Delia Smith has ticked off fellow TV chef Gordon Ramsay for being foul-mouthed.

The cookery queen praised Jamie Oliver and, despite the fact that she dislikes watching people eat on TV, Nigella Lawson.

But she said of Ramsay: "That's not teaching. I like him when he does his recipes, but I'm not keen on his swearing."

She told the Radio Times: "Jamie is brilliant and has done more than anyone. I enjoy Nigella - she has such a passion for food.

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Attack: Delia Smith has blasted Gordon Ramsay in a new interview, saying he needs to stop swearing

"I don't usually like seeing people eat on TV but when she does it's sexy and it works."

Smith, 66, said she regretted the prim image she had in her early days on TV when she made How To Cook, the back-to-basics TV series that even demonstrated how to boil an egg.

She said: "How To Cook sort of fails because there are still people afraid of cooking.

"Looking back at my career in TV, I wouldn't do the same again. Everything had to be perfect, and that isn't necessarily me.

"Sometimes I was really upset if I spilt a bit from a ladle and they insisted on filming it again. They should have left it in, and sometimes they edited out my smiles. I had this too-perfect image."

She also accused restaurants of churning out too many copycat meals.

She told the Radio Times: "In the 1970s there were lots of restaurants run by gifted amateurs.

"Now food has become like fashion - all the top designers and chefs are copied in the High Street.

"Everyone is trying to do cheffy stuff, with 'drizzles' and jus. My idea of a treat is one of the restaurants at our football club, our local pub, or a really good curry."

Smith, a director of Norwich City football club, also called for radical changes to the way football is managed.

She said: "It's wonderful for young people to be shouting and stamping their feet, rather than out on the street. Nothing nurtures a sense of community like football.

"But Sky Television came in with all this money and clever people created the Premiership, which is ruining it.

"The average age of a supporter buying a ticket is 40. It's outrageous, and needs the Government to step in and threaten to regulate it.

"They wouldn't have to do it - just threaten. It's all about greed and power. Maybe one big club with a foreign owner will go belly up, which will be a good thing and make people think."

The TV chef's squeaky-clean image was shattered when she was captured on camera shouting "Let's be having' you! Come on!" to Norwich City fans in a fevered attempt to get them behind their team.

She said: "It was grim, but it changed my image for the better, made me more human".