Here are the characters of The Vintage Village Bake Off, the Parkin siblings, who are now in their seventies.
Hattie
Hattie still calls herself Mrs Bowen, despite her marriage to Geoffrey being over for a year. Although he left her for a woman at the bowling club, Hattie still hasn’t recovered from fifty years of his domineering behaviour. She has lost confidence and has become, in the words of her neighbour, a ‘bit of a fuddy-duddy.’ Determined to change, she buys jeans and a pair of kinky boots, leaves her bungalow in an Oxfordshire village and goes to stay with Robert, her brother, in Devon. It is summertime, and she looks forward to rediscovering herself by becoming part of the close-knit community and playing the church organ. But once in Millbrook, her life changes. She discovers things about herself that she had no idea she was capable of, becoming strong, forgetting the controlling influences of Geoffrey and starting again.
Bunty
Bunty O’Connor has never chosen the easy path in life, acting first and regretting it later. Now married to Sean, she is about to make the mistake of her life. She leaves Ballycotton in Ireland and the man who adores her to take up with a plumber she’s met briefly, whom she arranges to meet at her sister’s house. It isn’t long before Bunty, typically impetuous and eager to please, regrets what she has done. But an event in her past has come between her and her soul mate Sean. Can she become a better person and put everything right – or will they be apart forever?
Robert
A retired headteacher and confirmed bachelor, Robert Parkin lives in his smallholding in Millbrook, a Devon village not far from the sea. Hesitant and mild-mannered, he enjoys the good life, surrounded by his chickens and goats, helped by his cat Isaac Mewton. When he’s not tending his garden, he’s baking, making jam and homemade wine, and listening to music alone in the conservatory. He is an avid member of the Millbrook gardening club and it surprises him that so many of the village women call on him to sample his baked goods. When Hattie tells Robert he is a babe magnet, he doesn’t quite know how to respond.
Then a local newspaper writes about his baking prowess and he is whirled into a Devon versus Cornwall Bake Off on live TV. And his opponent is a strong Cornish woman who is not afraid to speak her mind.