British Bake Off because she was 86 years old, there was only one person who could realistically replace her. And it happened. Please believe the rumors in the press. The next Bake Off judge is Nigella Lawson.

If that’s true, this is honestly the best call possible for a series that has lost its way. Over the past five years or so, Bake Off has grown slightly longer in the tooth. This is partly to do with the talent drain (over the years we’ve lost Mel and Sue, Mary Berry, Sandi Toksvig, Matt Lucas, and now Prue Leith) and partly because the series has struggled to keep its agenda fresh.

If we repeat the old, safe methods that made them popular in the first place, we risk becoming obsolete. As the level of difficulty continues to rise, there is a danger that home bakers will be alienated by the extraordinary level of conceptual avant-garde science. If they try to do National Week again like they did in 2022’s Reckless Mexico Week where they all wore sombreros and waved maracas, viewers would die of secondary embarrassment.

What The Great British Bake Off really needs right now is a combination of talent that is very hard to come by. New judges need real expertise based on decades of experience. You also need forensic intelligence and enough full-beam charisma to mask the cracks in the format.

There are people who can accomplish some of this. TV chef Lorraine Pascal would also be great, but judging by her Instagram, she currently works primarily in the skin care industry. Chef and author Ravneet Gill has a level of pastry expertise comparable to Paul Hollywood, but he doesn’t have the right level of name recognition. The show has been running long enough that Bake Off could also have used one of its own alumni as a judge, perhaps by hiring the show’s first winner, Ed Kimber, or its sixth, Nadiya Hussein. But the problem with this is that they’re not Nigella Lawson.

Nigella has been at the forefront of home cooking for almost 30 years, ever since How to Eat was published in 1998. A year later, Nigella Bites made her debut on Channel 4 and she has been the face of home cooking ever since. With each subsequent release, she has cemented her place. Now in her mid-60s, she is exactly what this series needs right now. She’s a brilliant Brit who manages to balance a kind of familiarity that puts existing viewers at ease with a level of international recognition that may even eventually grow her audience.

The only time I ever saw Nigella Lawson in action was over a decade ago, at a press day for the short-lived Channel 4 cooking competition series The Taste. And while co-judges Ludo Lefebvre and Anthony Bourdain were respectively intimidating and talkative, Nigella managed to be both at the same time. At first she was so arrogant that the mere thought of making eye contact with her terrified me, but then she exerted such devastating charm that I was a puddle. I have photographic evidence of sweat spots to prove it.

This is exactly the combination you need for Bake Off. While Paul Hollywood is usually pegged as the tough judge, the truth is that both Mary Berry and Prue Leith had similarly steadfast, steely, irreverent cores. Of course they were nice, but if you pause an old episode you’ll see the fierce look in their eyes. They both wanted you to make a good impression. Same goes for Nigella. She is very intelligent and has high expectations. Imagine serving her a crumbled soufflé. Imagine the hurt and disappointment in her eyes.

In fact, The Great British Bake Off is much closer to the end than it is to the beginning. Like fellow warhorses MasterChef and The Apprentice, this one has started to wear out in recent years and is destined for the scrapyard soon. However, if you’re going to come out, it’s only natural that you come out as strong as possible. Nigella Lawson is the only woman to hold the job.