IT’S a far cry from having the county’s best produce at your fingertips - but an East Lancashire chef is being tasked with creating a feast based on ingredients available during the First World War.

Eve Townson, chef at the Eagle and Child at Ramsbottom, will appear on the TV programme Great British Menu demonstrating the inventiveness of households during the blackouts and ration-book days.

Eve, 36, Branch Road, Lower Darwen, is up against Matt Worswick, from the The Lawns Restaurant at Thornton Hall, and Mark Ellis, from 1851 Restaurant at Peckforton Castle, in the North West heat.

Eve said: “It’s a celebration of the 100th year of the Women’s Institute and I’ll be keeping to my roots using local produce.

“With the Women’s Institute people have this sort of image of what it is all about but when you speak to the members you get the idea of keeping it local and using what they could forage during the war years - good hearty food.”

Some of the WI’s top guns will be sitting at the table along with judges Matthew Fort, Prue Leith and Oliver Peyton.

Eve added: “I’m not too worried about the judges as at the end of the day. They seem really nice people.

“I suppose it will come down to the way they interpret the brief, if it’s the same way I do.”

But Eve will have at least have two big fans supporting her - husband Bryan, a chocolatier who runs Blackburn-based beChocolate, and son Arthur, who turns four this weekend.

Eve will be spending her time away from home knowing the boys won’t be living on junk food.

She said: “I am not one of these faddy people who buys reformed turkey in the shape of faces for their children.

“Arthur is a good eater and he eats what we eat. Bryan has helped me with my development so I know they’ll be eating well. Arthur is excited about seeing his mum on telly but he keeps saying he’s going on with me.”

A spokesman for the show said: “If that jam isn’t set, if that gravy is too thin, and if that crackling doesn’t crisp and snap, then all their efforts will be in vain, because the WI will pick up on that in an instant.”