Big Cook, Little Cook

Big Cook, Little Cook is a television series for nursery school-aged children broadcast on BBC television channels. The programme is set in the kitchen of a café, with two principal characters, Big Cook Ben and Little Cook Small. Ben is a full-sized adult, but Small is only a few inches tall and flies around on a wooden spoon. Ben and Small are played by Stephen Marsh and Dan Wright respectively. The format of a programme generally includes a visit to the café by a nursery rhyme or fairy tale character. Little Cook tells a story about the visitor which paints himself as the real hero, and then they decide to cook the visitor an appropriate meal from Big Cook's recipe book. Little Cook will then fly away on his magic spoon to see where one of the ingredients is made, e.g. chutney factory. Activities within the kitchen, such as washing up and tidying up, are accompanied by catchy song and dance routines. Both cooks act in an expansive and overblown style, but the show seems intended to encourage children to take an interest in cooking. The cooks rhyme a lot, like "We need a story to help us cook, let's take a look in Little Cook's Book." Big Cook does most of the actual cooking and telling the viewers how to make the recipes; Little Cook does some preparation or sets the timer.