Woman's Hour - Parenting Podcast: Working with your Mum, with Jessie Ware and Lennie Ware

Episode Date: March 12, 2020

Jessie and Lennie Ware on their relationship since making their Table Manners podcast

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Hello, Jenny Murray welcoming you to this week's podcast for parents. Earlier this week, I spoke to Jessie Ware and her mother Lenny about their relationship since they started working together. Jessie used to be best known for her singing and songwriting. She is arguably now even better known in partnership with her mother Lenny Ware, with whom she publishes a weekly podcast called Table Manners. The two women cook a Friday night dinner to which they invite a guest, Sam Smith, Ed Sheeran, Jo Brand, Paloma Faith, to name but a few. It's been going for three years and attracts millions of listeners. So popular has it become they've now published a cookery book of the same title, Table Manners. Well here in the company of Sam Smith whipped cream

is a requirement. Can I whip cream with a hand blender? Hold on mum. Mum we need whipped cream this is going to be an issue. Have you got a whisk? I don't mind having non whipped cream. I've got, no I mind. How do you whip cream? Have you got ice whisk? I don't mind having non-whipped cream. I've got, no, I mind. I mind. How do you whip cream? Have you got ice cream as well?

This is an absolute mess, Mum. Oh, hold on, hold on. I found a whisk. Okay, well that could take 20 minutes. Oh, hold on, no. That could take 20 minutes. Oh my God, look at that whisk. Should I just try and do it for a bit?

I mean, how long's it gonna take? A little while, darling. Think of those arm muscles, babe. No, I haven't been able to work out, babe. I just have one Pete Sampras, like, bicep. Oh, no, Mum, it's already whipping. Good. Jessie, what prompted the idea of a podcast, a Friday night dinner with your mother?

I think I was always so interested in other people's stories and I was sick of talking about myself. Being in music, it's so self-involved and all-consuming about you, you, you. So I wanted to have conversations with other people and I thought the best way of having a conversation and not feeling like an interview was having my mum, who is the best host I know,

the best cook I know, cooking for these guests and us sitting around the interview was having my mum, who is the best host I know, the best cook I know, cooking for these guests and us sitting around the table and having a chat which felt very informal and light and talking about family and nostalgia and food memories. And I don't know what happened, but everyone seems to quite like it. And mum is the absolute star of the show. Lenny, what was your response to the idea? Because it sounds to me as if it was assumed that you would be the cook. It was. I was supposed to be in the background.

I didn't know what a podcast was. I thought I was just cooking for Jessie to chat to friends. And I thought this would help her improve her interviewing process. And it just took on from there because I couldn't resist joining in with the conversation. You never have been able to resist joining in with the conversation, I suspect. I think that's right. It does sound, though, Jessie, as if it's not always an easy ride.

Mother, daughter, one kitchen. Yeah, I mean, I've talked about this before and also in the book i talk about it but mum showed me tough love in the kitchen she wasn't one of those ones that you know here's your penny let's go and let's bake it was you're doing it wrong you're doing it wrong and i learned that way but actually i'm a pretty good cook from it so thank you mother um but yeah we're living together at the moment, which has been testing, but we're nearly out the end of it. And we've managed to make a podcast together and write a cookbook in that time.

And we're not killing each other. So it's all right. I mean, there have been a couple of disastrous moments. The blowtorch moment. The creme brulee with the Hayley Squires, yeah. Yeah, what happened with the creme brulee? Well, Jessie was using it too fiercely, I thought. Mum thought.

So I said, I'll take over. And the whole blowtorch fell apart and set me on fire, literally. I went up in flames. She was OK, though. You never used the blowtorch again. It's OK. I never used it again. It came apart.

And Hayley Squires just couldn't believe her eyes. She was just us two arguing and then me going on fire. What other disasters have you had? Short ribs. Short ribs. George Ezra. They weren't short ribs. They were very long and I marinated them for too long in wine and they were tough as old boots.

We had to get a Turkish takeaway and it worked out all right. But we laughed so much. We laugh a lot. And I think even in these kind of catastrophic moments, we end up laughing. And that's just been how we've always worked, really. How often have people asked you for the recipes? Because, I mean, now there's a book with all the recipes in it. Have people been saying, oh, that lovely thing you've got there?

Almost all the time, which is why we were approached to do a cookbook. So people kept on saying, gosh, that sounds delicious. Can I have the recipe? And in the end, we just sort of put them all together. And we've produced a cookbook, which I have to say is so easy. It's about easy cooking and just enjoying a lovely social time over a meal. But how easy was it for you to write down recipes for food that you have been cooking for years? That was tricky because it's all in your head and you do it by instinct.

So actually writing the recipes down was tricky. So they were tested. And tested and tested again. To make sure that they worked and they weren't just things that we could make work so everyone's going to be able to make my chicken soup with matzo balls i hope but wasn't there something a recipe that you've done and they couldn't make it work because you'd forgotten the eggs yeah the key lime pie i had done it and in fact we made it for Cheryl Cheryl yes we did Cheryl Cheryl well

she's called just Cheryl now Cole as mum is called Lenny now yeah I'm just yeah Cheryl and um I um had and no one could make it work so I said well I'm going to do it and I'll make it work and I couldn't make it work and then I realized I'd forgotten the eggs. Quite simple. Yeah. It's rectified now. They're in there, don't worry, the eggs are in there. What were your Friday night dinners like as you grew up? Fun. I mean they weren't kind of as you would imagine a Jewish household, you know, we lit the candles and then the rest kind of, it was Whitney Houston and dancing around the table and it wasn't necessarily a full Jewish meal, but there was always the ask of chicken soup, wasn't there, and chopped liver.

But we'd have all my friends from school who, you know, I grew up in South London. There weren't that many Jewish people there. So they'd come over with their parents, and we'd have these lovely long dinners together that would end up with singing and dancing at the end. You admit in the book to being a food lover. Yeah. And your mother says your toes used to curl in your high chair.

Yes. As the food was on its way. What do you love most of your mother's cooking? She's the best with flavour. I mean, well, chicken soup, she'll taxi over to me when I'm ill, when I'd be losing my voice in a singing. It's the Jewish,

it's the Jewish, yeah, Jewish penicillin, absolutely. But, she's so good with flavour and just everything. I don't know,

you've always been so brilliant. You've always, and also my children, we're living together and my children won't eat my food, but they'll always eat

my mum's food. And I'm like, hold on, she's just done a roast the same as I, but there's something about my mum's cooking that is the best there's always something about your mum's cooking yeah that's always the best how did you learn i mean where did you probably my skills from your mother yes yes i mean my mum was a good cook i mean a very conservative cook you know i was born 195, so it was five years after the war. There wasn't that much around.

When she first made spiotti bolognese, I thought we were absolutely quite continental. And, you know, we didn't have things like broccoli or kiwi fruits or things like that. But now, I mean, she just was a very good basic cook. And I think I'm a very good basic cook. No, Mum, you're better than that. I think you're more inventive than me.

Thanks, Mum. And I've learned a lot from you because Jess is brilliant at curries and adding spices. I'm not as confident. As a single mother for much of the time, with a job as a social worker how did you manage day after day after day to fit in good home cooking for the kids it's so important to me um eating and eating together that was really important that everyone sat down together at the end of the day and talked about their day and we ate together so um i plan. It's just good planning, really. I would cook in the morning something for the evening

and know it was ready there and we could just warm it up and we'd eat together. You'd come back from school and there would be the smell of food because you'd already have it ready. It was ready. So I think if you plan, it's easy. I think doing the podcast now, we're kind of planning all the time what we're going to cook for people. But planning together. I mean, it's not entirely your responsibility.

No, we do it together. Absolutely. How easy is it? This is probably a really stupid question because you're so famous anyway. How easy is it to find your famous guests who are prepared to come to dinner on a Friday night? Well, initially it was me going through my phone books. You know, we had Sam Smith on the first series, Clara Amfo, Ed was on the second, but yeah, it was my friends.

And now it's got a life of its own and people approach us and so it's just, it's now a kind of, I don't want to call it a business, but you know, people want to be on it. So it's been... And we're meeting more unusual people that we wouldn't have thought of before. And that's really interesting, to meet new and different people from different walks of life.

Yeah, I think we're on series 10. I mean, it just keeps on going. And so it's amazing. We meet strangers. But you want to know, Jessie, Busy With The Podcast, the book, another album coming soon, two children.

Yes. I remember the last time I spoke to you, you were a little bit tired because you had a baby and you weren't getting much sleep. How are you coping now, fitting all this lot in? I don't know what it is, but the more I've thrown at myself, the happier I am, I don't know. And I'm working with my mum and that's a

very unique, beautiful situation and the podcast has given me such a newfound confidence and I have this music that's coming out that is just so fun and my kids are amazing. It takes a village. I have, my husband helps. We have a nanny two days a week.

It's a big old, everyone gets mucked in, mum helps. So yeah, that's how it works. How surprised, Lenny, have you been at the success of the podcast? Beyond my wildest dreams, really. I can't really measure the success, except that if I'm at the Tube and I say, oh, God, the bloody Northern line, someone says, are you Lenny from the podcast?

I say, how do you know? Jessie says it's my whinging voice. But people recognise me on planes if I'm chatting. They'll say, are you Lenny from the podcast? It's so weird. So I know it must have a wide audience that people recognise my voice. It's very odd.

But how stressful is that then, to suddenly become famous after all these years and to be cooking for all her famous friends it's very strange i mean it's you know when it's someone like the wonderful nigella lawson i mean i think we planned for about six months if she ever came on what we cook but um meeting these wonderful people is just great. It's marvellous. How much do you still enjoy cooking? I must say, I'm not giving a... I used to give lots of dinner parties. That was my... I love it.

But I don't give as many dinner parties, that's true. I tend to go out to eat rather than cook. Do you enjoy the cooking when you have to do it? I do. I enjoy being good at it. That's what I enjoy. Sometimes I get tired and my back hurts a bit if I've been at it all day. She complains a lot but actually still delivers

the best food ever. Imagine what it would be if it was cooked with love. I mean, just imagine. So it's not cooked with love at the moment. Pinches of cooked with love at the moment. It's pinches of love always go in my food. Thank you both very much, Lenny and Jessie Ware. And, of course, the cookery book is out now,

and it's called, surprisingly, Table Manners. Thank you both very much. And do remember that for our podcast for parents, indeed our items for parents on the program, we are to some extent dependent on you. If there's something you think we should be covering, do let us know. You can tweet us or you can email. But for today, that's all. I'm Sarah Trelevan, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies.

I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service,

The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story. Settle in. Available now.