AN ALDERHOLT couple who have turned their love of peanut butter into a business are to star in a new BBC show.

Linzi and Jason Brown, who run the Nut Butter Company, are one of four food producers appearing in Top of the Shop with Tom Kerridge which starts on BBC Two at 8pm on Tuesday (April 17).

The show brings fledgling businesses together to test out their products on the locals in Malhamdale in Yorkshire and secure a place in the final.

Linzi, 44, said: “It is a once in a lifetime experience. It’s been really good, exciting and different, and certainly pushed us out of our comfort zones.

“We’re very excited to see how the episode comes together.”

Jason, 47, says it is going to be “surreal” seeing themselves on TV and that it is “exciting” to be part of the show.

He added: “It was brilliant, the whole experience of filming. It was a really fun thing to do.”

The couple, who are members of Hampshire Fare, received an email about the show and decided to apply.

Jason said: “It’s absolutely brilliant, it was a real shock when we got the final phone call that we had made our way through the various selection processes."

The business, which was started last year, was something completely new for Linzi, a former nurse, and Jason, who worked in vehicle recovery.

Jason said: “It was just something we stumbled into. It is still surreal to think we have got proper products and take them out to all sorts of different people. It quite something and not every does it.”

They started the businesses after a “big health kick and change in lifestyle” which saw them lose 10 stone between them. Linzi says they started eating a lot of peanut butter and decided to try making their own.

She said after a lot of research and weeks of trial and error and some “horrendous batches” they finally settled on the recipe and now have four peanut butter products.

The pair hope the show will “spur on” other artisan producers to give it a go.

Linzi said: “If you have a passion for something then have a try, you never know where it might take you.”

The pair say they enjoyed working with the professionals, including chef Tom Kerridge, and bringing their products to a new demographic of people.

They say the challenge has been keeping it “under wraps” until now.