Obituary: Michael Bukht (Barry) OBE, television chef and radio executive

Broadcast journalist who launched Classic FM and won fame as the BBC's 'Crafty Chef'

Michael Bukht OBE (also known as Michael Barry), television chef and radio executive.

Born: 10 September, 1941, in London.

Died: 4 August, 2011, in Kent, aged 69.

AS A media controller Michael Bukht was widely known in the industry as the inspiration behind Classic FM which, in 1992, directly took on the BBC's Radio 3 monopoly of broadcasting classical music. Bukht brought to the station a fresh and invigorating approach to presenting the classics and relished the competition with the BBC.

He was controller for the first five innovative years and ensured it had a sure financial base. It was as Michael Barry that his jolly, bearded features made him a household name on television when he appeared on the Food and Drink programme. This was an unusual double life, but thanks to his genial nature and warm personality the public accepted the two roles without question.

Mirza Michael John Bukht (Michael Barry) was born to a Pakistani diplomat father and a domestic science teacher mother whose family came from south Wales. He attended Haberdashers' Aske's school in north London and read history at King's College, London. In 1963, he became a BBC trainee and rose to work on the popular early evening magazine programme, Tonight, hosted by Cliff Michelmore with reporters such as Christopher Chataway, Alan Whicker and Fyfe Robertson. In 1969 Bukht was the editor of the topical programme 24 Hours.

In 1972 Bukht was appointed programme controller of Capital Radio which had been initiated after the new broadcasting laws banning the pirate stations allowed the establishment of independent companies. It was on radio that Bukht - using the name Michael Barry - first became associated with food. He filled in as a holiday relief and recommended such mouth- watering recipes that he made the job his own.

Such was his success, the BBC engaged Barry in 1982 to be a member of the BBC2 programme Food and Drink. Barry became a familiar figure and was given the catchy nickname of the "Crafty Chef". In his red apron he cheerfully cooked away while the ebullient Oz Clarke provided information on wines. His cooking was never grand or over-embellished but maintained a delightful homeliness which gave it a wide-ranging attraction.

Barry, who intermingled his presentation with puns and asides to his fellow presenters, Chris Kelly and Jilly Goolden, continued to work on the programme until its last series, in 2001. The programme was an enormous success and Barry produced some 29 recipe and food books all embracing the word "crafty" somewhere in the title.

At the beginning of the 1990s classical music was breaking into new territories. It was the era of The Three Tenors, stadium concerts and cross-over records. Bukht felt there was a gap in the market that Radio 3 did not fill. Classic FM catered for a very different audience - Bukht always maintained that Classic FM and Radio 3 were not rivals, and that his audience came from those in search of easier listening. Not the least of the differences was that Classic FM had to carry advertisements and therefore was much criticised for playing "bleeding chunks" of music rather than complete symphonies.But the station struck a chord with the public and within two years it boasted an audience of five million listeners: twice as many as Radio 3.

Classic FM scored a huge hit in 1982 when the BBC turned down the opportunity to relay live from Covent Garden a performance of Verdi's Otello with Placido Domingo (one of the great interpreters of the role) and Kiri te Kanawa conducted by Carlos Kleiber. The relay was a triumph and put Classic FM on the map.

Bukht had a shrewd nose for knowing what middle Britain wanted to hear or watch and a canny business brain. In 1994 when the Radio 4 controller tinkered with his schedules and moved Gardeners' Question Time, the entire panel walked out. Bukht moved in swiftly and signed them up. It turned out not to be a total success as, between the gardening items, music was played. And that upset the listeners even more.

Bukht also worked in South Africa and did much to train new young broadcasters who were in the forefront of post-Apartheid South African journalism. He returned to Britain in 1985 and took over Invicta Radio in Kent, having purchased an old manor house in Canterbury. The station had a few challenging initial years but Bukht persevered and succeeded in making it financially viable.

Bukht, who had been ill for some months, was made an OBE in 1996 and awarded an honorary degree from the University of Kent in 2002. He inherited his Muslim faith from his father and remained a practising Muslim all his life. Bukht married the actress Jennie Jones in 1964. She and their son and three daughters survive him.