Table Manners with Jessie and Lennie Ware - S13 Ep 17: Sophie Ellis Bextor

Episode Date: June 15, 2022

For the next few weeks we’re serving something slightly different as we present our Table Manners live on tour episodes. We opened the tour at the Queens Hall in Edinburgh, the wonderful Sophie Ellis Bextor was our first guest and the crowd were raucous! Sophie chatted Monster Munch, Nanny Claire’s chocolate cake, what it’s like to cook for a family of 7 and how her kitchen mantra is “this is not a café!” A brilliant guest and a true sport, Sophie’s also tells us all about her new cook book, ‘Love Food Family: recipes From the Kitchen Disco’. Enjoy! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Edimra! Hello! How are you? Hi, hi, hi, hi. This is such a pleasure. You are the beginning of the tour, so who knows what will happen tonight. We have a semi-good idea about what's going to happen tonight. Hello! Hi. I'm Jessie Ware. You listen to our podcast, and we are so happy to meet you. You know, this has been a long time coming, what, over two years? And I am only one part of Table Manners. So please, can you give a rapturous applause to Lenny?

Soak it in, mum. Soak it in. Woo! Soak it in, Mum. Soak it in. You all right? Oh, wow. Have a drink. See? Not so scary. I'm very scared.

She'll be all right in a minute after a third glass of wine. She'll be okay. Yeah, where is the wine i know actually should i get you one hold on actually steve where is the wine where is the well we've got champagne let me make some champagne fine um you manage jess i can do it yeah you do that you focus on that so edinburgh we've been here for a mere six hours. However, I tried to get in some of your recommendations that maybe some of you... Oh, you've got the T-shirt.

It's me sniffing poppers. Do you want to just get on stage and let's show everybody? It's unofficial merch. But it's quite fabulous. I was looking for one of your mother boots. Oh, darling. Now get off my fucking stage and I'll see you later. So we have been here for a bit.

I asked for some recommendations. Mum, where did you go for dinner last night? Oh, I was in Glasgow. Who's from Glasgow here? Oh! Have you eaten at the Crab Shack? The new one? Oh my gosh, the best. Oh, it was just so delicious and so gorgeous. I just loved it. I want to go every night. Oh look, she's fine now. See, she looks quite, it's like we're in the podcast

now, right? Thank you, mum. Cheers, everyone. Thanks for being here. Cheers. What do you say in Scotland? Oh, hi. Is that wrong? No. Oh, sorry. Slange.

Slange, Mum. So, Mum went somewhere in Glasgow. I tried out, well, firstly, we tried to kind of, I tried to do as much as possible. I was going to go and do Arthur's seat and then I thought, you know what, I could sit on my arse for half an hour more in the hotel. But we went to The Outsider. It was delicious and very reasonably priced, so thank you for the recommendation. Now, because we're on tour, it's quite hard to cook.

Because this has been an ongoing discussion with my mother about how we were going to make the podcast work. Now, we did Edinburgh Festival here. Maybe some of you came. Mum found it incredibly stressful making sausage rolls for London Hughes. So we decided to take the stress out of it. Mum has actually done something very special that maybe some of you will be lucky enough to sample later. But we decided to get a takeaway because it's quite hard to kind of cook when you don't have a kitchen and you don't know that many people that have kitchens in Edinburgh.

So we looked through some places of the places that you suggested and lots of people said Baba. I don't think they understood. Right, so we wanted to buy some food, because everyone was like Baba. We were like, meze, perfect. Everyone can have a little dip, dip, dip. And share. And everyone, like, it was one of the top places that everyone had said, so we were like, bang, let's go. About four calls we made to be like, hi, we would like to buy some food. We're doing this podcast. We're going to feed people.

We want to pay. This woman is saying, yeah, yeah, yeah, no, that's fine. And we have a table for 8 o'clock, and you're like, okay, fine, that's not going to work. So instead we got it from somewhere else. I don't actually know the name. So we're serving mezze to our guest this evening. Yes.

Which is fine. Otherwise, what would you have cooked for this guest? I would have cooked something really special, because she is so special. She is. Do they know who it is, Jess? No. Oh, you're going to be so pleased.

If I say that she is the kitchen disco queen, that might be... Well, I think we should introduce her now. Should we? Well, I'm so excited. She actually saved me during lockdown. I think she saved a lot of people during lockdown. Yeah, Friday night, you'd get going,

she'd put on a seatbelt. Sorry, I'm sorry. Before she comes on, there's a couple, I believe a couple, that are gasping for breath and holding each other tightly. Are you okay? Because my mum has checked there's a defibrillator at the back, so we're okay. Are you all right? Drink up. Get a grip. It's going to be okay. Any guesses of who this guest could possibly be?

Well, should we invite her on? Give it up for Sophie Ellis-Baxter! Hello, everybody. Hello. Oh, hello. Hi, hello. Hey, Edinburgh. I have to say, it feels excruciating standing at the side, seeing your reaction to finding out it's me.

That's like an anxiety dream right there. So, yeah, give me some champagne now. So this is the couple. Thank you. This is the couple that had to hold each other for dear life. In fact, now that we're here and I'm so near, I need to know your names. Hold on.

I warned you there'd be audience participation and me potentially falling down the stairs because I haven't worn heels in about... All right! Fucking hell! What's your name? Sean. Steve. Steve.

How did you two know each other and how did you bond over Sophie Ellis Baxter? We've been partners for ten years Ten years Also I made your mum's brisket and cola yesterday And did it work? And it was fucking delightful

The cookbook is available at the front The Jewish penicillin has cured me several times. Oh! But, hon, you haven't talked about Sophie yet. Oh, yeah, we're just... Enough of that mum's brisket!

Just anything we can get out, you know. We love Sophie so much. You saved us during lockdown as well. You're just the best. We love you. Thank you. Well, should we ask Sophie some questions? We can chat about food

we've got a lot to get through I know I could talk about food all day actually it's like perfect one of my favourite things brilliant

I feel like should we unveil the mezzo I mean everyone's going to be like oh I mean yeah sure whoa

this is something oh yeah oh that's oh and there's some back and forth perfect so Sophie cheers cheers here's to your first night ladies thank you cheers Oh, and there's some backers as well. Yeah, great, perfect. So, Sophie, cheers.

Cheers. Here's to your first night, ladies. Thank you. Cheers. And thank you for coming all the way from London. Yeah, hell yeah. To be here. Absolutely. So, let's begin at the beginning.

Let's begin at the beginning. Let's start. Yeah, let's go. We wondered if you had anything Scottish with the name Alice Baxter. I'm not sure that I do, actually. I think my ancestry is really quite dull. My granny looked through a lot of it, and it was all sort of southern England. So, no, I don't think anything that exciting.

I would have liked that very much. You've performed in Scotland quite a lot. Yeah, in fact, I was in Glasgow only about three or four weeks ago. Yeah, I've been here. Yes, I've been here. I did this venue on my last tour before. It's a really lovely venue. I just played in Glasgow on the

Kitchen Disco Tour with a Scottish artist, actually, called Wo'o, who came and did a song with me as well. It was really fun. Nice. Good party crowd. Yes. Yes, we love the Scots. Jessie, I really feel we should have had a glitter ball for her. I know. The budget wouldn't cover it.

Well, you could have brought your white horse. Oh my goodness. Have you heard about the white horse on tour with Sophie? So basically, I'm sure a lot of you did impulse buys during lockdown and maybe some of you also impulse bought a life-size white horse like I did

um I bought it during the first lockdown uh at that point not knowing what I'd use it for there was literally no tour in sight and luckily the people I bought it from they were set designers so they kept hold of it for me and then I first met the horse on the first night of the tour in Birmingham and what's the horse called? So I called it Bianca, like Bianca Jagger. Yeah, love it. Even though, looking at it up close, it was clearly male. I thought, if you're going to make a horse,

why bother putting that detail in? I mean, it's just extra resin. Anyway. But, yeah, and then it was so lifelike that actually I got a couple of messages on like Facebook and stuff after some people saying I don't agree with you having a live animal on stage that's it's cruel um which made me laugh a lot and then someone else called it a stuffed horse one night as well and if you could see it has disco ball hooves this horse I mean the chances

of a horse with disco boot hooves dying, then becoming stuffed and then me acquiring it. It's just too many things need to line up for that to be the case. But yeah, so I would start the gig sat on this big horse behind a big kabuki, a big sheet, and then that would get unveiled. And I just thought, I don't know how now to go back to a life where I start a gig any other way. It was just such a happy thing to start setting a horse every time. So who was around your dinner table when you were young and who was cooking? So it sort of depends at different points, really, because I was an only child when I

was very small to my mum and dad. And then they separated when I was four. And then the family has just kept doing this ever since. And so I had, happily, good cooks in both houses. My mum's a really good cook, lots of home cooking and my step-mum as well and both of them would get me involved with chopping and peeling and getting involved with what was happening. I'm sure partly as well because I was always very enthusiastic. I've forever been excited by the idea of making myself something to eat

and eating stuff other people are cooking for me. And so yeah, we would have homemade meals and then sometimes a bit of a treat like my favorite which is fish and chips which is still my favorite meal of all time i would pick that as my last supper yeah fish and chips okay so we've already got the main the batter yeah well obviously it's good when it's freshly done do you like with beer isn't that i'll have that i will have anything i'm actually not that fussy is that no you're not no have you got a particular place that you'll go to for your fish and chips?

At the moment, yeah, our local one is good. It's called Chris's. It's just down the road from us. The kids like it from there as well. And I have to have a gherkin. In fact, gherkins are on my rider. I have to have gherkin. Oh, wow.

No gherkin, no working. which I have to have as a t-shirt at some point actually no I love this this needs to be merch no gherkin no working it's true you know first thing I'll check I love they've got the gherkins yes so okay so your order your order for at Chris's Chris's yeah Chris's fish and chips it's gherkin yeah I actually have two now

I've gone to like two gherkins fair enough yeah just so that I've got oh I know so that I can prolong the joy

and yeah I've just I always loved them and I'll sometimes pop in there just to get gherkins oh right okay but they I mean you always loved them. And I'll sometimes pop in there just to get calkins. Oh, right. I mean, you've been pregnant several times, Sophie. I have.

Was that one of your cravings? You know what? The only craving I've had during pregnancy that was food-related was Flaming Hot Monster Munch, which I can't remember which baby it was now. I think it might have been my third. Yeah, I got through a lot of flaming hot monster much. I've forgotten about that.

You've had a big milestone this week, haven't you? Yeah, so my firstborn turned 18 last Saturday. That's incredible. And do you know what's really sweet? I don't know what you guys are like, but I'm a little bit phobic about opening my post. So it just sort of piles up. And yesterday I thought, well, I must go through.

And in it was a really sweet card from my mum, sort of saying, well done for all you've done to get your baby to that point. And it was really sweet to have to find that. I should have opened it before,

obviously, but just did it, carried on the celebration that bit longer. So tell me about those moments with your generous mother in the kitchen teaching you how to cook.

You know, what was... Jessie, you learnt by watching. Whiplash. Whiplash, yeah. But yeah, tell me, what were you cooking together and do you do this with your children too? I'm trying to encourage it, yeah. I mean, I think I'd love it if my kids can leave home being able to cook and be able to dance. I think that's two good qualities.

Well, they've had a few years of practice with the dancing, right? Yeah, it's a bit like stealth, you know, we just keep kind of bringing it in and chop, chop, chop. Wiggle, wiggle. But, you know, I think if you can make yourself something nice to eat and cook for people, it's always been a good way to extend love.

And, you know, I don't think it's about being the best cook it's just about saying let's eat together and it's a nice thing to do and um so when I was small I'm thinking like I mean spaghetti bolognese immediately popped into my head I think probably because subconsciously that was the one where I felt a kind of split in loyalties because you kind of you know you've got your mum's cooking my mum is obviously like the person where it's like, oh, my mum's cooking. And my step-mum also made a very good spaghetti bolognese. And I think I might have controversially once dropped that

into conversation in the other house. But what did we do? Loads of stuff like roast dinners and big sort of convivial feasts. We're always having people over. My mum's very social, so lots of people dropping around. And probably a little bit like me, she'd have a phase of a few particular recipes and we'd be doing that for a long time and then it would shift into a new phase of all the other recipes and yeah so she's still cooking for me now I went I actually had a sleepover at hers last weekend

because when my eldest had his party I took my younger four to my mum's to have a sleepover so that sonny could have the house to himself. He had a house party? He did have a house party. How did that work out? It was actually pretty tame. Yeah, it was quite cosy. They're a nice bunch of kids.

I don't think I'd do it with my next one down. Did you have anyone like a warden there watching or an older person? I did have an older person. Like a 20-year-old? Exactly that, yeah, yeah. And also one of the kids that's there, he's got good loyalty to me, and he was like, you know,

kind of, don't worry, I'll look after everything, you'll be all right. Okay, that's what I need to do. Yeah, he sort of acted as a bouncer, which was perfect. Fabulous. Yeah, yeah. But also, we're the house where everybody comes, I think probably because there are so many kids,

we're the house that can expand and chuck them all around. And I always wanted to have that because that's how it was when I was small too with my brothers and sisters and people always coming over. So not only did you help everybody in lockdown, you've written a cookbook, which makes sense because it's an extension of your love of cooking and cooking for people.

Yeah, so I first actually... Richard, my husband, is a really good cook as well. In fact, I think he's a much better cook than me. He's one of those natural cooks, just sort of always manages to make it work. I don't seem to do that. Yeah, he's good. And he's the son of a chef as well. His dad was a cook.

Oh, his dad. Oh, his dad was a chef? Yeah, he was at the Café Royale in London in the 60s. Oh, wow, how fun. Cooking for, like, the Beatles and things like that. So really cool stories. And, yeah, so about five years ago, actually, Richard and I thought maybe a cookbook would be fun. Because we're surrounded by lots of people that cook.

And everybody that comes around to our house will bring their recipes into it. So we thought that could be really nice to bring it all together. And then at the time, so it's like 2017, nobody was really interested. I wrote a pitch and everything, and nobody was very interested. And then I think after the Kitchen Disco, we got approached. so it's like 2017, nobody was really interested. I wrote a pitch and everything and nobody was really interested and then I think after the kitchen disco, we got approached and it was like, great, we can now do it.

So it's not just our recipes, but my mum's got recipes in there. Our old nanny who looked after the kids has got things in there. Is that Nanny Claire? Nanny Claire, yeah. She's got a couple of things. Although she's got this cake that she makes

that we call the Cadbury's Tribute Cake. It's a sponge cake and then she literally melts that we call the Cadbury's Tribute Cake. It's a sponge cake. And then she literally melts like a ton of Cadbury's, like literally the whole massive bars. And then just pours that all over. So then it sort of solidifies. You've almost got like an entire chocolate bar. It's incredible. But when we came to do the cookbook, we were looking over the recipes.

They worked out that per slice it was sort of double your daily allowance so they said this very very pretty slightly different version and as soon as Nanny Claire saw it she was like well that looks terrible so I don't know she feels very well represented but yeah there's loads of

recipes in there from like Richard's dad and yeah my sister's got something there my brother's got cocktails, loads of cocktails. Yeah, it's fun. What's your cocktail? Well, what's the cocktail that you would order? Oh, I'm a bit, you see, it used to always be margarita. Like, no thought.

Love it. Yeah. Woo! But I've got really into Negronis now. Oh, yeah. Different sounds. Woo! Margarita. Woo! Negroni. Makes a lot of sense, though. Slightly, like, a little bit more grown Oh, yeah. Different sounds. Woo! Margarita.

Makes a lot of sense. A little bit more grown up. Yeah. I want to know, how did you start the kitchen disco? Were you just fed up and it was lockdown and you were miserable and you thought, or do you do it every Friday night anyway?

I think the answer lies somewhere in the middle because we went into lockdown in our house a little bit earlier than the national one because I don't know if you remember, it was that time where if someone you knew had a cough, you were suddenly at home for two weeks. So we were stuck at home already and then the national lockdown started.

Richard and I just felt completely useless. Our diaries emptied. We just felt really discombobulated, a bit freaked out. Kids were quite stressed. And he said, why don't we do something online? You could do one of your disco sets and we'll just live stream it on Instagram. And at the time, our youngest was 14 months and crawling everywhere. I just thought that's lunacy.

But I didn't have anything else I was doing. So I put on my catsuit I wore this secret catsuit got through a few songs and at the end of it I was just thinking I just think everybody's going to make fun of me they're just going to say that looked ridiculous what were you thinking and actually there was this this real warmth and I thought you know what that has given me just the tonic and the way I thought of it in my head was a bit like if you decide you're not going to drink and you have a non-alcoholic beer and for a little minute it just gives you that suggestion of that so for a little minute those disco that would just give you that pep

like like you've done a gig like you'd seen people even though really you hadn't and um it just became the thing to distract us it was all you know domesticity and discos and not really anything else did Did the kids love it? I don't really know. Were they like, come on, mum, let's watch Disney Plus? If they wanted to do that, they could. I never, ever said you have to come. In fact, sometimes...

But they were there. Yeah, I mean, some of them were there all the time. A couple of them would drop in and out. My second one, Dan Kitt, he was the sort of least interested. So he would sometimes just say no i'm not going to bother and just make me a cup of tea when you're finished watch telly upstairs but um i always needed my eldest because he had to look after the baby so he had a very very proper job so i'd say i'm sorry sonny i just i can't do it without you with a toddler wandering

around and then um yeah the others would drop in and i remember one week, my, I can't remember which one it was, I think it must have been Jesse, so he's six now, so he must have been like four or five. And he said, I'm not coming, I'm not coming. And then it got to like five minutes before we went live. Where is he going to go? Jesse, where are you going to go? Upstairs?

Yeah, just go and play, yeah. Exactly, yeah, just go, yeah, hang out. And then he turned up wearing a silver bomber jacket, monkey hands and some sort of, and he went, I'm a disco monkey, let's go. Okay, okay, son of mine, let's go. Okay, son of mine, let's do this. So it's good fun, but you know what kids are like, we didn't

really like to sit around and chat about it when it wasn't happening. For them it was like 20 minutes that happened on a Friday, they didn't really have any idea of... So did your husband film you? Yeah, Richard was on, he was full tech support. And how did he do the music at the same time as the filming and all of that? Well actually, the true answer might bore you if I go into all the details,

but he did a really clever thing because he managed to basically, with like gaffer tape and wires, construct it so that going into the phone, because it was just literally his phone, was my microphone input and the music and he could mix the two. Wow. When we did the first one, we just used the sound in the room, just the speakers in the room, and it was chaos. You could hear the kids screaming all this. When we did it with just my microphone going in, you couldn't hear them so much. So I could just sing and sometimes they'd

be like shouting or squabbling or something. And he was like, you can't hear them. And then I could like, my shoulders could drop and I'm like, oh, it's fine. Nobody's judging this bit. It's just like normal life. I mean, I could still confiscate the odd weapon when they were like, oh, they found a drumstick. That's going up there. That's like, you know, someone's climbing the window. But it was just good fun. And then afterwards, it was always like Friday nights. We'd have a cocktail.

We'd maybe get a takeaway. The kids would stay up that bit later. And it just gave us something that was other because there was no other. It was just the same day over and over. Where did your love of disco come from? Quite late, actually. Really? Yeah, I was always a pop kid. I loved pop music

when I was tiny, and I got really into indie when I was a teenager. And then it was really after I did Groove Jet when I was 21 and started singing a bit of dance music that I kind of joined the dots to where the roots of dance music were for me, like the soul of it, the emotion.

And I thought disco is it. Hearing those incredible, rich, often female vocalists telling tales of heartache and cautionary tales. And that incredible music. I just thought, but it's really, yeah, probably in my 20s actually. So relatively late, I think. When did you like disco, Jess? I think I was like, well, because I liked

drum and bass was kind of, well, R&B then drum and bass was kind of my first bit of dance and club experience was drum and bass. And disco wasn't like people, well, 17-year-olds weren't listening to disco at that time. Well, I wasn't anyway, none of my

mates were. I feel like it came later, because I think I had a weird thing where I felt like house was so slow compared to drum and bass, that I was like, ugh. And actually, house kind of feels like it derives from disco, and then actually, they were... Anyway, it came to me slightly later, too, I think.

I'm a lot older than you, but I think you're right that for both of us, where the musical landscape was, disco really wasn't the thing at the time. And then I really a little bit older than you but I think you're right that for both of us where the musical landscape was disco really wasn't the thing and then I really kind of appreciated the melodrama and you know like you're saying the cautionary tales and the the magic of the orchestras and their incredible budgets they must have had you know what I mean like so musicianship as well yeah playing on those things like insane exactly and they often start so silky and small and by the end you're like everything's

whirling around you. It's just such an incredible soundscape. I love it so much. So back to that kitchen, the cocktails. So you've done this book. I was going to get the words wrong. Don't worry about it. This is going to happen to me now. Love, food, family.

But no matter what order you put it in they all sound all the right elements and so yeah and it's got recipes from your mum cocktails what's your proudest recipe in there that you feel like that would be the one that you would give to anybody in this audience it'd be like bang it's a winner oh that's tricky actually i mean it's just easy because you've got five kids yeah I mean I think our favorite thing yeah exactly well we've done this so this month has been a good example of this kind of cooking actually because we've had four birthdays in April in our house so for each one we've we've cooked

for lots of people coming around and so I like those really big non-fuss sort of communal eats so I would either do for everybody a huge pulled pork and then you can have all the Mexican stuff that goes with it. You can have street corn and slaw and salsa and guacamole and all that fun stuff. Then we can have margaritas. Woo! Or

I'd go for actually just a really traditional roast. I think roast dinners are brilliant. They're an effort. I don't think they are. Are we talking chicken or what? Are you talking which? Yeah, chicken is probably my favourite go-to. It's so cosy. I feel like that's the easiest one

because I feel like you can bung everything underneath the chicken and then it always tastes good. Yeah, it tastes really good. But we still put Yorkshire pudding with it as well. I've kind of learnt to do it with everything now. Do you make your own? Yeah, I love it.

It's quite simple, alchemy, I think. I'm not very good at a lot of technical things, but Yorkshire pudding, I love that thing of it rising, and I would do it in a massive tray. So it comes out as one rippling, big Yorkshire pudding. Oh, that's nice. It's really fun. Tear it up. Gorgeous. Now, do all your kids have different

dietary requirements? Yeah, that's what I thought. Yeah, it's like having five very harsh critics, definitely, for every meal. So how does, like, meal time in your household look? Are you doing different dishes for them all, or are you being like, suck it up, eat the fucking pork? Yeah, it's a little bit, except for the vegetarian. We've got one vegetarian now as well.

Nightmare. Yeah, which is a different one. How many vegetarians are there tonight here? Neatly. How many vegans? Loud and proud, I like it. Not many vegetarians or vegans up in Scotland, I have to say.

So what's happening with the vegetarian? So we have to, my usual phrase you hear me say is this is not a cafe. So we don't have lots of different orders coming in because that would be a nightmare. So there is a core meal and then we'll just do little variations for each plate and actually i would say that a successful meal is when most of the people eat most of the food and you can't if

you're in a big family you can slip under the radar a little bit you know you've got one and you're kind of looking at your child like please eat please eat when there's more you're like oh most of the meat and that's fine i don't even know which plate that was. Does anyone else want this? It's fine. Okay, that's good to know. Are they good eaters? Overall, they're all right, yeah. I think they're much more adventurous than I was as a kid.

I remember I was quite fussy, I think. I remember things like if I had orange juice with bits in, I wouldn't eat or drink it, or if anything was a bit spicy. But I think they're a bit more adventurous. But then our palates are better because we've got access to so many more ingredients and flavours. You know in a one mile radius of our house we've got thai or korean or vietnamese or japanese or you know we're so lucky like that just didn't happen when i was you go out to eat a lot there's a big gang of you if you do i tend to zoom world

takeaways i think because my youngest is three and so the idea of sitting in a restaurant and then his attention span waning and then him just wanting to wander off, and that's not that fun for me. Do you find that less people invite you over now that you're a family of seven? Definitely. Because I'm already finding that as a family of five.

Yeah, 100%. It's like... I think I announced when I was telling my friends about my fourth baby, I was like, well, none of you invite us out anymore anyway, so I might as well have another baby and create my own little gaggle. Do you think you will have another? I don't know. I can't form the sentence, I'm down, I'm just not one of those people, but

I'm 43 now and I think maybe it's time to watch my babies grow. Maybe that's where I'm at. Maybe that's the chapter. Do you think you'll have another? Would you like me to have another? I don't think so. Well, then... And that will have any bearing? Exactly.

I want to know about birthday cakes. Is there a birthday cake that is like an absolute winner for you? Well, usually not one I've made. My success rate of birthday cakes is varied. And I have a couple of very good bakers. My sister Martha is an excellent baker and Nanny Claire was always the baker as well and she'd be horrified at the amount of cakes that I now buy because...

Survival. Yeah, survival. I've made a couple. I used to make them all the time. I've got a theory that for some people they like that style of cooking where you have the ingredients, the exact things produce that result.

I'm more the person where I'll look at a recipe, I've got like three quarters of the ingredients and I'll have a go anyway. You can't do that with a cake. No. If you miss out the flour, it's not going to still be a cake. So would you avoid doing bake-off? Oh yeah, definitely.

That doesn't, I love watching it, but no. I'm actually also, I'm not that much of a sweet tooth. I know a bit of chocolate and I'm happy to be honest. Okay, so let's go on to your last supper. We've already got fish and chips as the main with two gherkins. Yes, please, thank you. And a margarita. Well, I don't know, that used to be her drink.

So, you know the drill. Drink of choice, starter, main, pud. Yeah. Okay, so my starter. At the moment, I feel like I want to go old school with a prawn cocktail. But a really good one. And I say that because sometimes they've got a bit silly and fancy, and I don't want that.

You're not the only person that goes for prawn cocktail. I bet not, yeah. People do love it. It's coming back, I think. I think it is, but I want the small prawns. Small prawns? Yeah, not the big, oh, I like it. I don't want fancy jumbo prawns.

I want small prawns. Because then you get the ratio of the sauce with the prawn, I feel like, better. Yeah, not the big, I don't want fancy jumbo prawns, I want small prawns. Because then you get the ratio of the sauce with the prawn, I feel like, better. Yeah, yeah. Although now I'm talking and I'm thinking, but hey, what about, you know, a carpaccio or a little ceviche? That would be very nice. Have a few. Well, yes, brain, that works.

Do you like your prawns in kind of a glass or in avocado? I'm having them in a glass, I think. Yeah, and brown bread and butter with it? Yeah, that'd be very nice, thank you. Yeah, I like that too. And then you're going straight on to fish and chips.

Fish and chips, yeah. Would you have wine with your fish and chips? Yeah, yeah, I would. Which one? And if it's New Year's Eve, I'd have champagne. Okay. It's always what we do if we're not going out for New Year's Eve. Which wine would you have um

oh yeah actually yes that is the word that flashed in my head too i feel like i've got these little numbskulls in there do you remember like the things the signs they put in any any yeah any uh no i'm what's my like at the moment my sister's introduced me to something called pickpoll. Do you know that one? Yeah, it's gorgeous. I'd love that, please. It's a good one.

Like someone's in Mick Hicknall's Pleasure at the Fairground video. Woo! Like that. Go on, sorry. It's lovely. It's really crisp, isn't it? I think it'd go nicely with the fish.

Yeah, very nice. Yeah. And besides the gherkin, do you have tartar sauce? No, I have mayonnaise and ketchup and vinegar on my chips. Oh, wow, that's dirty. Controversial. Controversial. I don't put salt on my chips.

I know this is contra. You don't put salt on your chips? No. Just never have. I don't add salt to hardly anything I eat. Oh, my word. Tell me when she cheats. Because...

The great thing about food is we're not all the same, guys. And they loved you at the beginning. Yeah, if I said the same things as you, you'd be like, well, this is fine for a while, but where are you different? I'm different because I don't add salt. I'll do it when I'm cooking, of course. You need it. But when it's done, if it's seasoned correctly,

you'll find you're happy. Vinegar? Yeah, vinegar. Vinegar. Okay, so we're not salty and we're not... of course you need it but when it's done if it's seasoned correctly you'll find you're happy vinegar yeah vinegar vinegar yeah okay so so we're not salty and we're not I feel like you're never

going to forgive me for that but and you're not that you don't like a sweet that much but what are you going to go for your for your pudding

so I've still got room post all this food yeah okay if it's the sort of pudding why I always say yes apple crumble and custard. Have I got you back on side?

We'll judge her by her pudding choice. It's a fair choice, yeah. But I like the sort of school dinner one, you know, where it's all like sweet on the top and then the custard all sort of seeps into the nice crumble topping. Have you got a recipe of crumble in the book?

I haven't actually, no. But my mum makes a really good one. No, we've got some nice stuff. Have you got a recipe of crumble in the book? I haven't, actually. No, but my mum makes a really good one. No, we've got some nice stuff. We've got tiramisu, which we had at our wedding. Oh, nice. Because Richard and I got married in Italy, solely for the food. We've got no link to Italy at all.

We just thought, I bet there'd be really good food for the wedding. So which part of Italy? So it was in Umbria, and it was in this hotel that was at the time run by a family where it was all like an honesty bar. And, you know, we took over the whole thing. It was quite a dinky wedding.

Were you honest? I think we were. I think we were too honest. It was really, we ran up an impressive bill. But it was really fun. We were like 26, and it was just, we were one of the first of our group of mates to get married. So we didn't really have an idea exactly of what a wedding had to be like so we kind of just had lots of fun and played and I always think for you being quite a young mum and a young bride but and I think you

were you were because if you've got an 18 year old and you're very young now um not massive I was 25 just my 20 after my 25th birthday I Sonny. So it's not super young. It seemed young for a pop star to get. Do you know what I mean? Well, it was... Mum, you sound like a man from a record label. Do I? No, but it does seem young to...

No, it was young in my... I was the first of my friends. She was younger than her friends. Shut up, Jessie. She was younger than her friends. I think I didn't actually have any girlfriends, have a baby until I had my third when I was the first of my friends. She was younger than her friends. Shut up, Jessie. She was younger than her friends. I think I didn't actually have any girlfriends, have a baby until I had my third when I was 32, 33. And that's when they all started having babies.

It was really nice. It was so nice to have friends with babies at the same time. But I think the flip of it is that Sonny became like the communal baby. So he's got really good relationships with a lot of my girlfriends, like properly. They really know him and he really knows them. And I don't think that happens when there's babies popping up all over the shop you kind of get that he really got the benefit of that aspect but at the same time yeah it was a little bit isolating at times when I had the first one and they didn't necessarily

were in the same boat as me just that so he's not left home yet no he's still at school he's not left home yet. No, he's still at school. He's still at school, but next year. He must finish school this year. Yes, he's still going. I'm sorry, it says the woman who still has her 34-year-old son at home. Okay, okay, let's just add that in, fine. Jessie, it's because... He needs to save up for a deposit. Because he's saving lives all day, Jessie.

So annoying. Yeah, I'm So annoying. Yeah. I'm sorry. I'm going to get left with a couple, aren't I? I'm going to get a couple of adults, like really grown-ups. I want to know. I want to go back to the wedding. Okay.

So the food. Oh, yeah. You went there for the food. So what was the wedding meal? So I can't remember it specific of every course because, you know, it's that thing where it was literally like a starter

and then you have your pasta course and then the meat course and then it just went on and on but it was just all really delicious. I seem to remember

we had beef. I think we had a sort of seafood pasta. The tiramisu was really good. It was just all great and like sunshine and it was in June and it was just really happy.

What was your first dance um all night long by Lionel Richie oh that's great that's great and because Richard had played in loads of wedding bands yeah he was like right we're gonna do an edit he said you don't dance the full length because you know it's like you got three four minutes yeah yeah how are you do that bit? Well, we did do that bit. We broke into a dance routine. So we started off all like, so my friends, the time has come.

And then, so on that line, we're like busting out the moves. And then I put it in the set, actually, for the last tour. And I was teasing him to see if he could remember the moves, but I don't think they're there anymore. I don't know. He kind of raised his eyebrows like maybe they were there, but he had the bass there and he couldn't really do them.

And I'm not sure he remembers quite frankly. So he went on tour with you? Yeah, he was in my band. And so was my brother. My brother's on drums. It was really, really cute. Yeah. That's lovely.

My little brother. That's incredibly wholesome. Didn't you want to be like, fucking get your shit together? Maybe he's an amazing bass player. Well, we met. I hired... No, your husband was on bass. Sorry.

Yeah, I hired Richard and that's how I met him. At a I know your husband was in bass sorry yeah I hired uh yeah Richard and that's how I met him at a rehearsal room like I was his boss lady um so that's that we're used to that dynamic a little bit and then my brother actually he's a really flipping amazing drummer and he's been off and worked with lots of people and it just was serendipitous that he could come come back and be with me I didn't think he'd come back to me, actually. I thought he'd kind of go and do other things. But just because of what happened last year with musicians, you know, and the change of plans, it's like, right, quick, come and do my thing. Really nice.

How did you two meet then? You met him working for you. Yeah, yeah. Where was the first date and was there food? There was food. Of course there was food. We actually kind of sort of like wooed each other a little bit with food because we had our first Valentine's.

I remember he cooked for me. And it was the first time he did that. And it was like this really elaborate. He did like a lobster casserole thing. But it was like we used food as our way. I get this. This is quite funny. He was vegetarian when we met.

Close your ears, vegetarians. I was like, I'm not having that. I need him to enjoy the same food as me. So, yeah, this is really, really crappy. That's quite sinister, so... I did it to my guitarist. I did. First night of tour. Well, this is how I worked it.

He would eat fish, so I was like, OK, well, if you eat fish, then what about duck? We went just to the surface. Slowly, slowly, slowly. Yeah, and it worked. And now he eats loads of meat. I'm sorry for the vegan in the room. I'm sorry.

Terrible, isn't it? But, you know. If you had Lionel Richie as your first dance, I bet you like karaoke. Yeah, I do like karaoke. I do, too. She doesn't. It's weird, don't you think?

Well, I think the thing with karaoke is it always starts out really good fun. And there's those people who are like, oh, I'm a bit shy. And then you cannot get them off the bloody microphone at the end of the night. And then you're a bit like, I'm not sure this is fun watching you do

your sixth or seventh or eighth song. And they get quite competitive. And some songs are really long, yeah. You have to choose crowd pleasers. So which one would you choose? Well, I've got two songs I've done a lot. One of them works. The other one I've tried a lot because I think it's going to work and it doesn't.

Okay. So you're that person at the end. A little bit. I won't do it again and again on the same night, I promise. I'll turn it. Is that what people do? Sometimes they get in there, oh no, let me just do Puff the Magic Dragon,

and they're like, oh, seven minutes long. So what's your nemesis? Oh, right, so the one I've done that I think works really well, I do Faith by George Michael. Oh, wow. It's just this really nice little song. It bobs along, it's fun. That's good. It's a fun one nice little song. It bobs along. It's fun.

That's good. It's a fun one. The one I've done where I'm like, in my mind, I'm like, check this out. Because I do know all the rap. But it's just a bit slow. And the backing tracks are always a bit cheap sounding. It's Shoop by Salt-N-Pepa. Right.

The original tune is awesome. But when you get the... Like midi keyboard doing that like background and then you're going here i go here i go here i go okay girls for weakness and then you're like oh no i've picked the wrong one i've done it again it's not gonna they're not impressed with my rap they're getting bored and i've got oh i've syncopated that bit wrong and yeah the wheels fall off i don't i'm not gonna do it again in fact has anybody got a crowd favourite in the audience that they do? No!

Did you hear that? Murder on the Dance Floor. Really? Aw. That is a good one. Do you feel like everyone does your accent whenever they do it? It has to do your accent. I've never been in a karaoke place and someone's done one of my songs.

I would have to hear it. Anybody want to sing Murder on the Downs? Dance floor on. Anybody else got any other crowd pieces? Which one? If This Ain't Love. Oh yeah, another great one.

I feel like you're just trying to get brownie points though, Sean. What about you in the green? That's a great choice. Everybody joins in with you, right? Any other ones? Is that because you saw Harry Styles at Coachella

bring up Shania Twain? That is quite good. Still the one, that one. Oh, sassy. That don't impress much. There's big power ballad-y type ones. I saw a friend. Oh, sassy. That don't impress much. Okay, fabulous. I think you're right. I think those big, like, power ballad-y type ones. I saw a friend... I saw Your Love by Sheep.

Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, that would be good. Ain't No Body by Chaka Khan. That's a good one. So your mum's house was very much like how your house is, was it? Yeah, very similar. Lots of people coming in, knocking in. Yeah, and a very creative house, always stuff going on, bits and bobs everywhere, lots to

look at. There's one wall where she let us all write things on the wall, like poems and stuff. So my little brothers and sisters were little when they did it, so what they wrote was very cute. And I was kind of a teenage, so mine was all like an Emily Dickinson poem, some pulp lyrics.

It's all like a very different moment. But it's quite fun. It's still there. Did you do it in your house? Well, yeah, I have let my kids draw on the wall. Is that weird? They're allowed to draw in their bedroom if they want to. Yeah.

Maybe I need to start adopting some of these rules. I'm just like, you can always paint over it. Like, I don't know, I suppose downstairs, absolutely not. But upstairs on their door, they can do stuff. And, you know, we could just cover it over. I don't really mind. Is that weird? No, I think that. You're right. I don't really mind. Is that weird? No, I think that's probably really good.

I don't know. I just think I've got too... I worry about other things, but not that. Yeah. I think we've all got things like that. I spoke to a girlfriend the other day and she said that she doesn't mind when her kid swears. He's like nine or ten.

And that, to me, I would not be comfortable with that. So I think we've all got things that... That would be very hard for Jessie. I'm waiting for the teacher to ring up and say that her children have used the F word. My daughter actually tells me not to use it.

That's amazing. He doesn't like it if he hears me swear. Even now. Maybe I should do this thing of doing a good job. Do you have good table manners? Do I? Yes.

I like to think so. I'm not incredibly strict with the kids, but there's certain things that do upset me. I do feel like there has to be a certain parameter of what being at the table together means when you're together. And there are some things I wouldn't like at all. No phones or iPads? No tech at the table. No tech at the table, for sure. That or iPads no tech at the table for sure no tech at the table

especially in the mornings in the mornings I'm actually quite chilled before school there's so much going on if someone's watching a cartoon or something it's like fine just keep quiet well I do this with another one but in the evenings I like that I don't like it if they get very slouchy at the table

you know if they're kind of all slumped I don't mean like that. And I don't like it if they get very slouchy at the table. You know, if they're kind of all slumped. I don't mean like that. I mean like one of my kids will literally kind of put his head on the table. And I'm always like, no. If you're feeling like that, go and sit on the sofa. Not here. But I'm probably a bit, I've got one child who's, I don't know if it's like, he was very premature.

So I don't know if he's actually like a little bit dyspraxic. But he's really messy there'll be a trail of everything and so I think that made me re-evaluate a lot and now I'm just like you know pick and choose your battles man what really matters if people around he probably wouldn't do it in front of them anyway

because he's getting a bit more self conscious and embarrassed but I think I got a lot more relaxed after that really so you've got all these boys around you I mean there's a lot of football talk no I haven't got a lot more relaxed after that, really. So you've got all these boys around you. I mean, there's a lot of football talk. No. No. I haven't got a single one who's particularly interested in football.

No one's into football. I'm worried about the score tonight. Chelsea Man U, darling. We're missing it. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. Don't mind me.

Tell us about your podcast. Yeah, I love doing my podcast, actually actually and you must do it i'm doing it um so i have a podcast called spinning plates and it's basically i speak to working women who happen to be mothers i think because i'm really fascinated about how people make that work when they're doing their work and they're raising a family um yeah well for me it was such a big deal like trying to well I think I'm still working some of it out now and um so hearing from other people and their experiences and their stories like endlessly fascinating for me even though mum suggested you were you were incredibly young to have a baby but being a woman no no no being a woman in music a working woman in music, a working woman in music, and getting pregnant at a big point in your music career,

did you find that was a battle? And I'm sure you've been asked that question many times. But as somebody else that's working in music, I'm always kind of like, how do you do it? I've asked you about 10,000 questions backstage about childcare and stuff already. But it is interesting, because when we're in the same boat and actually I don't think many people did

ask me about it, only because I think when I had Sunny, it was a different landscape for mothers then. Harder, no? Just I think we've now got better at having lots of different versions of motherhood portrayed and it's easier to find things

that resonate with you and feel less alone with what you're up to. Whereas then I felt like motherhood was like, this press was quite sniffy about it, like, oh well, you're having a nice time now but you wait till that baby's here and you're just going to be changing nappies and you won't be wearing heels, it's going to be, oh, you're not going to find that very easy, Miss Pop Star. And I just felt like slightly embarrassed about the juxtaposition really and unsure of how to make that my own um and so basically I mean the timing was I didn't I didn't plan on having my first baby I'd only been going out with Richard for six weeks when we found out we're having a baby yeah and you're still together going strong come on Leah you don't know why so yeah I'd actually just released my second album

so I knew I was pregnant and I was singing the first single from the second album on top of the pops and it was a song called Mixed Up World and I was thinking this is absurd like I'm about to tell the label and anyway it's just really sort of scruffy but you know, I think

I've found what works for me. And I got more and more confident with making those two sides of my life one as I got older. Part of it's growing up as well, I guess. But also more babies I had. And so, yeah, I love doing the podcast because everybody's got such incredible stories. And it's really, I mean, it's it's so diverse like this Monday I just spoke to Claire from Steps and then yeah it was so brilliant she was great yesterday I spoke to a makeup artist called Lisa Eldridge um next week I was speaking to a forensic pathologist who does post-mortems every day there's a hula hooping roller skating uh record breaker um it's like Marawa yeah Marawa love Marawa me too I'm amazing yeah so yeah I, I wanted it to be like all over the shop because that's just, I mean,

mostly we just talk about them. Like the kids, it's like the icebreaker, but there's so much more to talk about. With five children, you are spinning plates, having a whole career going as well. But you do make it look quite effortless. And I think that was what was so wonderful about Kitchen Disco. We got an insight. And it didn't look perfect. It looked fun and warm and loving and like a smidge chaotic,

which is what made us all, I think, relate. And mad and brilliant and just, I think that's what was so beautiful. I think it was Jesse, and he was a bit miserable one day and you managed to use the word, you changed the words in the song and sang the song but said, don't be sad, Jesse, come on. And you managed to involve him

and he was happy again. Yeah, there were a couple like that. I remember the last one we did of the first lockdown. We thought it might be the last one we did total. And Ray, yeah, no. Ray had really built it up. So at the time he must have been at seven or something. He'd really built it up. And he wanted to do this certain dance move.

When I said something to him, he went, ask me how to do this and I'll do it. And then it went a bit wrong and then he stormed off. And I was like, oh, he's going to feel terrible. So I had to kind of get him back involved so that he would have a happy memory of the bus. But, you know, that is kind of family life. And so that he would have a happy memory of us but but you know that's that is kind of family life and our family is really chaotic and at times I am not holding it together at all but I think you know I've definitely I do definitely love all the aspects I get up to I think I'm a very very lucky person and I'm still as excited about what I do for a

living as I ever in fact maybe more so I think my love affair of music and performing is like really, just really really strong so I think if you love all those things we're just some of the luckiest people because then you find the space to do it don't you, to get on with it like you guys doing this yeah

look, no pressure or anything but has anybody got questions for Sophie in the audience? Just let that simmer for a sec. Oh, here we go. I haven't met you yet. Hold on. Oh, wants the mic.

Let's go, showbiz. Let's go. Oh, yeah. A star is born. Stand up, star. Show yourself. Hi. Do it. turn around.

Say hello. What's your name? It's Lewis. Hi, Lewis. Hi, everyone. Hi, Sophie. You said fish and chips was your meal of choice. Scotland, famous for battering everything.

Have you had a battered Mars bar or a battered pizza? I haven't. You need to try it when you're here. Would you recommend it? How many of you actually had a battered Mars bar or a battered pizza? I haven't. You need to try it when you're here. Would you recommend it? How many of you actually had a battered Mars bar? See, that's not that many. I thought the Scots were a bit pissed off with this kind of thing, right?

I don't think I've even seen it for sale that many places, but I would try it. I mean, what's the worst that can happen? It's batter and it's chocolate. It's going to be all alright, isn't it? Anybody else got any questions? Hold on, let me come around to you. What's your name? I'm Olga.

Hi, Olga. Hi. Hold on, there's a bit of feedback, so let's like, how can we make, stand up, and let's try and make this, so, how's that? Wow, Olga, you've got some legs on you. Hi! That's why I sort of keep sitting. No, please, let them shine.

Sure, like these legs. Olga, I'll ask you a question. I have a really serious question. So, darling, you have five children. I have one, and I don't know how you handle that. He's 16, maybe that's why. Where's the question? But the question is, how often do you have sex

with your husband? Oh my God. All the things. Wow. Fucking hell. Straight to the point. Lenny only did those questions. Sorry, Sophie, about our audience. What I love about that... But how many times do you... Olga was like, you were so, like, composed. I know. I mean, I might be assuming, but from your accent, you didn't sound British. My Britishness makes me very embarrassed,

like, on your behalf. I'm like, oh, my God. But what I would say, to slightly divert, when you say about handling, I found having one kid turned my world upside down, by the way. I don't think having five means having one is easy. I think having one is tons.

I always feel like, you know when magicians have those foam balls that they can use to fill gaps, and they can squish into small things because they all squish together. I feel like the bit in my brain that has the handles or the kid stuff, every time you have a new kid, you just squish another one of those foam balls.

So basically, however many kids you have, just fill that space and then you just put in more of those foam balls. Ah! She's too classy. She obviously has sex, doesn't she? She's got five fucking kids. Come on.

There's only one answer. Enough. Well done. And on that note... Can everyone... Please let it be the interval. Please give it up for Sophie Ellis-Fexler. Thank you. We'll see you next time. Or bring your classes with you for outdoor runs, walks, and hikes led by expert instructors on the Peloton app. Call yourself a runner.

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