It Can't Just Be Me - Introducing: Where's Home Really?

Episode Date: November 1, 2023

One more week until It Can't Just Be Me returns with special guest Gabby Logan!In the meantime, how's this to keep you busy?This is an episode of Where's Home Really?, an award-winning podcast that sets out to  discover what home means to famous faces from the worlds of TV, music, comedy, food and beyond.In this episode, Jimi meets chef, author and broadcaster Andi Oliver. to discuss cultural appropriation, jerk rice and the time Andi accidentally joined a punk band.You can subscribe to Where's Home Really? wherever you're listening to this.___________________________________Have questions about sex? Divorce? Motherhood? Menopause? Mental health? With no topic off limits, Anna’s here to prove that whatever you’re going through, it’s not just you.If you have a dilemma you’d like unpacked, visit itcantjustbeme.co.uk and record a voice note. Or tell Anna all about it in an email to [e-mail] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello there, it's Anna here, just letting you know that it's only one more week until I'm back on It Can't Just Be Me with a very special guest in the shape of the magnificent Gabby Logan. But to keep you busy until then, I wanted to share another podcast with you, this time from Where's Home Really? another podcast with you, this time from Where's Home Really? Where's Home Really sets out to discover what home means to famous faces from the worlds of TV, music, comedy, food and beyond. It's hosted by Jimmy Famarowa, who you may well have seen on MasterChef, and his guests have included Nadia Hussain, Charlene White and Babatunde Aleche. In this episode, Jimmy meets chef, author and broadcaster Andy Oliver. Their wide-ranging conversation takes in Adele, cultural appropriation,

Jamie Oliver's jerk rice and the time Andy accidentally joined a punk band. It really is a brilliant listen and I'm just that little bit jealous that you're about to hear it for the very first time. I'll be back next week, but until then, enjoy Where's Home Really? Yes, we are back.

Welcome to a brand new series of Where's Home Really with me, Jimmy Famarewa. This is the show where I get to speak to people from the world of music and media, food, arts and culture about what makes them who they are. I am excited that our first series has won a Best Interview Podcast Award at the prestigious British Podcast Awards. Just get that one in there. Thank you to all of those who have been on this journey so far and hello to any newcomers.

You are all very welcome. Kick your shoes off, squeeze up on the sofa. I'll be exploring what gives my guests that feeling of belonging and solidified identity by asking each of them about four key elements. Those are a person, a place, a phrase and a plate. Now for me, one of them would be, and this is quite specific to my family, powdered like instant pancake mix and the maple syrup derivative once known as Aunt Jemima that wrapped up in a suitcase would be mulled across continents from you know my fancy

American relatives and it'd be the most precious thing in the world when like an uncle would arrive with this thing from this incredible world it It really, really evokes that sense of bringing a gift of generosity and also how many different cultures have impacted the way my family eats, the way we live, the way we kind of try to share things with each other and that spirit of generosity. So that would be the one for me, even though these days I'm far too bougie to use powder, pancake mix. I just make my own, of course. So anyway, that is something that I really cherish and definitely gives me a

sense of home. But what about my first guest to kick off this new series? We have this modern thing about cultural appropriation because we do appropriate. Of course we do. I remember when everybody gave Adele a really hard time when she had her hair in little knots. The girl grew up in Tottenham. All her mates looked like that. Leave her alone, let her do what she wants to do to her hair. Today's guest is a chef, presenter, author and lapsed punk singer. She began her career as a musician performing in a variety of bands during the 1980s, before turning her hand to presenting in the 90s. She has hosted television and radio programmes and documentaries for the BBC, the British Council, ITV and Channel 4, and has just launched Stirring It Up, her own podcast with her daughter and fellow presenter, Makita Oliver. These days, however, she is perhaps best known as the host

of the hugely popular cooking competition, Great British Menu. She has since returned to her early passion for cooking and this year released her first book, The Pepper Pot Diaries, Stories from My Caribbean Table. She is always, to me, an irresistible combination of eloquent thoughtfulness and straight talking mischief. A huge welcome to today's guest, Andy Oliver. Hello, that's so nice. How about that for an intro? I added in that last bit myself at the last moment, because I just think that is you and like, you know, I'm kind of hearing that laugh. I'm grinning already.

There's something about you. You feel like a cousin. Like you just remind me of so many people that are kind of the building blocks of my life. Are you quite conscious of that in your work on Great British Menu, going on Saturday Kitchen, things like this, of being a conduit for kind of these ideas and also taking up space and kind of being kind of visibly who you are.

Yes, I am conscious of it. I could not be conscious of it, you know, because there's not many of me around. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I am conscious of it, but I take joy in it. I don't, it doesn't feel like a weight. It feels like an opportunity. And again, this is the third time I've used the word privilege and it gets on my nerves that word these days because it's very overused but it does feel like a precious thing that I'm afforded this space that I've made people give me this space actually that I take up this space that I inhabit this space that I can talk about you know when they first asked me to host Great Rich Menu I said no yes i remember you spoke about this yeah because you because i felt like it was really important that there was a

woman of color a a woman a woman of color yeah and a woman my age in a position authority of authority in the culinary world talking about food from all over the world in all sorts of different ways and i think that that is a precious thing. Holding power. Holding power and having voice and being respected and having these conversations with all of these dudes and all of these people who perhaps have a narrower lens sometimes about food excellence and where the beauty lies, you know. I take it very seriously and I celebrate it and I love it. I always kick off by you know flipping the title

of the show back to my guest and and just getting you know a temperature check on their reaction to that question where's home really where are you really from this must be something we mentioned the Pepperpot Diaries there and I and I wonder to what extent it became part of your journey of unpacking with that. What is your initial response? I think my initial response is home really is in my heart. There is something about coming from a diasporic people where you learn that you carry home. Home is not necessarily a tangible place that you sit in. My parents certainly carried home within them. And you see that as a child growing up, you can see.

And when they talk about home, their faces would transform. Right. For somebody who has the heritage I have, and I guess anybody who's from a migrant or diasporic people, will understand that thing of home being something that you carry in you because it protects you yeah and it propels you yeah through the next bit of your journey you know knowing that you are umbilically linked yeah to this other place is the thing that keeps you going and even as a first generation caribbean person born here i still talk about home yeah like I grew up there. I'm from Suffolk. You know what I mean? When I say home, I mean Antigua. I don't mean Bury St Edmunds. I mean Antigua.

You were a forces child and your dad worked for the RAF, wasn't he? Yes, worked out in the RAF, yeah. And so that straight away calls into question this notion of home being like one single place and that notion of moving around. But also I imagine when you talk about your dad being this different persona or different person and having this lightness that was kind of foreign to you, I imagine he was, as you're suggesting there, a man of kind of rigour and discipline and things like that.

He was very authoritarian. He was a bit of something of a bully. The good things he did in my life were teach me how to cook and music. He had the most incredible music collection and he was a real kind of bon vivant gourmand. He loved to cook. You know, he's one of those every single pot, every single thing, make 25 things.

You know, I realised there are so many things about him that I have in common with him. And I found that very difficult to reconcile because I didn't really like him. And I realised I'm like the good things about him that I have in common with him. And I found that very difficult to reconcile because I didn't really like him. And I realised I'm like the good things about him. And that gave me a real release and a real liberation, actually, because I realised that what I've done is take the things from him that were of value. We should talk about your place. What place are you going to go for?

It's Pigeon Point, which is Pigeon Beach, which is in English Harbour in Antigua. It's not even that big a beach. My cousin used to have a beach bar there. Oh, it's just when I think about it, I get like goosebumps and almost a tear in my eye in a way because I yearn for it. She had this little beach bar and it was literally a shack with a little barbecue and we would do chicken on there and there was a little fridge with red stripe done was that always obvious to you that oh no this is where i belong you talk about going there as a teenager was it kind of always very apparent i think so you know so i got there when i was 16 antiga and i had well two things at first i'd never been in a country that was predominantly black. So that was a shock to my system.

And it was a good shock, but it was really like, wow. He's black. This is amazing. But the thing that blew my mind the most was walking up the road and this woman said to me, hey, you. And I looked at her and she said, you must be a prince. Prince is my family name, right? My mum's family name.

And I went, what? How do you know that? And she said, because of how you walk. Wow. So when we, the women in my family, we call it parrot foot in Antigua. It's being pigeon toed. So we all walk like with our feet turned in. Right.

And our bum sticking up in the air a little bit. And she said, because of how you walk. And I said, how I walk? She went, look at you, a two parrot foot. And I was like, oh my goodness. And then she said, which one are you? And I said, Maria. And she went, I of how you walk. And I said, how I walk? She went, look at you, a two-power foot. And I was like, oh, my goodness. And then she said, which one are you? And I said, Maria. And she went, I went to school with Maria.

And it was this lady. So that smallness as well and that kind of community and connection. It blew my mind, the idea that somebody can know which family I came from because of the fact that my feet were turned. Because of how I walked past it, she went, you must be a prince. And then it was Carnival. And I was in my grandma's house on St. John Street in St. John's in Antigua, which is the capital. And then we went down to Pigeon Beach.

And Pigeon was the first beach I went to in Antigua. And I just fell in love with it completely irrevocably and forever. And it's almost like the first thing I do when I get to Antigua. I love it there. There's a simplicity to it that speaks to, it helps me breathe. Yeah. Imagining you as a 16-year-old there and having this defining, eye-opening, incredible experience. Incredible.

So many things going on. It was the first time also I didn't feel other well i was going to say that how do we contrast that with what you were experiencing in beresford edmunds well i was the only black girl in my school in beresford it was not the year in the school you know and it was a big like low county upper school it was a great big you know comprehensive school some of it was you know tortured by people constantly racist nasty crap it was the 70s yeah i would say it's before they turn the lights on in the country it was grim it was grim a lot of the time so getting to this place and that i wouldn't i wouldn't come back my dad i stayed i stayed for months and months

right wow so when you were 16 did you finish school or I didn't really finish school right I got to the point where I was legally allowed to stop going and I just stopped going I barely took my exams yeah I was already done I don't like people telling me what to do anyway I liked it even less when I was 16 yeah you know like you remember you used to have careers teachers I don't know if they still have it and I went and saw my careers teacher and they said oh you know what do you want to do and I said I want to be an actress and she said don't be ridiculous and she told me that there was a job at the free telefactory at the road and I was like I'm not going to work in the free telefactory I mean if you want to do that good on you but I was not into it right and I went home and my mother was livid my mum's a

teacher yes yeah and my mother was absolutely incandescent with rage that this woman had told me that i couldn't do something right and luckily for me my mum has always been like that she taught me to have no put no ceiling on myself and to have no boundaries and you know to just i don't literally have no boundaries no filter in many ways in many many ways might have interpreted that lesson differently but she taught me to reach for what i want yeah and to not imagine that i can't do things because somebody else tells me not to so you know i very soon after that i left berry anyway and i think i came back from antigaua and came to live in London. Right so it was that kind of I was already in London quite a bit and then I went to Antigua

with my dad and then I came back and that was that. Yeah you mentioned their music talked about wanting to be an actress and I can hear it now that your love and delight in words and language and phrasing and stuff that seems to be quite an important component and through line and it's there in your work now and and so i want to lock in on your phrase that you're going to go for i'm gonna well there's two things the first thing is soul food like i just said it to you and i'll get like it's like i get an internal little warm thing like kicks off because the idea that food feeds your soul and not just your belly is central to the way that I live, actually. People associate the term soul food with black diasporic cooking. And to me, bangers and mash is also soul food.

So if I'm in Poland, I want to know what their soul food is. When I meet somebody, if I can talk to them about the food that they yearn for, the food that they want when they're happy, the food that they want when they're sad, when they're joyful, that central thing can lead us to friendship. It leads us to humanity. It leads us to a kind of opening up of the heavens. And you can kind of rise through conversation and connection and

you can meet someone who you have nothing else in common with but you can understand why they want a lobby if you're from stoke-on-trent or whatever it is you're talking about you know because that one dish that thought that thing is core to our humanity. And so the idea, when people talk about soul food, I feel like it's like a caress. Yeah. So soul food is that. And then the second one is one word, and that word is auntie. And I love being an auntie, you know, like,

and I don't just mean my brother's kids. I mean all the people that have grown with my daughter all the younger people that i meet who now call me auntie i love it so much like me and nana nana's my best friend i'm talking about nana cherry she's my best mate and we were at carnival a few years back neither of us drink very much anymore carnival don't have the energy and we had a like weird like pear champagne or whatever and we were at Carnival a few years back. Neither of us drink very much anymore. Carnival don't have the energy. And we had our like weird like pear champagne or whatever. And we were sitting on these like funny deck chair things outside our house. And she looked at me and she went, how did this happen?

Only just one minute we were like out in Carnival, running up and down, running wild. And next thing, we're the aunties. But it's like I feel so proud yeah to have reached this moment auntie status auntie status certified yeah certified auntie like when they get the boys coming and the girls coming in carnival or whatever it is and they're like is it ready it's like yeah yeah it's coming it's coming the food right and they're like oh auntie man are you making chicken and i feel so connected to this like centuries old tradition of you reach a point in your life and in your world where you can embrace the younger people around you and it just feels

like a privilege yeah in the most beautiful way yeah and I guess in a weird sort of way I'm so with you two incredible choices that feel beautifully connected as well like i've been thinking about uncles as well like you know i kind of you know as as somebody that's like you know getting older about to turn 40 getting your first when you get called uncle it's like oh god but you know you embrace it and i don't think it's necessarily just about age and i think about that nurturing that that auntie quality and I think it's also about embracing my own wisdom you know and understanding that I have gathered quite a lot of wisdom over the years I turned 60 this year yes so it's a very contemplative year I think it's a real moment you know the different sort of um moments that you hit in your life I'm like how did you approach it

was there was there an evolution in the way in which I just I feel like I've just been sort of moments that you hit in your life. I'm like, oh. How did you approach it? Was there an evolution in the way in which you were? I feel like I've just been sort of slowly rolling towards it. And now I feel like I'm standing up in it tall. And it feels good. It feels like a good place to be, you know, because, A, I'm still alive. And I'm grateful for that because I've lost quite a lot of people along the way, obviously, at this point in my life. And there's something about reaching 60 where you do get

like a retrospective. You start to look back and I'm looking at all the things that I've done and places I've been and things I've kind of gathered in my soul and knowledge and what I want to do more of and what I want to do next. So it feels like a really kind of powerful place to be. All my life, people have said to me, you're a very powerful woman.

And I never really, oh, what are you talking about? Sitting here, I've got 20p. I'm just like stressing out. Don't feel very powerful. Don't feel very powerful. But now I get it. And I am powerful. And I love it. And I am powerful and I love it. And I love to feel that way and to understand that assertion

and authority are not aggression. To understand that as a woman, you can embrace that power socially and actually feel good in it. And I think it's difficult for women to hold that close and to feel that authority and to feel that position in the world. Welcome back to Where's Home Really with me, Jimmy Famarewa. Today, I'm talking to chef and presenter, the amazing Andy Oliver. Hello.

Hello. Let's talk about your person. Everything I know about you, you've cultivated these almost like ragtag collectives of, you know, I've seen you talk about Christmas having multiple waifs and strays. And, you know, you've had this open house kind of policy throughout the various places that you've lived. Who are you going to go for? I'm going to go for Nenna Cherry. Yeah.

Because she's my sistren, like forever. She was just 17 when we met and I was 18. Yeah. So we were teenagers. We met, my brother had had a car crash and he was in hospital and he had his leg in traction. They used to put you in traction. He was there for ages.

And I came down and Nana used to go and read to him every day from this African Bible that she had. Oh, wow. It had all these stories in. She used to go and read to him. And he had sickle cell anemia too, my brother. And I walked into the room and she was sitting next to the bed and I remember what she had on.

She had this little head tie on. She'd just come back from Sierra Leone and this like blue, like little wrapper thing, lappa. And Sean was like, this is Andy. And I said, oh my God, are you Nanette? Because he'd been telling us about each other all the time. And we were like, hi. And it was like, oh my God.

It was like love at first sight for both of us he knew intuitively that we needed each other and so she grew up in sweden in the south as well as new york and also but she and i had had similar experiences about being the only black girl and we just recognized each other immediately and this is how long ago it was it was in uch hospital we went in the hallway and oddly i don't even smoke had a fag in the hallway and then came back in literally talked to each other for half an hour came back in and we said we're going to sing together and about two months later we were on the road together i wasn't even a singer she was already making music but i hadn't done any music we We just said, well, let's sing together. That's incredible. And then I think about two weeks later, the Slits were playing at a venue that was called The Venue.

And at the end of the gig, Nana looked down and saw me and pulled me onto the stage. And we went into this dervish, dancing, mad thing. And then Gareth said to me, do you want to come on tour? Wow. And that was the beginning of your... That's how I started singing. Literally, there's never been a plan.

Yeah, yeah. But what it says to me is that there was something in you that as much as we're talking about Pigeon Point and the Caribbean, the Antiguan side of you being really defining and shaping you, there's this other component that is kind of like punk and British. Have they ebbed and flowed in terms of like what's dominated like in the kind of mix of who you are I think so I

mean the thing that drew me to punk I realized is that it was it was always about not having to be one thing you could do whatever you wanted and be whoever you wanted and for me it there was always a kind of clash for myself in that you know I would come down to London and be whoever you wanted and for me it there was always a kind of clash for myself in that you know I would come down to London and be with black kids in London and they thought I was weird yeah and then I was in Bury and they were like you know go home back to where you come from and I just was I just was very like why are you all telling me to be the opposite of who I am I don't know what you mean I don't know who you want me to be. And it was always really confusing and really upsetting.

I never felt like I fitted in anywhere. And then punk happened and they went, excellent. Do wear those shoes on your head if you feel like it. The first thing I ever wore on stage was my mum's bedroom curtain. And I just wrapped it around myself

and stuck a pin in it. It was a nice curtain. It was a very nice curtain. It was like a damask burgundy with a kind of golden lay. I mean, it was a nice curtain it was a very nice curtain it was like a damask burgundy with a kind of gold inlay i mean it was a good did your mum know that you'd taken it i just took it down i don't know she she left she was left with one she must have missed it i'm just picturing the scene your mum's sort of toddling over to draw the curtains cut to you on stage. I just love that there were no rules. And meeting Nana,

she had grown up in this very freewheeling family. Like her mother was this extraordinary artist, Mokey Cherry. Her dad was the very famous trumpet player, Don Cherry. Mokey's incredibly famous and well-known now as well. Just extraordinary woman, unbelievably inspiring,

brilliant woman. And her dad, Don, just like Merlin, you know. known now as well just extraordinary woman unbelievably inspiring brilliant woman and her dad don just like merlin you know and i nana drew me into her world very quickly and we drew into into each other's world but i learned the art of being free from nana she taught me that i could be whoever i wanted to be you know we used to wear these like massive kind of gowns, flowing gowns, and then we would tuck up into our knickers and take our shoes off and just dance and then cook. And that was our world, you know, sing, dance, cook, repeat.

That's what we did all the time. And that gift that Nana gave me is one of the most precious things anybody has ever given me. Yeah. Everybody needs to be seen. And we saw each other. Yeah. And we still do. She came to see me the other day and we don't get that much time on our own, you know.

Yeah. And it's funny because people, when we're together, people want to be around us. Right. And that's a lovely thing. Yeah. But sometimes we're like, can you just go away? Yeah. Speaking of sofas and kind of family and people around you,

obviously Celebrity Gogglebox and you and Makita are now this kind of, even more so, this dynamic duo now. And you've got the podcast, which is incredible. I was telling you off mic that it's such a good listen. It fascinates me, this, because I think, obviously, you've worked together in varying forms, like the incredible show that you did in the Caribbean. I think I might have messaged you like separate to that.

You did. The things that you and Makita were talking about and a lot of similar to the things we're talking about today about this feeling of not belonging, feeling that connection. Makita was talking about her own journey with, you know, her blackness, with her heritage and how she's come to kind of reconnect and embrace it. What has it been like, first of all, working together in come to kind of reconnect and embrace it what has it been like

first of all working together in such a kind of concentrated way like the reality of it is it do you have to just be like okay we let it all hang out we show it all yes right yes i mean i'm a we're both like that kind of anyway yeah because i just i think the truth works the truth matters but the truth also works because you're not trying to kind of keep up with some stupid lie that you perpetrated or or or some facade and it's too tiring all of that stuff yeah and certainly for Makita and I we got we're so so I had her when I was 20 and I was on my own till she was about 10 or 11 then I met Garfield my partner he's still my partner and I think that those 10 years of us just being like just me and her.

She said to me the other day, quite recently, you know, we're a team. We've always been a team. And so it's just us being ourselves. We make each other laugh because we know each other so well. She's like, you know, I hate it when parents go, she's's my best friend because they're not meant to be your best friend yes well yeah I was gonna say you know I'm the mother she's got her own friends I've got my own friends but she's clearly a cornerstone in my life and obviously one of the most important human beings in that life in my life what ways does that relationship differ from, you know,

the environment that you grew up in, the house that you grew up in, the parenting that you were kind of, that you were shaped by? Because I always find this fascinating and, you know, it comes down to that. I think what's quite interesting is that I think for my, certainly my parents and my parents' generation, there was a, there's a gap between understanding the other person's life. I understand Makita's life because, you know, when Makita...

Have you always understood it? Yes. So when they started going out, when they were way too young to be going out, 14 or whatever they were, probably even younger. You know, she would go to a club that I used to go to because half of them were still there she'd go and met some guy called you know da da da da da

and I'd go is that guy still trawling about trying to talk to young girls tell him your mother said stay away from the kids or her and my niece

I remember that line yeah they used to use my name or Nana's name or Tessa's name like some of the aunties to repel weird dudes.

Do you know what I mean? They'd go, guys go, hi, how are you doing, girls? And they'd go, I'm Andy's daughter. And they'd go, oh! And just like, sorry about that. We'll see you later. It's like, you know, because the same stuff was going on. I was a teenager in London, but I was out partying, running parties,

DJing, doing stuff, doing all the things that they were doing. So I knew what was happening in their world and what was happening in their lives. So there wasn't that kind of chasm of experience. Obviously it was different because generationally it's a bit different, but I knew what, you know, I'm awake. I know what's going on. So I think that was different. So I guess it was a lot more honest rather than like... A lot more honest. With a lot of, and I think this is especially true of like diaspora kids and second generation kids, that there's this, there's the person you are at home

and then there's the person you are sort of out in the streets and out in the world. And it's definitely true of me that there was a kind of, you know, we're too busy, don't ask, don't tell. Yes, don't ask, don't tell policy, absolutely. With me, it was like I knew too much. I'm kind of quite annoying for them in lots of ways. Now, one time my niece was on the corner of Westbourne Grove

trying to have a fag, trying to be like a grown-up in the street, and my mate said he went up to her and just took the cigarette out of her hand, didn't even say anything to her, put it out and kept walking. How annoying is that, right? So there was a lot of crossover, I suppose. And I'm grateful for it because it just meant I had a third eye into that teenage world, which you kind of always want to have and you kind of almost need to have in so many ways.

I think it also makes things a bit difficult because they can't circumnavigate you so easily. You know, when you're a teenager, what you want to do a lot of the time is circumnavigate your parents. It's like, get out of the way. If I'm going, where are you going? Where are you going? I know, what's in that bag?

What's in that bag? Open the bag. Open the bag. You know what I mean? And our house was always the open house, like you said, but all the kids, I'd rather have the kids at my house and I know what's going on than have them around some weird guy, you know, some weird house, which I used to do with my mates you know so that knowledge of that particular path meant that you were able to

be like look just come and hang out here just come out and hang out here yeah and I would rather have 12 kids teenagers around mine so I know where they are you know so that's what her childhood was like really you mentioned You mentioned cheese toastie. Food has just been a constant throughout our conversation. So let's talk about your plate. You know, I imagine it's quite tough because how do you pin it down to one thing or one dish? So I've chosen oxtail, braised oxtail and rice and peas and plantain and a really good crisp lemony salad because that's just like a dream dish. and planting and a really good crisp lemony salad because that's just like a dream.

But I have to expand on that because what that is is one example of soul food. And in Sweden they call it husmanskost or la cucina por vera. I call it poor people food. It's like food that comes from invention, food that is made by people who didn't have anything. That magical element where you get, I mean, it's a tale.

But it's one of the most delicious, incredible things in the world to me. Oxtail when it's cooked right. I love it. And from any culture, actually. Like, you know, Italian oxtail is incredible. Joe, who does my nails, was saying, oh, my mum makes an oxtail noodle broth. So any food that comes from that kind of tradition is my heart. I love it so much.

And then the other thing I wanted to say is gravy. Just as an umbrella category. Just give me the gravy. Okay, don't bring me dry food because I don't like it. Gravy binds. It's like a kind of love language, gravy to me. It's the kind of extra bit that you give. It's like the silkiness of it, the roundness of it, the depth of flavor. You know, in really fancy kitchens, there's a whole bit where they just make sauces. That's what you do. What are you? I'm the saucier. That's my job. I just stand here and I make gravy.

I'm like, you're a rock. And also, I do really feel, so, you know, the high-end oat cuisine stuff that we're talking about is beautiful, and there's an incredible skill, and it takes years to learn how to cook like that, but I don't think it's more important than braised oxtail and rice and peas. It's not more skillful either.

It's a different skill and it's a different level of beauty. It's a different thing because we have not codified. Most poor people food has not been codified. Nobody sat down and went, this is the way you make an oxtail gravy and it has to be this way. Then, so it has not revered in the same way. And the skill that it takes to learn how to really put on a pot and make that pot work. You know, it takes years.

It's taken me years to do a good braised oxtail. I've nailed it now, but it took me a long time to learn how to do it. Because you have to learn from watching because nobody will tell you either. They lie. So you have to watch and pick up the secrets and try a little bit. Run in surveillance. You know what I mean?

Hiding in an airing cupboard. All of that stuff. So to me, it's just as beautiful, just as valuable, just as precious, just as desirable as, you know, an incredible bouillabaisse, which is, of course, poor people's food anyway, but something like that. What are the things for you that you really think of as the ways in which Caribbean culture has shaped the UK and the wider world? That's a really amazing question, actually, Jimmy, because I think that it starts at such a kind of base root level

you know but I think music and our food less outside of the home food needs to be more outside of the home because it's still in culinary sense I think it needs to be impacted more because people think Caribbean food is one thing they call it jamaican food yeah yeah yeah absolutely bananas as you can imagine in terms of music and style and approach to living i think especially for my generation like i meet people you know we come from this beautiful i think one of the jewels in the british crown is our multiculturalism. You don't find it anywhere in the world. Nobody does it like we do it here, especially in the cities.

We've got this incredible melting pot of people who are influenced by each other, who take from each other, which I think is really, really important. We're allowed to take from each other's cuisines, from style, from all of those things. You know, we have this modern thing about cultural appropriation. I think it's a very complicated thing, cultural appropriation, because we do appropriate from each other. Of course we do. We all live together.

You grow up. Like, you remember when everybody gave Adele a really hard time when she had her hair in little knots? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it was like, the girl grew up in Tottenham. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. All her mates looked like that why can't she leave her alone

let her do what she wants to do to her hair my god it's complicated and it's complex this interchange and the different things that we're shaped by

the whole thing about Jamie's jerk rice and they wanted me to go on the news and I was like I'm not going to go on the news and talk about

don't be stupid leave the man alone and then I realised I thought why is it a problem that because it was a bit realized i thought why is it a problem that because it was a bit irritating i thought why is it irritating i thought it's irritating because it means he doesn't understand what jerk is yeah yeah jerk is not a spice yeah jerk is a cooking method yeah and it's a spice yeah and the cooking method came about because enslaved africans were

hiding from soldiers up in the mountains the maroons up with the maroons and they covered the food so they couldn't see the smoke and that's's why the food is smoky. That's why it's cooked that way. So there's a story to it. There's a history to it. And it's important. Yeah. So you can't jerk rice. It's not a thing you can do because it's not seasoned. So it meant that he didn't fully understand what jerk was. And that's why it was annoying to people. Not because he wasn't Caribbean. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Do you know what I mean? It's like if he'd understood the entire picture of it, I just feel like we all borrow from each other. I don't think it's helpful to shut other people down. I don't think it's the way forward. If there's an issue, talk to them. And that way we elucidate, we explore, we have growth. I make bangs and mash all the time because I like bangers and mash.

I don't make bangers and mash in the Caribbean, but it doesn't matter because I'm also English. I'm also British. You don't love it any less. It doesn't mean any less. I don't love it any less. All of this, I couldn't agree more. As with so many things you've said,

it has been my pleasure to understand a little bit more of where and how you make your home and you've built up this wonderful person that you are um i look forward to seeing you saw and to uh actually meeting more now now do you want to come over yes i'm coming i'm coming come on the podcast come on my podcast and then i'll feed you and then there will be a heaving table to be continued To be continued. To be continued. Andy Oliver, thank you so much.

Thank you for having me. Amazing. That was so much fun. It was just so interesting and so fascinating. The layers to who Andy is. She's so spirited, so smart, and so open to kind of new experiences new ways of thinking and so kind of rule averse that you just can't help but feel like uplifted to like be in her presence

so that is it for another episode of where's home really please join me next time for more stories about family and culture, food and belonging. And we'd love you to follow Where's Home Really on your favourite podcast platform. It's always great to hear your thoughts, so do leave us a comment or a review. Like Penny, who wrote a wonderful podcast, I love the way I am transported into the home of each guest. I feel so warm and fuzzy when I hear the way I am transported into the home of each guest. I feel so warm and fuzzy

when I hear the perspectives of family life. Please, please keep these coming. I promise that isn't my mum under a pseudonym, but Penny, we absolutely are. You've got a whole new series to enjoy. So stay tuned for a whole host of brilliant new guests coming up, dropping into your feed every Thursday morning. From Podimo and Listen, this has been Where's Home Really? hosted by me, Jimmy Famarewa. The producers are Tayo Pobula and Aidan Judd. The executive producers for Podimo are Jake Chudnow and Matt White. And for Listen, it's Kelly Redmond.

Until next time.