DAVE Myers and Si King, known across the land as The Hairy Bikers, are on a mission.

The wisecracking duo who have brought the fun back into food are out to prove that you can enjoy a healthier diet.

The pair have just released a new recipe book - The Hairy Dieters Make It Easy - and are keen to engage everyone in eating more healthily.

Both Dave and Si are shadows of their former selves having taken up healthy eating in 2012.

“It’s all about changing your relationship with the food that you ate that made you fat in the first place,” said Si.

“Dave and I have never said that we are never going to eat a pork pie and have a pint again. But if we do eat a pork pie or do have a couple of beers we know that we’re going to have to compensate for that later on in the week.”

Dave, the smaller of the duo who also competed on Strictly Come Dancing, added: “My guilty pleasure is pizza, I love a good pizza and I also like a couple of beers with that pizza. What I have got to reconcile myself with is that if I do that I’ve got to practice what we preach and eat from recipes from the book for two or three days to redress the balance.”

The pair are an engaging double act brought together by a mutual love of food and motorbikes when they were both working on a film set - Si as a locations manager and Dave as a make-up and prosthetics expert.

A series of highly-rated TV programmes have followed showcasing their exploits in various countries around the world making them one of TV’s favourite double acts.

“We do rub along all right I suppose,” said Dave. “I think I have spent more Valentine nights with him than I have with my wife!”

The pair are clearly very passionate about their new book.

“We have gone to great lengths to make sure that everything about it is right,” said Si. “It’s actually a book that we wanted for ourselves. It’s part of that weight loss journey and importantly it’s about helping you to sustain that weight loss.”

Dave added: “We wanted to make it user friendly so the calorie counts are there on every recipe; all the vegetarian recipes are marked with a big V so you know where you are and all those suitable for freezing are clearly marked.

“Also people love tray bakes so we’ve include quite a lot of those – it also saves on the washing up as well.”

Given their new role as champions of healthy eating, do they find that at odds to some of their TV shows or indeed their early recipes?

“It’s all about that balance,” said Si. “On our travels we want to celebrate the food and cuisine that we know and find.

“If I want to eat a French cassoulet which is heavy and full of calories, I’m just going to make sure I don’t eat like that for four or five days, it’s that simple.”

Dave added: “I still think that our perfect pies book is the best pie cookbook out there - it’s our seminal work!”

“Pies are a huge favourite of ours which is why we wrote a book, but it’s all about moderation.”

Anyone who has seen the pair on TV or at one of their live shows gets the sense that they remain rather like naughty schoolboys who can’t quite believe their luck they are doing what they do.

“It is a bit like that,” said Dave. “We are hosting Saturday Kitchen in a week or two which is a hoot. It is nerve-wracking but when we’ve done it before we’ve just looked at each other thinking ‘this is brilliant’. What a treat, what a privilege to be part of that!”

The pair aren’t planning on taking it easy now that the new book is out.

“We’ve another book coming out at Christmas which we’re be starting work on soon,” said Dave. “Then we’ve got a charity motorbike ride across British Columbia in September. I did one last year with the rock band Thunder which they organised it for Childline Rocks and this year we’re both going on it which will be fun.”

The pair will be heading to Blackburn to promote their new book next month.

“We’ll be answering questions and talking about the book and our adventures. It’s going to be a relaxed evening. We won’t be in any hurry, we’ll chat for as long as people want to really, so it should be fun.”

Si added: “We’ll try not to be like Ken Dodd so they have to turn the lights out on us!”

The Hairy Bikers, Croston Theatre, Westholme School, Blackburn, Wednesday, June 13. Details from www.eventbrite.com. The Hairy Dieters Maker It Easy is published by Seven Dials in paperback at £16.99