S4 EP3: Jamie Oliver on public feuds, chopping his finger off on live TV, and his controversial jerk rice

28:00What were you doing to make yourself famous? Books and TV. Had they bought The Naked Chef? They loved it. Yeah, they were mad for it. And their TV was interesting because I was doing basically like live TV, like this morning, and I was using the wrong knife for the wrong job, and I was rattling through. I never cut myself using knives. I mean, I'm as good now as I am when I was 12 with a knife. Like, I just, I know what it's doing. And if you know what you're doing with a knife, you don't. Cut yourself. But I was on this live show, and I took the end of my finger off. And I'm like, right, that's mega pain, but we're live.

28:34How much? How much of the finger? I don't know, like three millimetres? Yeah. Mine was a tiny disc It's the end The pain was completely disproportionate Mine went in the food as well by the way I said nothing And I'm like right That pain is like 75-80 % That's like mega So I just like smoothly Because I was a bit of a pro by then Got a tea towel and wrapped it around my finger Because there was claret pouring out of it And I could feel it filling up And I carry on the piece to camera Teaching how to do it They're translating I've got a translator in my ear and I'm rattling through this dish with a bit of my finger in it and then I kind of like, I was doing matsutake mushrooms with like pappadelli and parmesan and lemon thyme, plated it up and they're like putting it into the plates and they're like eating it with chopstick, ooshie, ooshie, you know, it's like, and then they're like, thank you very much, nice one, that's Jamie Oliver, da-da-da, and then through to advertising break and then I screamed because it was fucking painful.

29:37But in Japan, they don't go to advertising breaks like ours. They go to a live advert in the same studio four metres away and there's a young lady doing like Dazz Automatic and it's like, ah! And that shh, shh. But yeah, look, I know that pain. It's a horrible pain. I was using a Japanese knife as well. I think that was the other connection. It was a Japanese knife, so it got me by surprise. I'm also quite used to working with fairly blunt knives. I'm used to see there's a little bit of give. it can bounce off if you're using a crappy knife and you're not employing, but this one went bit right in.

30:12Yeah, I could look at the way I'll have a look one day. I need a little lesson I cook a lot but I don't still, I still, I'm very primitive Life's too short to not be on point with knife skills, you can do much stuff, much better, much quicker and not cut yourself if you get the fundamentals right and there's really good fundamentals and there's only really three knives that you need But I've been using one of those string choppers right I think you're going to totally disapprove of this but you know the ones I mean where there's a rotating blade so my point is I've maybe taught myself to be helpless in the kitchen by relying on no no because you're using a tool instead of taking your fingers off no no it's really good I think you use whatever but now by chop like a moron but I think it doesn't matter what tools you use to get to the end goal um and whether it's cooking or anything else and I think very much like your work like it's when i started the naked chef 25 years ago the average time spent cooking dinner was 46 minutes i think the average cook time now is less than 20 minutes um the basket data from the best sources is saying that we've never cooked less than now and also if you translate that data it also says that the nhs has got no hope in hell and um it just means a lot of kind of fairly dark prognosis for health so you could say well have you failed and I could say well potentially but I also would it have been worse if I hadn't have done 25 years of all the relentless stories campaigns and bits and pieces but I think like we've got technology now we've got the ability to the uberization of food and delivery services and and how convenient but also expensive and often not very healthy more than often so I think for me like yeah is Is there room for another book?

31:54Well, yeah, because the target's different. Like the target for The Naked Chef book one, that would be bliss. It would be bliss, you know. Even when we're doing our 2030 project, which is to half childhood obesity by 2030, that's only to go back to the health statistics of the millennia, 2000. Really? You know, so Simply Jamie is basically using all my tricks, everything I've learned, and also hopefully you feel like it's very visual. Like you'll turn a page and it will be like 10 things to do with a chicken breast. bosh, like exciting things of little rubs and sprinkles that you can now get in a regular corner shop or supermarket, like 10 things to do with a salmon fillet, you know, like here this is how you make salads taste good right, here's how to get more of your five fruit and veg a day into your diet, so like, it's not just the idea it's not just the recipe, it's also how it's designed on the page, and I just, I hope and I feel like a maybe, but hopefully when you flick through the book you're like, okay that's useful oh that's useful, so I'm kind of grovelling.

32:50I'm desperately trying to get people still cooking. And I truly believe that if people cook, the world is a happier, healthier place. I think the cooking, the books are the heart of your business. Would that be right? I guess they've become that. So it's like monetarily, if I can put it in Cresthose? If you sell some. So you make, you know, I make about£1.20 a book. Do you? And Naked Chef, first one sold, what's the first one called Naked Chef? It was called Jamie's Kitchen. Naked Chef. Just called the Naked Chef. It would have sold, what, a couple of million? Yeah, at least, maybe four. Really?

33:23Yeah, I mean, it's... They can't all do that. No, no, but I mean, obviously it's been out the longest, so it's had reprints, but I mean, I can't remember exactly how many it sold, but, you know, we've sold 50.4 million books, but also that ain't easy. Like, a successful book is 10 ,000. Like, a really good go is 40 ,000. Like, you'll get, you know, that is... So, like, I still genuinely, I sweat for every page, font, paper. I've worked every department of publishing. I've lived in the publishers for the first four years. I've gone to factories where they print it. Your books look superb. They're very attractive.

33:58The photography is immaculate, the food styling. It's everything to me. That was a compliment queuing you to the fact that now I'm going to ask a slightly more pointed question, which is there's also been reports that there's an open secret in the industry at large about the ghost writing of the recipes. It feels reasonable that, like a songwriter... I've never done that. Have you never done that? Never. Really? No, I mean, I... So, for instance, part of my process is I've physically never written or typed a word. So, because it's tricky for me because of my relationship with words. So, the first three cookbooks I wrote, I did on dictaphone.

34:33Each chapter would have a cassette, and probably most young people listening to this don't know what a dictaphone is. You'd speak into a little tape recorder. It's a recording cassette recorder. But now, you know, as soon as I'd earned a couple of quid, I employed an editor who I... So when I write, I talk and they type what I talk. And that's why there's no spelling mistakes in the books because I didn't write it. But no, I mean, I'm over. I'm over. I don't apologise for that. I think like my relationship between design step by steps, you know, fighting for white space. So the words don't scare you with it's complicated.

35:06I mean, who would have thought that I would have been the author that I am today, which is I mean, which is basically, I guess, the most prolific cookery author on the planet. One of the highest-selling authors in the world, I'm told. I don't say that to show off. I say that because I'm in shock. Do you know what I'm talking about? There's a story in the New York Times saying most of the... Do you remember a few years ago... I think it's right. Someone was reported as saying that one of Nigella Lawson's recipes had been ghosted or someone had said, oh, I've just made a bit of money. I've sold the recipe to Nigella.

35:42Yeah, I can't... I mean, I only know Nigella as a great writer, so I can't see why she would want to, because it's her talent. But I think it's very common. You remember that report? You remember that news story? It was a small... Not on her, but on general chefs, you'd be amazed how many chefs don't write their books. Yeah. It's really embarrassing. And also, it's like, don't come to me, like, in the early days... Because I've got a couple of recipes, and if I came to you and said, I'm not going to write a cookbook, but I think you'd be good with this, Jamie. and, you know, if you want to tweak it, fine.

36:13You wouldn't be interested? I would be really interested to see what you do. Genuinely. Seriously, though. There's no hierarchy of who I'll be inspired by. It could be a five-year-old kid. It could be a granny. It could be you. It could be a magazine. It could be nostalgia. It could be a memory. It could be something that fell on my head. It could be something that's in season. You know, I do your bolognese, but do you know what I do? This is ridiculous. I chop up some chorizo and fry it first because sometimes they call for bacon or pancetta. Yes. But chorizo's... Very good. It's very clever that you did that.

36:43It's paprika. Do you think so? Yeah, I mean, it's not authentic. It adds a lot of depth. Yeah, so you get umami, you get spice, you get salinity, you get salt, and you also get smoke. Yeah. So what you've done is actually very clever because you're giving your bolognese a kick up the jack seat. Now, I did that. I put pancetta in the base of a paella, which went viral in Spain, and I had death threats for putting... Not literal death threats. Well, I think they are when it's written on Twitter and it says, you know, if you do this, we'll, you know. Holy smoke. No, no, I mean, I wasn't frightened about a load of, like, chorizo-wielding Spaniards to come and, like, batter me to death with one.

37:24But, I mean, it went on for bloody months. What's quite nice about being slagged off sometimes is it creates this environment where people have opinions and actually it sort of settles itself out. So even though I said it wasn't this kind of specific paella, which didn't have sausage, it was seafood, actually the history of paella was, or paella, was anything that moved went in. So from snails to literally squirrels to, you know, meat, fish. If you look in the history, and in the history of paella, you would have sausage of some form, shape or form. Undoubtedly, chorizo would be in there. But everyone's always arguing.

38:06You've just reignited the beef. No, no, it's not a beef. The truth is that when communities cook, they're passionate about the specifics of specific dishes in specific areas. And, of course, there's lots of areas. I don't know if you've ever seen Italians talking about food. They're all arguing whether they're right or wrong. It doesn't matter because everyone's so passionate. And I'm just a little foreigner from the outside, right? So technically, why did I put chorizo in the paella? It's because British people can't season very well. We don't think about it. Like, OK, the dish is done. Right, taste it.

38:39Does it need salt, pepper, squeeze of lemon juice, bit of chilli, bit of herb? You always have to balance. The last minute before you serve it is always the most important. So by putting chorizo in the base, you smashed it because basically you're guaranteeing a good bang for your buck. So compliments to you. I appreciate it. But I won't be doing it as an Italian ragu. we'll just call it what would you call it? I just think we should call it Louis Bangin Bolognese Louis Raghu

39:28Sure, we should probably... We should touch on the jerk rice situation. Yeah. It was like... I did a load of recipes for the Olympics. The UK where someone's story like, Jamie Oliver's made jerk rice, and it was like, no, jerk rice isn't a thing, it literally doesn't exist. Like, people were lampooning you as though it was this crass misunderstanding of the cuisine and the culture. Which it was, yeah. I mean, that's... The thing is, like, I think, like, one of my ex-students, who was from an Afro-Caribbean background sort of summed it up by saying, look, it's just a middle-class white guy trying to get more people to dig our food, like get over it.

40:03And I think that's pretty much like, I mean, my whole career and probably a vast majority of those book sales is based on like, how do you compromise with common sense to get people to try something new, have a go and tune into sort of like vibes that people love, whether it's Piri Piri and Nando's or whether it's kind of like, you know, making your bland, boring rice have a little bit more like a kind of vibe to it. But I think, you know, and there's always going to be, and certainly now, I mean, like every book I write now goes through like cultural appropriation specialists. Does it? Yeah, I mean, it pains me to do it.

40:40But, you know, ultimately for a bloody cookbook, I don't want to offend anyone. Yeah. And the world's changing, so you've got to be sensitive and fix it. But where does that end? I don't want to be like, OK, I'll be the GB News person. Most dishes are formed. It's madness to imagine that, well, you have to use everything that's indigenous to the UK. I assume you've got British heritage, right? Yeah. So then from now on, you can't use any cumin or cinnamon or coriander. But most of the British Christmas is from around the world. Yeah, that's my point. And jerk ham. Cooking globally is an evolution of movement, wars, stealing.

41:21Yeah. And good times and probably mainly bad. Yeah, well, and fusion and collision and... Which are all of the above. ...intermixing, which can be beautiful and it can be horrific, but here we are, nevertheless. Fish and chips, not British. You were Portuguese Jewish. Pies, not British. Pies, really? Cumberland sausage, not British. They're German, immigrant German. Pies are from the Greeks via the Romans, and fish and chips is Jewish Portuguese. Portuguese. So like, so not even British. From the New World. Yeah. South America. Potatoes, sweet corn. Onions, chilli. Tobacco, onions, chilli. Yeah.

41:59So get over yourself. Even like, even Italy. Like, you know, don't talk to me about red sauces when tomatoes come from South America. You know, everything was very brown in Italy. Well, they say Marco Polo brought noodles back from China. I'm not sure if that's, I think, a rumour. Yeah. I mean, you'll definitely get death threats for that. But they say that like, basically, in the Middle Ages, Marco Polo, the Italian explorer, went to China and brought back noodles and thereby begat the whole world of spaghetti and pasta. I think if you wanted to sort of like give credit to the other side, you'd say, well, but we don't want like a middle...

42:32I'm not speaking about you, I'm speaking hypothetically. A middle-class white guy in the UK saying, this is Louis Theroux's authentic African or Asian cuisine. Like, you know, if I became the face of Indian cooking, We would rightly say that doesn't feel quite right. Anyway, I'm just thinking out loud. Yeah, I mean, essentially now what you end up doing is you have to say things like inspired. So Asian-inspired salad with crunchy da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. And sometimes you're taking key ingredients because a lot of what, like the way I write isn't as linear as you might think it is. It's quite a slightly strange spectrum process of what's the promise and what's available in an average supermarket.

43:14and then through breaking down chapters that are useful, I haven't written anything yet, and breaking down accessible ingredients, like top 100 ingredients that everyone has in their basket every single week, clockwork. A basket in Britain only changes about 4 % every week. So we don't really change what we buy much. We're buying the same thing every week? Yeah. So I look at what's available. So things like Niso or Gochujang, or in the old days it was balsamic vinegar and sun-dried tomatoes. like these things that are in every corner shop and and and you know balsamic and there's a standard things now these can bring a bit of life to your boring bland world you know so i i haven't even written a recipe yet so i kind of look at ingredients i look at the promise i look at the chapters then i look at a spread within a chapter of veggie vegan fish meat getting and then i look at the brief of trying to get more essentially if you although no one will believe me but the truth is if you get to the heart of what I do, it's trying to upsell fruit, veg, nuts and seeds.

44:11That's genuinely what I'm trying to do. So any way of getting, like, meat reduction in a ragu, which is actually very traditional because we didn't throw meat around. Like, they'd always have pulses and veggies in there. Like, getting more, you know, Britain, average Brit gets... Meat reduction, for a second, you had me confused. I was thinking, like, reductions are culinary terms. OK, yeah. You meant reducing the amount of meat in a ragu. Yeah, so, like, if you're talking... In your new... In the new one, you've got... Surprise me. In the bolognese, you've got lentils. in there. Does that taste alright?

44:38Mixing the meat and the lentils. If you know what you're doing, and I do. We've so gone random. We were starting with the idea of cultural appropriation. When it's Europe, it's less complicated. Nevertheless, I'm curious to know whether Italy expressed any concerns about Jamie's Italian. No, Italy, the Italians are clever, right? A, it's a very diverse country. So, like, 28 city-states, it was only brought together in the late 18th century through Gary Baldy and all other sort of people. Like, you know, they also know about business. And, you know, probably I've sold a large proportion of prosciutto, mozzarella, parmesan and olive oil for Italy.

45:21They ain't stupid. That's why they made me a... Yeah, I got knighted by the Italians last year. Did you? Yeah, I got, like, what do they call it? Cavalieri. I wish I could say congratulations. Congratulations. I thought I might get an Italian passport. For real? As part of it. So you're viewed as an ambassador for the culture? I don't know. I didn't say that. If I said that, I'd go in the press. I'd say that. But no. Did you open a Jamie's Italian in Italy? No, I think it's a love. I think the Italians are quite clever. They, I mean, it doesn't mean they won't argue because they will. And it doesn't mean they won't put me in my place.

45:52They still will. But there is, I love them. And I think generally speaking, they love me. And it's not about anything specific. I think it's more about a tactile love and affinity and a connection. It's like about, it's just about getting amongst it, rolling your sleeves up, having a go, and the idea of loving someone through food, which many countries partake in, but the Italians, I think, are quite famous for it. Italian food as a global menu is probably the number one, you know, as far as making you feel a certain lovely way. If you had to put, well, maybe you just answered this, if you had to put one national cuisine, Obviously, there's so many and they're so brilliant, but above it, for you personally, personal choice, would it be Italian?

46:37I think it would be Italian. Probably. But, you know, I think Japan's a close second for me. Have you ever had the Japanese one where the fish is still alive when they fillet it? I have seen it, I've witnessed it, and I have eaten quite a lot of living fish. While it was alive? Yeah, I mean, that's called fresh. Oh, I suppose oysters. Let's take an oyster, shuck it. Is it off-putting? It's strange to see a live fish. Yeah, no, I think, you know, as a food lover, I'm happy to eat animals, but of course, and vegans and vegetarians wouldn't appreciate this, but some of the stuff they do is for show, so its heart's still beating, and they're serving it on itself while it's still alive.

47:17I'm not getting involved in that stuff. You've seen that? I've witnessed it, and I've seen it. What was it like? It's pretty, I mean, it's grim. If you go to Tsukiji Market in Japan, I'd say the large majority of that fish is still alive. So in Europe, when we catch fish, it's landed and it's dead before we get it. And they just sort of suffocate to death because they're not in water, right? They don't bash them with a mace or whatever it's called. Isn't it a priest? It was a priest. What's it called? Do you know what I'm talking about? A little mallet? Some fishermen have mallets for when they catch a trout or a salmon.

47:48But in Japan, they catch them. They put them in little envelopes of running salted water with air and they keep them all alive. And in Tsukiji Market, most of the fish there is alive. and then when they kill it they'll do it efficiently bush through the head like straight away and then they'll put a little wire up its spine which will sort of stop its nerves sort of flinching and that way you have the best quality fish in the world and no doubt the Japanese are incredible at fish but yeah I mean like peeling a live prawn and putting that on a little perfectly made piece of sushi and it's still twitching I've had that you've had that yeah very delicious indeed I mean, it's cultural, isn't it?

48:27I mean, anyone that partakes in a burger or kebab has been part of the food chain in some way. Well, we should talk about that in a sec. What about dog? I wouldn't eat dog if I was offered it. I've eaten whale. Do you think that's hypocritical of us, you know, I say us in the West to take a view of that? And we'd all eat dog if we were hungry. And I think to shock lots of people, there was, I think even your pet dog, if left in a room with you after you've died, would be having a go at you. A couple of days it would have a nipple, wouldn't it? What about horse? I've eaten horse on multiple occasions.

49:01France is quite common, I think. Yeah, very common. And Italy. Richard, hammer through these. This is quite good. Caged veal. Well, that doesn't happen anymore. Not in the UK, but it does on the continent, no. It shouldn't be in Europe. Really? Yeah. I mean, it's an old wives' tale. But, yeah, that's not ethical, in my opinion, or anyone that's got other brain. I didn't realise that. Actually, all of us should eat veal because it's part of the dairy industry. I didn't eat veal because I thought it was supposed to be... Anyone that drinks milk should eat veal. Really? Because 50 % of cows born are men, and if it's from a dairy breed...

49:40Dairy balls. Then they're normally bolted through the head at birth. So we should all be eating veal if we're ethical. Well, I learned something today. Anyone that eats goat's cheese should eat goat because it's a system and you've got carcass balance. I mean, that's brought us to one of the grimmest things to speculate on, which is the plight of the egg-laying cocks, if I can put it that way. It sounds a little odd. They're not cocks. They're the male chicks that are born in the egg-laying chicken industry. They're generally, yeah, they're normally killed through an inert gas. Through an inert gas, argon, apparently.

50:15Or eviscerated immediately. Or macerated, i.e. shredded. Sorry, not eviscerated, macerated. Within two or three days of being hatched? No, pretty much straight away. No, they're done straight away. Done straight away. They're done straight away because they're bred so the males are a different colour, so they know who the males are. They know what they are. Yeah. But it's a strange thing to think about, isn't it? Well, it's called waste and it's a business. And there's billions, so billions of chicks, baby chicks, every year. They don't get wasted. I mean, if you want to, it depends where you are.

50:41I mean, I don't want to, I mean, I'm having an open conversation. But it's, they don't get wasted. They go into the food chain. and they just go to feed animals and pets and things like that. So they don't get, like, buried. But, like, if you eat meat, you should think really hard about it. I know. How's your energy? I'm good. I'm here for you. Okay. There's so much to cover. One thing I wanted to talk about is you seem to be incredibly hardworking. You don't seem to be. I know you are. And you also have a young family. Well, some of them are still young. Some are leaving the nest. I am well acquainted with the push and pull of the work-life balance.

51:21Recently you gave an interview where you actually surprised me by saying, I don't know if you came to kind of regret these remarks, but you sort of said, actually, I'd give up all the fame, all the success. Oh, yeah. With Kirsty Young. And happily, in fact, I would rather have not had it if I could just have a pub and run it, I suppose like your parents did. Yeah, people didn't respond. Some people got it and some people didn't. Well, I suppose, I mean, I do get it. I mean, the road not taken can often seem appealing, but you'd also be giving up, well, obviously a lifestyle, an enormous amount of money that you have and a business, all the people that are indebted to you for the opportunities that you've given them, the platform that you've had to try and influence debates.

52:04So it's not one of complaining or whinging. No, no, I didn't feel that. And I've really tried hard since I... I learned quite quickly within that first three year part of being famous that it was quite shallow. And actually, no one ever talks about the currency of anonymity, walking into a room without having a first impression. So, you know, when I and actually my family walk into a room, there's a first impression. Now, if it's for better, that's not great. And if it's for worse, that's not great. You don't want a life where you get favours. I mean, it might be nice getting a few favours, but it's not healthy to have a family where you're trying to teach values of right and wrong.

52:48You lose some of your social muscles because the red carpet's being rolled out. You're not seeing people's true selves necessarily. Yeah. But then you do have, your way is kind of... I'm proud of the work. ...lubricated in certain respects by goodwill, right? Yeah, and then you need to find privacy and then you need a sort of like further away house and a bit of land so you don't get looked at and spied upon and got paps pointing. But speaking of someone with less fame and success than you, but to a certain degree, I feel as though there's such a lot that's good about it as well. Yeah, there is.

53:19And I need to sort of, it's no, like, I'm living my life and I don't have regrets. Like, I know I'm on a pathway and I'm trying to do the best version of me. And every night when I go to bed, it's sort of like, I just want to be useful and, like, I love the people I work with and I love what I get to do. But if you were, hello, Jamie Wright, you can do it all again. I'm doing an impression of some version of a god. I wouldn't do it because to make me really, truly, truly happy, you don't need much. And I think having more time with your family and having a family able to make first impressions because they've earned it, not because they're the son or daughter of someone that's...

54:00Well, that's interesting. When you make it about the family, because it's often said that other people, or maybe their family is the price that famous people pay for their celebrity. I sometimes think it's tougher on my nearest and dearest than it is on me. And also, not that I have, but if you look at the data, it doesn't bode well. It doesn't. Often kids of celebrities or well-known people, they go off the rails and it takes them a while to come back to sort of... And my kids have to put up with, you dad's a wanker or turkey twizzlers or you know like that that probably could have done without that especially in teenage years when they just want to be themselves and and be normal and fit in and they've got me as their dad so no i i don't think i don't think fame is healthy it's really not and if you are going to partake in it then you like it's got to be worth it and that's and then you can sort of predictably go down the financial route or this that or the other but I think it's not about that.

55:01It's about trying to leave a mark and tell stories from your point of view and empower people. But you don't think that... I'm just going to play devil's advocate for a second. So you're running a pub somewhere where in Cambridgeshire or Essex, aged, you know, whatever, 49, with your family. And do you not think you would feel like you'd missed out? Like you wouldn't feel it was a bit... I think I would feel like I'd missed out. but I think passionately that simple lives, focusing on your craft, focusing on your family, not wanting or not being able to have too much, I think it's a better place than having to run and propel yourself at 1 ,000 miles an hour.

55:45I've built a massive machine and it's a lot of responsibility and I'm making it worth it and it is worth it But, like, you know, I just think just to be and to be human and to cook humble, delicious food and to not worry about, like, an exponential amount of bonkers shit and having a rhythm. Yeah, probably I would have some... Everyone's got worries, right? So they're just different kind of worries. Are you still up at, like, five most mornings? 4.30, yeah. 4.30, what, five days a week? Yeah. Sleeping at the weekends? No, because I have to... I sleep in, yeah, till seven. You're 7. Why do you get up at 7?

56:23Because I've got to take my son to rugby. Right. And then you're in bed at what time during the week? I'll desperately try to get in by 10, but I normally get in about half 11. So you're really getting only about five or six hours sleep? Yeah, it's not good enough. I probably get, if I'm lucky, six hours sleep a night, which is probably not ideal. I couldn't function on that. But it's a lot better than it was. But, yeah, I treat sleep like work. and I treat work like a hobby. And I read that you used to be on, like, three or three and a half. Yeah, that, yeah. What's that all about? Enthusiasm and optimism for life, responsibility, fucking mobile phones that just relentlessly have questions from people that I answer, like, from around the world, so it never stops.

57:12But, I mean, I've fixed most of it. I mean, I'll... But I think the technology and the availability and my personality kind of laid me open. You know, this is about 10 years ago. I'm surprised Jules put up with it. So am I. Yeah, well, thank God for Jules. She's amazing. But, yeah, I think... Did you rely on her to put the brakes on a bit? Sometimes it's our other one, our partner, who's able to see clearly. Yeah, I mean, she's great. I mean, she's very focused on the kids. But, yeah, I mean, she was... So she gave you this space. She wasn't saying, like... Yeah, she's amazing like that. This isn't good for you, Jamie.

57:50Like, you need to... She probably did. What's to stop you from saying, actually, do you know what? I want to slow down, especially why... I know your youngest is, what, eight now? Eight or nine? Yeah. And, you know, those are good years. Yeah. And this is probably your last rodeo, right? I mean... Oh, yeah, as in sort of not life, but babies. Having another baby, right? Yeah. So there's a part of you that must be aware, like, the years are slipping by. I think about this, you know, I've got an 18-year-old, 16-year-old and a 9-year-old. And you think, well, one part of you is like, well, where did the years go?

58:22Like they've grown up. The boys have become men, right? Are you all boys? Yeah, all boys, three boys. So I'm not trying to put my shit on you, as they say, but I'm curious whether you... I guess the question is, why don't you slow down and just say, do you know what? Fuck it. I'm going to do eight hours of work a day, which is good enough for most people. and then I'm going to go home and switch off and chill. Yeah, I've gone through waves of work-life balance. Generally, it's in a good place. I think currently at the moment, because of the world that we live in, everything's a bit disrupted. So one has to be on the front foot and work extra hard and be super...

59:01I'm finding the funding for my work now, like programming, ad-funded programming. I'm making it, producing it, presenting it and promoting it. So even my... Do you mean TV shows? Yeah, like the funding for it. On Channel 4, what do you mean? Yeah, I mean, I think just because of where the industry is at the moment. So I work with Channel 4 and ad-funding programming. But in a sense, I'm not trying to... I feel like I'm trying to give you a hard time. I love it. I love you and I love it. I haven't got... So that's all in your control. I'm an open book. There's no one telling you to do that. So some part of you...

59:32So why do I do it? You could slow down. You could slow down. Yes, look it. So I'm 50 next year. I've probably got 15 years of good graft in me, but probably seven exceptional ones. Like, I am where I am. I have the machine that I've created of team and place. And I could stop tomorrow, and so that's it. I'm done and pay the con, you know, do whatever, wrap up however I've got to wrap up. But I think ultimately my life and my business is very much driven by impact, which sounds really worthy, and a load of people will say, oh, bullshit. it so um what does that mean it means like every part of our business has to contribute to moving the dial moving the story like telling stories or empowering people in a certain way and i just feel that for 25 years i've done a good job and and if you look at the list of things that i've done and how it's changed legislation or this or that or the other uh in food or we've done quite a lot but like it's the tip of the iceberg and i just think that there's a lot more that we can do in the next seven to ten years.

1:00:38You see it all and you couldn't strip away and say, do you know what, I'll do campaigning and I'll do less on the other side. Less licensing, less restaurants, fewer books and focus on the campaigning. Does that work? I mean, campaigning is paid for by commercial success. So like 5 % of all our profit goes to sort of driving social change. I wish it was 10%, and it will be if I can, but currently it's 5 % of everything we earn goes towards... The campaigns team is a team. These are talented people and they're not cheap, but there's no revenue flow within campaigns team. It's a department of a business that really doesn't exist in most companies, if any or hardly any.

1:01:23The tail is so long and it's never ended. We have a big board of things that we're trying to do to move the goalposts on child health. and visibly or invisibly, every one of the bits of work that I've done has been trying to move that. Hear, hear. Congrats. We could keep talking on and on. I think basically we're going to get in trouble if we do. Have you ever eaten that Italian cheese that's got maggots in it? No, and I don't think I would. Not your cup of tea? No, not really, because I think it's disgusting. I mean, I get the process. So for people listening, there's a cheese where they allow the flies to land on it and then lay eggs and then they kind of complete the cheese.

1:02:06And in the centre of this cheese, the maggots only ever feed on the cheese. So when you get into it, you have cheese, a kind of fall off from the cheese, like soft bits, and then this kind of milky substance that you dip bread into. Which is sort of what the maggots have been shitting out? Eating and shitting out, yeah. And you suffocate the maggots before you eat it, I think. No, I think you just put your bread into it and whack it in your mouth. And the maggots become part of the cheese. Anyway, listen. Thank you for having me. Good luck with everything. Thanks for coming by. I'm looking forward, in all sincerity, I mean, I think I've made it clear I'm a fan and I'm looking forward to the new recipes.

1:02:42Thank you. And new series. And the new series. God knows we need the help with the ratings.

1:03:01Welcome back. It's me, Louis, on my own this time. Big thank you to Jamie for coming by. After all these years, I mean, as I said, I've met him, but to actually sit down and have a proper chinwag was something we'd never done before, and I felt we covered a lot of ground. There's a few things I should pick up on. OK, are you ready? Marco Polo and the pasta debacle. Is it a debacle? It's more of a debate. Apparently that's been thoroughly debunked, the idea that pasta came originally via the Italian explorer Marco Polo, bringing it back from China. Italians correctly lay claim to be the inventors of pasta, or pasta, however you prefer that word to be pronounced.

1:03:48On the question of whether Nigella Lawson ever had her recipes ghostwritten for her, or whether the practice is common in the industry, This is a little bit of a minefield. What I had been remembering was an article from 2002 from the Mail in which an unnamed friend of a chef called Sky Gore said that at a party, Sky was wandering around with a bag absolutely stuffed full of cash. She had£2 ,000 and said it had been from Nigella, who just paid her for 10 recipes she'd given for a new television show that she's doing. Miss Lawson, this is a quote from the article was trying to play down the implications of the cash for recipes revelation she admitted she did pay for help in testing and researching recipes she insisted the money was not directly for the recipes themselves I pay people to research my recipes to test them out, she explained I have a good team of helpers and together we try my recipes out so Nigella's always denied paying for recipes but I will say that in the New York Times which we can link to in the show notes There's also an article about cash for recipes more generally.

1:04:54Well, and the fact that many cooks get their cookbooks ghostwritten for them. Apparently that's an open secret in the industry. So check that out. Make up your own mind. Jamie says he'd never do that and has never done it. What else to say? Oh, my takeaway was really that, you know, he's a force of nature and unstoppable and dedicated to this slightly, in a sense, contradictory or certainly not always aligned vision of doing both effective campaigning for a variety of really good causes to do with obesity and healthy eating and whatnot. and on the other hand making a go of viable businesses and taking on the sponsorships or the contracts that make that workable.

1:05:42And so he's having to straddle those and also that he works incredibly hard. That's obviously not a newsflash, but he says that really if he had it to do over, he'd just want to have a pub and just keep the family and himself out of the limelight. Nevertheless, there's no sign of slowing down. There was a kind of dissonance in how he seemed to see life, you know, because I'm thinking like, well, you could just slow down and not work quite so hard. He didn't seem to see that really as something he wanted to do. Correct me if I'm wrong. I wish I could say now I tried some of Jamie's recipes from his new book.

1:06:19I haven't done that yet. I'm intrigued by the lentil bolognese combination. it's harder to cook at a high level with only vegetables right anyone can fry a steak right or roast a chicken but make a delicious nut roast and then i'll talk to you i'm serious even a vegetable lasagna it takes so long and then basically what people at there be like that's yummy and then what they're thinking is I'd rather be eating a meat lasagna I think maybe they're not even a ratatouille I like a ratatouille but you find with young children none of them are thrilled when you bring out a ratatouille I feel like I'm Donald Trump at a rally just kind of droning on and with no sign of it ever coming to a kind of intelligible end point But that's the Trump era which we're in now, and we can do that.

1:07:21The snowflakes can't stop us.

1:07:26Anymore. Thank God. Sprinkle whatever portion of irony on top of that remark, as you feel, suits your taste buds. And that's about it, except for the all-important credits. The producer was Millie Chu, the assistant producer was Mahn al-Yaziri, the production manager was Francesca Bassett, and the executive producer was Aaron Fellows. The music in this series was by Miguel de Oliveira. This is a Mindhouse production for Spotify.