Woman's Hour - Alison Steadman, Mary McAleese, The Woman's Hour Power List 2020, Chutney.

Episode Date: September 24, 2020

The award-winning actor Alison Steadman joins Jenni to discuss her latest projects. ’23 Walks’ is a film telling a love story in later life, and ‘Life’ is a new BBC1 drama set in Manchester, and follows the stories of the residents of a large house divided into four flats. It explores love, loss, birth, death, the ordinary, the extraordinary and everything in between.Mary McAleese was President of Ireland twice. When she finished her second term, she turned her sights on the global Catholic Church, and having the credibility of a doctorate in Canon Law behind her, she spoke out against what she saw as the misogyny within it. She did it despite having a deep personal faith that goes back to her childhood. Mary was born in Belfast in the 1950s; witnessed the Troubles as they started and how they went onto to wreak havoc and pain on both sides. She became a barrister even though it wasn’t expected of a woman: especially a woman from a working class background. She’s brought out her autobiography - Here’s The Story. The 2020 Woman’s Hour Power List is all about ‘Our Planet’ - and the search is on for 30 women based in the UK who are making a significant positive contribution to the environment. This could be through working in conservation or running a local anti-plastic campaign – but there are also less obvious sectors in which women are making a huge difference. Emma Howard Boyd, the chair of the Environment Agency, and Flo Headlam, a horticulturalist and garden designer talk to Jenni about their less conventional journeys into green careers – and highlight the lesser known areas where women are driving change.With Autumn setting in, it’s chutney and pickle season and a great opportunity to use up your remaining fruit and veg. Food historian Lizzie Collingham explains the history behind these tasty relishes. Presented by Jenni Murray Producer: Louise Corley Editor: Karen Dalziel

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BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, Jenny Murray welcoming you to the Woman's Hour podcast on Thursday the 24th of September 2020. Good morning. In today's programme, Mary McAleese and her memoir, Here's the Story. As a Catholic born in Belfast, her family experienced the troubles. She became a lawyer at a time when girls didn't, was twice president of Ireland, studied canon law and opposed misogyny in the church. It's some story. Emma Hoard Boyd and Flo Hedlund will be

judges for this year's Power List. What, in their view, qualifies a woman to fit the bill as someone who's made a significant contribution to our planet? And as autumn begins to bite, it's chutney and pickle season. What fruits and veg are worth preserving? Now, Alison Stedman has for a long time been one of the most familiar faces in the theatre, film and television. There was the memorable Abigail's Party in the late 70s, and most recently she was Pamela in Gavin and Stacey. Tomorrow, a film called 23 Walks is released.

It's about a developing relationship between Fern and Dave as they walk their dogs. Fern's Yorkshire Terrier, Henry, and Dave's Alsatian, Tilly. Then next Tuesday, you can see Alison on BBC One in a new drama series called Life. Alison, you've obviously been extremely busy. In both Life and 23 Walks, you play a woman who's been hurt by her husband's behaviour. What similarities do you see in Fern the dog walker and Gayle in Life? Well, they're quite similar. Fern is on her own and she's been on her own for quite a while.

And she's a very confident lady who sort of still enjoys life. But she's lonely and she's very sceptical of men. You know, she's had a husband that's treated her. She's had two husbands. The second one treated her very badly. And so she walks her dog every day and she meets this gentleman. And eventually a relationship develops, but she's very wary of this.

And so it's a it's a lovely story. It's a gentle story. And of course, the two dogs are involved um i used to have a dog myself and i used to love walking him um where you could sort of chat to people and uh you know it is nicer than just walking on your own to have your dog with you and so this relationship developed over the period of the film shall we hear fern Fern and Dave's second encounter? In the first encounter that they'd had, there had been a bit of an altercation between the dogs. Hello, Henry. Where did you pop up from?

Henry, come here! Where's your Mrs Gottham? Henry! No worries. He's no trouble. They're friends now. Can I give him a treat? I don't think so. Well, if you must.

Come on. Come on, Henry. There you go. Go off and play. Come on. Are you always here? Yeah, usually this time. Either here or on the fields. Do you know King George's fields? No. A lot of people don't. They're lovely. Come on, I'll show you. It's all right, I believe you.

Sorry about the other day. So you should be. Big dogs make a person nervous. But those guard dogs get treated bad to make them nasty. Listen, wouldn't hurt a flea. Oh, yeah, I can see that now. Her name's Tilly. Go on, give her a stroke. Hey, Tilly. This one's Henry, right?

Yeah. Oh, can't imagine how you knew. Come on. Bye, Henry. You here tomorrow. Alison, how easy is it to work with a dog that isn't your own dog? I mean, both of them seem to be amazingly obedient. Yeah, well, obviously, I mean, they're trained dogs, but we did have a bit of time where we got to know them.

Well, we both of us always had some little bits of sausage in our pockets, which they knew. So they knew if they behaved, they would get a treat, they would get rewarded. But it took a bit of time, but once we got to know them um and we'd been filming for a few weeks um you know it was it was really lovely really lovely now how aware were you of dave johns who we got to know of course in i daniel blake before you agreed to take part in this I read somewhere that you'd met in secret um no I don't think we met in secret but uh but we met up and we chatted about the film um just to see how we both felt about it and um and we were both very enthusiastic and I mean I knew Dave Johns as a comedian more than an actor obviously I'd seen I Daniel Blake

and thought it was absolutely brilliant and so the whole thing came together in a really kind of good way and we had the best time filming it was wonderful because we filmed it in three blocks over three different seasons because we wanted the spring we wanted the autumn with the leaves you know so um it was quite a long shoot spread out because the film takes place over a year and it was really lovely and of course Dave being a comedian makes you laugh all the time so it was it was great as you said it's a slowly developing relationship and we don't want to give away too much of it but I have to say watching it I thought oh my goodness I'm watching a piece of work where two older people are seen maybe falling in love and developing a sexual

relationship how surprising was that to you? Quite surprising, yes. I mean, you kind of think, you know, well, once you're beyond 40, no one's going to ask you to do those sort of scenes. But, of course, life goes on. And just because you're over 70 doesn't mean that you're not going to have a relationship with somebody, either just to be friends or indeed, you know, to take it further and end up cuddling in bed. So I think it's great that we're actually seeing something where, you know, people of a certain age are actually still living and enjoying themselves. Now, in life, the character of Gail, it's actually her 70th birthday.

She's just beginning to realise her husband Henry treats her badly. And it's an old friend who's pointed it out. Let's just listen to that encounter with her old friend. Gail, he's awful to you. Who?

The way he treats you, everything he says is mocking you. Who? Your husband. It's been going on so long, you probably can't see it, but... That's just not true. He doesn't. All the time.

And really, you know there's a problem. That's why this was bothering you. You see us once. One lunch. To make a judgment on my whole life, it's quite insulting. Exactly. And you can do what you want. I mean, I would never have said anything if you hadn't asked me to be honest. We're happy.

We've had a hugely, very happy marriage. You never used to be shy. Look, I'm sorry, I've got to go. Lots to do. Come this afternoon and watch. Just watch. Yes, all right. I'll see you later. Bye. Alison, what did you make of Gail? Because watching you do it, the expression on your face changes so quickly.

One minute, oh, of course I've had a happy marriage, and the next minute, oh, my goodness, is she right? How do you achieve that way of your face expressing so many different things in so short a time? Well, I think Mike Bartlett wrote Life and he is a brilliant writer. He's so wonderful. And so when you're in the middle of the scene, Gail is actually discovering things about her marriage herself. She's seeing something. It's like, you know, she's been married for over 40 years. She's got two kids. She's got a little grandson. From an outsider's point of view, she looks perfectly happy. But of course,

inside, she's been troubled for a long time, but won't admit it to herself until have an old school friend turns up and looks at the relationship and starts to point things out and then she starts to look at the relationship and think hmm maybe she's right but how dare she interfere with my marriage so there's all these things going on in her head and I think you know as an actor you you you absorb these things and obviously try and express them and it was wonderful I mean it's in six hour long episodes and the story is brilliant because you you think it's going to go this way and it changes and then it changes again. I mean, Mike Bartlett's just a great writer.

How surprised were you to find two great roles for an older woman written by Paul Morrison, 23 Walks and Mike Bartlett, Life, two relatively young men creating great work for older women? It's wonderful. It's absolutely brilliant. And 20 years ago, this wasn't happening. I was saying to a friend the other day that when I was first acting, somebody said to me, oh, you if you can get beyond 40, you'll be lucky because when you're 40, over 40, they don't want to know. And that was true at one time.

So if you weren't sort of young and pretty, you know, they didn't really want to know. But thank goodness that's changed. You've played, though, so many iconic roles. When you look back, which stick most strongly in your memory? Well, I think probably Candice Marie in Nuts in May if people remember that that was such fun to do working with Roger Sloman the two of us Keith and Candice Marie we filmed in Dorset we rehearsed in Dorset for weeks it was just great fun and of course Beverly in Abigail party um you know you can't uh can't forget that and when we actually filmed that for television i was four months pregnant with my first son so he's a living calendar so

i always know how long ago it was that we did that what about gavin and stacy now 17 million viewers apparently watched it last Christmas. Will they be back? Oh, I've no idea. I wish. I mean, we were so thrilled to be back together during the Christmas special. And we never, honestly, didn't think it would happen. I used to get asked all the time and I was convinced it would never happen because it was 12 years James is you know in America Ruth's writing novels she's writing other television things they're both so busy and successful we

thought that they can't come back together but they did whether there'll be any more is I don't know I really don't know I I doubt it but then look I was wrong before so is it is it true that James Corden once said to you can I help you carry your bags and you said yeah and you better go on asking that question I honestly don't remember that. I'm sorry. Oh, these rumours that you read in newspapers. I thought that might be just typical of you, just telling a young man how to behave himself.

We first worked together a long time ago. James was only 19 and he was quite a character then. So we probably did have small, friendly confrontations, shall we say. He's a great guy. Alison Stedman, pleasure talking to you. Great work coming out tomorrow and next Tuesday. And thank you very much indeed for being with us this morning. Thank you, Jenny. Thank you so much. Now, if you're listening on Tuesday,

you'll have heard the announcement that the subject of this year's Woman's Hour Power List is our planet. The search is now on for 30 women based in the UK who are making a real contribution to the environment. On the judging panel will be Flo Hedlund, who's a horticulturalist and garden designer, and Emma Howard-Boyd, who chairs the Environment Agency. Emma, how common is it to find female leaders in your field? It's great to be here today, Jenny. And one of the things that is so exciting about focusing on the whole issue of our planet is that it will be able to help us shine a spotlight on all of the brilliant women that are leading organisations with an environmental focus. But I think the

other thing that I'm hoping we'll see that comes out of this emphasis is those women who are leading organisations where they can actually have a hugely positive impact on the environment without it necessarily being in the traditional sector. And I think that's one of the challenges we all face, those of us that are working on the environmental agenda, is making sure that the environment, climate change, is at the heart of everybody's decision making where flow would you say power lies when it comes to protecting the planet hi good morning jenny um that's a big question and power is a is a big word i think power lies actually right across the spectrum if you like it's a continuum so as well as uh people uh in really positions that

where they're making decisions about budget that can inform and instruct um can systematic change i think further along the spectrum people who are working at local levels and people are working at the community level also uh can do things we can all do things in our life to actually make our environment that much more healthier and more sustainable. Emma, I know you spent some years in financial services. How does that experience contribute to your environmental concerns? I started my career in mainstream finance but very quickly realized that one of the things that wasn't being factored into decision making was the environment agenda and wider factors and so

I switched to in the beginning focusing on green investment making sure that what we were investing in through the funds that I was associated with had a direct focus on environmental solutions. But as time went on, and we're talking about a career of a few decades, it was really clear that we needed to move all of our investment decision making into looking at the issues of environment and climate change and I think there's a real power that can lie within financial services. I'm working very closely at the moment with a campaign called Make My Money Matter which is emphasising that if individuals and women in particular take control of their finances and think of it through an environmental lens, you can have 27 times as much of an impact

on the environment as you would do working on your own carbon footprint and doing things like reducing the amount of flying that you're doing. So there's a real power that sits within financial services. So what sort of things should women be investing in and what sort of things should they not be investing in if their concern is the environment? There are a whole range of different products that now exist that specifically focus on environmental issues. Some of that is solutions, so where we're seeing investments in renewable energy, water technologies. Others are where the emphasis is encouraging the leadership of business to take account of the environment and think about

their supply chains, think about the risks that are coming from climate change and really direct decision making to take this into account. So that ultimately, if we're saving through our pension funds for our retirement, we're considering retiring into a world worth living in. Nature is really coming to the fore as well. And I think that's something that is very relevant right now and something that we've experienced over recent months, particularly with the pandemic, a real desire to appreciate the role that nature plays in our lives. Flo, how did you come to horticulture? Well, it's a second career, actually. So I had worked in charities for over 20 years. And

after I had my second daughter, I realized it was time to do something different. And I wanted to do something completely different. So through a bit of soul-searching I actually realized that I was always walking around and sort of redesigning people's gardens and sort of sorting things out in people's gardens as well as my own and it just so happened that working part-time I found a course that I could pursue part-time and so over three years of working part-time studying part-time I eventually made the transition into um into gardening uh on the opening day of the London Olympics so it's always going to be a special day for me. There's been I think an

increase in interest in community gardens during the virus what what do they offer in protecting the planet well i think at a local level um they can really just increase the biodiversity um you know a lot of people now are thinking about making their gardens much more pollinator friendly but actually just having spaces where people can come together and grow a whole host of ornamentals but also produce as well it means that people are coming together and they're learning they're learning about you know things that we can do at a very micro level that can affect us in our lifestyle but also I think that radiates out as well you know so people people talk about to these gardens the word spreads you know you either get you know send a message to other people that they can do it, or there's also a link of what we call polluted gardens.

So I think it's a movement that is sort of ground up. Emma, what about big business? You know, some of those great companies that are big polluters. Where are the women there who are hoping to make positive change? We're seeing many women rise to the top of businesses. And I think it's really important to recognise that you can be outside a business as a campaigner,

working at a local level to encourage change. You also need individuals within business to bring about that change. And again, some of the work that I've done over recent years with the 30% Club has meant that we have got more women leaders at the top of organisations, whether they're chief executives, chief finance officers, and this increasing recognition that impact on the environment, responding to some of the big challenges that we face, is absolutely part of their remit. I think all sectors still have a challenge with getting more women leaders, but there's no doubt that we're seeing huge developments

with the number of women rising to the top. And with that comes this broader agenda as well. As judges for the Power List, what are you actually hoping to find flow? I'm hoping to actually be surprised, actually, by, I think, suggestions from industries that I'm not to actually be surprised actually by I think suggestions from industries that I'm sectors that I'm not familiar with but I'm also looking for people to really sort of champion local and local heroes local heroines women who are working and you know maybe you know therapeutic gardeners working in wetlands, working in community centres, garden centres.

Women are actually sort of, you know, the backbone of the local environmental movement. And Emma? Well, I'm really, again, keen to focus on those women up and down the country that are making a difference. There's no doubt that when I'm visiting different places, visiting communities that have been flooded, there are some fantastic female community leaders. So it's making sure that we find those individuals, shine a spotlight on them and give us all hope and encouragement that we can make a difference, whether it's at that

local level, at a national level, and indeed influence the global agenda as well. Emma Howard-Boyd, Flo Hedlund, thank you both very much indeed. Now, the Power List will be announced in a live programme on Monday, the 16th of November. And of course, we'd like to hear from you. If you want to make suggestions, you can send us an email through the website. Still to come in today's programme, in chutney and pickle season, what is the difference between the two? And what are the best fruit and veg worth preserving?

And the cereal, the fourth episode of Things Fall Apart. Mary McAleese was born in Belfast in 1951 into a Roman Catholic family. They saw some of the worst excesses of the Troubles. She grew up to study law and become a barrister at a time when girls were rarely expected to have such an ambition. She went on to become a popular president of Ireland,

twice, studied canon law when her term ended and to the surprise of many as she has a deep personal faith spoke out against misogyny in the global catholic church. Her autobiography is called Here's the Story, a Memoir. Mary how were you and your family directly affected by the violence of the Troubles? Well, we were very strongly affected by it because I grew up in a place called Ardoyne in North Belfast. It is the area of Northern Ireland with the greatest incidents of sectarian murders, it had a huge history, going back generations of sectarian conflict that had never been resolved, fully resolved, was always just sitting waiting to be stoked up in another generation. So we were in the middle of that. We lived in a battle zone, in a war zone, effectively.

The roads we lived on were places where there were not just everyday fights between young people, police, soldiers, between Catholics and Protestants, but of course, where terrorist groups, we experienced on a daily basis that nightmare of the fear that it would happen to us, and of course it eventually did, and just the terror of living in a place that seemed completely out of control. My younger brother, who is profoundly deaf, he was attacked in a sectarian attack, left for dead, thankfully didn't die, but was horribly scarred emotionally by it. The young man who attempted was one of a gang of four, from a family with very strong roots in the Orange Order,

a very Protestant organisation that is strongly anti-Catholic. And he was provided with a watertight alibi, apparently, which allowed him to escape any culpability for my brother's attack, but then subsequently also left him free to murder the manager of the Ulster Bank about a mile down the road from us. So then my young sister was attacked. Our home was attacked by a gang of about 20 to 30 very militant neighbouring Protestants. And then they came with, when that didn't work,

they came with machine guns and machine gunned us from our house. So pretty terrifying times, Jenny. So Mary, to what extent was it these experiences that drove this little working class girl to say I'm going to be a lawyer and I'm going to work towards peace? Well strangely enough those two things were quite separate because I had already formed the view before the troubles broke out you know over the 68 69 period um i had already formed the view that i wanted to be a lawyer um and um a number of reasons for that i mean i had a number of great heroes in my life one was dan o'connell daniel o'connell the great liberator

who really introduced um into the westminster parliament and the notion of um not just parla not just a parliamentary democracy for everybody, but of human rights for all. This is at a time really when politics was peopled by elites, indeed, as Northern Ireland's politics, where it was run by a really a Protestant elite formed in elitism rather than egalitarianism or equality ideas. So he was a great hero of mine and he was a lawyer. And the other great hero of mine was Sir Thomas More, also a lawyer. And I lived, incidentally, inside a legal system in Northern Ireland which was totally dysfunctional, a police force that was dysfunctional, a legal system and judiciary and laws and a political system, all of which conspired really to create the circumstances in which Catholics felt excluded and unprotected in their own country. And unvalued, not valued.

But then what was it like to be Northern female and a Catholic when you began to live in the Republic, working at Trinity and at RTE? Well, that was a different ballgame. I mean, when I looked at what was happening on the ground around me in the Belfast that I grew up in, you could have been driven to anger and to frustration, and people were. That's very often what drew people into paramilitarism. When I look at what happened to some of the young men that I knew, both in the Protestant and Catholic side, because I always lived in a Protestant area and my friends were mainly Protestant. So I could see that we were being pulled and drawn in different directions.

And I honestly could never understand violence as a response. it was very masculine very macho very shape-throwing and ultimately zero in terms of return in fact less than zero because it left it left dreadful raw wounds so that's where i began to commit myself to the idea of both using law and reconciliation to get the raw the right the law the right way up if you could create a law which did offer the kind of protections right across the community it seemed to me that was a way forward we had to wait in 1998 mind you really until we got that firmly embedded um and of course equal opportunities legislation fair employment legislation all of those things helped to build a new structure and i committed myself really to that to that way of dealing with the

problems when i came to belfastast, when I came to Dublin, Trinity was an oasis. Dublin was an oasis. But it was also a place that really didn't want to engage terribly any more than England, Scotland or Wales wanted to engage with Northern Ireland. There was also a feeling there that,

oh dear, we really don't understand what's going on in that awful place. And, you know, please don't tell us about it. And I find that particularly, of course, in a certain time Trinity was wonderful I mean it's a tremendous intellectual oasis and a place that really valued the contribution of women I then went to work in radio and television um with our national broadcaster and I don't think I could say the same thing there really um and I And I had a pretty awful experience. My first year, I actually had a good experience.

I worked with people who really understood the North well. And then I worked with people who didn't and who, regrettably, were in charge of broadcasting current affairs at a time when, I don't know if you remember the awful times of the hunger strikes and all of that in Northern Ireland, a really calamitous time when you needed people who really understood what was happening because there was huge changes happening within the Catholic nationalist population. There were huge changes in their political thinking. And that was all being missed. It was completely missed in Westminster, utterly was missed by, you know, by the British press, completely. Actually, I think in fairness to the British press, they might have had some better idea than Ireland's national broadcaster, certainly

in current affairs. Mary, how significant was it that you succeeded Mary Robinson as president, making you the first woman in the whole world to succeed another woman to such a position. Funny enough, I never really figured that very much in the equation. Other people have made more of it.

Yes, but I think it was and is a sign of what was going on in the minds of Irish people. You know, bearing in mind that for a very long time that regrettable twinning of church and state, which wasn't a formal twinning, but was a very effective twinning of church and state in Ireland, really didn't make for the kind of free thinking and the kind of open thinking that we needed to grow and to develop as a, you know, as a full scale liberal democracy. But ironically, the great thing that changed that, I think, in many ways, was the advent in Ireland of free second level education and the massification of third level education, a lot of which was actually helped and facilitated, you know, by the Catholic schools, which still tend today to dominate the educational scene and they produce people with the critical skills that help them to critique the very church they

were members of. Which of course is exactly what you did now the last time we spoke it was about your criticism of the church, its misogyny, its avoidance of the issue of sexual abuse. What actually prompted you to study canon law and then speak out so openly against the church and when you have such faith? Yes well first of all yes I am a person of faith and but I'm also a person with a thinking brain and I was baptised into the Roman Catholic Church, you know, as a very tiny baby. And for the rest of my life, I have been told by canon law that the obligations that I undertook then at baptism, that I'm obliged to, I'm obliged under them to remain obedient to whatever the teaching of the church is for the rest of my life. Well, with the greatest respect

to the church, it has left out a few chapters in the meantime. Number one, when I undertook those so-called obligations, I was about three days old and hadn't a clue what was happening. And these were major obligations. The very idea that you would surrender your intellect and your freedom of conscience, thought, belief, and freedom of religion to an organisation for the rest of your life, it runs completely counter to our understanding today of human rights. Human rights,

Universal Declaration of Human Rights, says that every human being has the right to freedom of religion, conscience, belief, thought, including indeed the right to change religion or abandon religion. Now, that reality hasn't really fully yet dawned on the Catholic Church, which has its own system of law called canon law. I've always been interested in that. I've always been interested in my church. I've always been interested in those issues. And I already had a master's degree in canon law, even though I'm a civil lawyer by profession. I had a master's degree in canon law when I left office in 2011. And I decided then I would go to Rome and that I would study canon law so that I could, that when I spoke about these things, that I would have credibility as a trained canon lawyer, which I did.

I got the licentiate in canon law in the Gregorian University in Rome. That's the equivalent, I suppose, of being a solicitor in civil law. And then further than that, I spent the next three, four years doing a doctorate in canon law on children's rights and obligations in canon law. And Mary, what impact do you think you have had on the protection of children from sexual abuse? Within the church? Women's ordination, justice for victims of abuse and the acceptance of same-sex relationships, which you have a son. That's a very good question, Jenny. And the argument is, this small, very self-serving, very hermetically sealed group of men who have no conduits really for talking to people like me. I mean, you might, I don't know if you at a conference on women in the Vatican, you know,

banned from going to a place that I had been welcomed to by, you know, by Pope John Paul, by Pope Benedict. It seemed to me rather remarkable that in Francis's time, I would be banned from speaking. And I think that was because of my support for gay marriage but I never was it was never explained to me so in the sense that look I'm ignored completely by the church's hierarchy I mean utterly absolutely ignored but that's okay because they're only a tiny proportion of the church there that they're desperately powerful yes and they make the rules yes but the church is 1.2 billion people which is why I stay it's 1.2 billion people, which is why I stay. It's 1.2 billion people. It's the biggest NGO in the world, hugely influential. And of course, it's a permanent representative of the United Nations, which only speaks of its power. No other faith system has

that power and influence in the world. So I stay in the hope that my tiny little voice sometime will permeate upwards and help along with the voices of many others because jenny the truth of the matter is people are walking away in droves um they're tired of these old men trying to beat the drum of obedience and being obedient to um to teaching that is long past itself i did and needs to be, needs to be critiqued. We belong to a church that is wonderful at talking out to the world from its moral pulpit. Wonderful, for example, on climate change, which you've just talked about. Pope Francis on climate change, excellent. Pope Francis on migrants, excellent. On outreach to the poor, excellent. On women, atrocious, women in the church atrocious, on protections for children who are

abused, very weak and lacking in credibility still. Mary McAleese, do not ever describe yourself as having a little voice. It is quite the opposite. Thank you so much for joining us this morning. Thank you for saying so, Jenny. That gives me a lot of heart. Thank you. And the autobiography is called Here's the Story, a Memoir. Thank you so much for joining us this morning. Thank you for saying so, Jenny. That gives me a lot of heart. Thank you. And the autobiography is called Here's the Story, a Memoir. Thank you. My pleasure. As the weather begins to turn autumnal and we become aware of the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, what to do with all that mellow fruit and vegetables? It is, of course, the time of year when chutneys and pickles are made to preserve what remains.

But what's the difference actually between a chutney and a pickle and how do you do them well? Lizzie Collingham is a food historian who studied some of India's culinary history and has a new book coming out next month called The Biscuit. Lizzie, what is the difference say a chutney for something that is fresh a fresh relish that you prepare that day and eat the same day with your meal so in delhi when i stayed in delhi i stayed in a wonderful guest house in delhi and every day we had rice dal and two veg dishes and she always had the cook make a fresh green coriander and mint chilies sometimes a bit of coconut ground up as a condiment to eat with your food and that would would be called a chutney some languages call a pickle a chutney but most of them would say an achar and a pickled preparation

is something oil-based or sour or salty things like limes layered with salt and maybe some spices and put in the sun in jars to ferment. That would be a pickle. Now at this time of year, my granny every year made pickle lily, which she absolutely loved. And she always used to say, have a bit of pickle lily with it, love. And I was, no, thank you. How do you make a picklecalilli? Well, I can tell you how the very first recipe to enter Britain in 1747 to be published in Hannah Glass's The Art of Cookery made plain and easy made piccalilli. So she basically, it's a very elaborate recipe. You have to salt slices of fresh ginger and long pepper, which is a bit like chili, and garlic and dry them. Then you boil mustard seeds and turmeric in white wine vinegar. Then you cut up cabbage. She says you can take anything, cabbage, cauliflowers, cucumbers, melons, apples, beans, plums, any old fruit.

Stick them in a jar and pour the boiling mustard. Layer them up with the ginger and long pepper and garlic, which you've dried dried and then pour the boy the boiling vinegar over them and then just leave it and then it would ferment into a pickle and then interestingly as well she says as any vegetables come into season you can add them to the pickle to the brine and top up with vinegar as you need to so it's a kind of long-lasting ever top-up-able, pickly chutney thing. That's how you really should,

and she calls it to make. I don't think my granny put chilli in hers. No, I bet she didn't. Probably all the rest of the stuff. Just one other thing. I think a lot of people at this time of year have too many tomatoes. Some of them are green.

How best to preserve them? Well, that's nice. Green tomato chutney is lovely. And that, again, is, I mean, women have been pickling vegetables in their still rooms since the 17th century. And they, that's very English to use vinegar. Okay, so the Indians didn't have vinegar. So you put them with spices and vinegar. But the really Indian touch there is to add sultanas.

Now the British in India picked up all the different things that the Indians would sprinkle on their curries and sultanas was one of them. And they'd put it indiscriminately in anything Indian, halfway Indian. So with some nice spices, pickle some green tomatoes, add sultanas that go nice and fat,

and then you've used up your green tomatoes. We've all got loads of damsons, another thing. If you want to go foraging, there's loads of damsons this year. They make a very nice chutney with ginger. So briefly, is it a good idea to have something slightly sweet to sometimes take the edge off what can be quite sharp? Yeah, I would. I actually personally would also have said no thank you to your granny's pick a lily. But damson with stem ginger washed off with the sugar, the sugar washed off with a bit of sugar and a bit of vinegar.

Oh, yummy. Nice. I was talking to lizzie collingham about chutney talitha said i just wanted to let you know that pickled watermelon rind is the best food in the world flo said oh i'm going to try that pickle lily recipe but as for green tomato chutney though i've tried it in the past, I do wonder about the solanines. I'd be glad if a scientific view on cooking with green tomatoes could be expressed, please. On Mary McAleese, Yvonne said, Hi Jenny, fantastic to hear Mary McAleese on your programme. I'm an Irish woman living in the UK. Mary Mack succeeded Mary Robinson when I was in

secondary school. What an inspiration for us girls in Catholic school. It was a given that women could run the country. On the power list, Emma and Flo joined us and Afi Parvizi-Wayne said, one lesser known area is in the period care space where female-founded start-ups are introducing sustainable alternatives to one of life's essentials. And on Alison Stedman, Valerie said, oh, for heaven's sake, yet more of this sex and the elderly myth. Is it still necessary to allude to a sexual relationship in anyone over, what, 60 as wondrous?

I'm here, as are thousands of elderly people, to tell you that sex for us near and over 80 is more than wondrous. It's better than ever. But you see, I wasn't suggesting what happens really in the bedroom. I was just saying it's unusual to see it on screen. I hope you don't mind. And then finally, Dr Rangoon Geese said,

she will forever be Candace Marie to me. Well, thank you for all your comments on this morning's programme. Do join me tomorrow when we'll hear from the award-winning saxophonist Jess Gillam. She'll be discussing diversity in classical music and giving her advice for playing an instrument during lockdown. And I'll be joined by Amelia Gentleman, who's the author of The Windrush Betrayal. She'll be here with a campaigner, Glenda Caesar, and the lawyer, Jacqu Jacqueline McKenzie to discuss Paulette Wilson, the woman whose role in speaking out was crucial in exposing the Windrush scandal and the victims' continued struggle for justice. Join me tomorrow, two minutes past ten. Bye-bye.

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