Woman's Hour - Trouser Suits, Family Secrets, Bishop Cherry Vann

Episode Date: February 20, 2020

The trouser suit: powerful in its own right or just a copy-cat of a man's? The fashion historian, Lydia Edwards, has a new book out called How to Read a Suit. She discusses when they became fashionable for women and if we'll still be wearing them in the future.We talk to Cherry Vann, the new Bishop of Monmouth. She's the first openly gay woman bishop in the UK, as well as the first bishop - male or female - to be in a civil partnership. She officially became bishop this month but just beforehand, and quite unconnected to her appointment, the Church of England issued a statement suggesting sex belongs only in heterosexual marriage. So how did that affect her and what message does she think it sends to Anglican LGBT members. Winter salad and a Pear and Rosemary Upside Down cake is on the menu in our latest Cook The Perfect ... And we've got Part Two of real life family secrets. Who are Sarah's birth parents?

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2, and of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme. Peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, Jenny Murray welcoming you to the Woman's Hour podcast, fourth Thursday, the 20th of February. Good morning. In today's programme, anything from a nettle to a lettuce. Catherine Phipps' new recipe book is leaf. She'll cook the perfect winter salad of red leaves, mackerel and orange, and she'll bring a cake, pear and rosemary upside down. How to read a suit. When did they become

fashionable for women? And what does a suit say about you? And the second part of Sarah's family secret. What did she do when she discovered at 44 that she'd been adopted? Earlier this month, Archdeacon Cherry Van was enthroned at Newport Cathedral in South Wales and became Bishop of Monmouth in the Church in Wales. Her appointment coincided with a statement issued by the Church of England suggesting sex should take place only within a heterosexual marriage. But Bishop Bann is the first openly gay female bishop and the first to be in a civil partnership in the UK.

And she joins us from Cardiff. Bishop Bann, I think I can call you Cherry, if that's OK. Yes, you can. Yeah, that's fine. For a long time, I know you tried to hide your sexuality. Why? Out of fear. Like a lot of other gay and lesbian people, it's not an easy place to be in the church as a gay person. And fear means that it's just easier to keep silence

rather than the risk of being rejected or losing your job or losing friends. So it's easier to keep quiet. And why did you decide to make your civil partnership public now? It's been a journey, really journey. I think when I was first invited to have my name put forward for this post as a possibility, I think my partner and I decided that this was the time to start being more open and honest. We knew that the Church in Wales was more accepting as an institution of gay and lesbian people and it just seemed the right time to be out and be honest. But how did you deal with the recent

statement from the Church of England which says that sex should only take place within a heterosexual marriage? Well, the church in Wales is a different church. Obviously, I've spent 30 years in the Church of England, and I'm very well aware of the debates and the conversations that are going on there. I think the church as a whole is on a journey, trying to understand what it means to be lesbian and gay and what that means for the church's doctrine. I know it was deeply upsetting to an awful lot of people, not just gay people, but heterosexual people as well, who have gay members of their family and gay friends. And I think it just

stiffens the resolve if I can put it like that to continue to work positively and creatively until we get to a place where everybody is accepted and welcomed irrespective of their sexuality. As you say the Anglican Church continues to grapple with this question. And I know that some parishioners are said to refuse to see a priest or a bishop who is gay. How do you bridge that gap? For me, I do it by extending the hand of friendship. I think foundational to all ministry is building good relationships. I will talk to anybody. I will see anybody. I will have a conversation with anybody. And I think those who find it difficult that they have a priest or a bishop who's gay, I would

say, well, go and have the conversation. Because at the end of the day, what matters is that we're human beings. And I think a lot can happen when people have the courage to have the conversation and to get to know one another as human beings, first and foremost. Now, the Archbishop of Canterbury said last week that the church is still deeply institutionally racist and one wondered at the time, well to what extent is there institutional homophobia as well? Why do you suppose the church in Wales is somewhat more open about this question? I'm very new to the Church in Wales so I don't know its history

but I guess that the institution, the hierarchy, the bishops the governing body have had the courage to take this step it won't mean of course that everybody in the pews, in the churches or indeed in the local communities will be of the same mind. But they have taken a lead, and it's a very positive lead that I welcome and rejoice in. And it has enabled me and other people like me to feel safer about being honest and being open about who we are.

And I think that's the way we need to continue to go. Now, equal marriage continues to be a contentious issue. honest and being open about who we are and I think that's the way we need to continue to go. Now equal marriage continues to be a contentious issue. How likely is the church to accept it and perform marriages between people of the same sex in church? That's a very good question. It's something that many of us hope will happen, and I think the trajectory is in that direction. I think there's such a swell of opinion now that this is something that is just and something that is needed. many, many gay people who long for the day when their partnerships can be blessed in church, when they can have their services accepted as marriages. And I think many people will long for the day when that can happen. And I think it will happen.

I don't think there's any doubt about that. I think it's just a case of when and how and making sure that we take those steps to bring as many people along as we can with us. Now the fight for women's ordination, as I'm sure we both remember very clearly, was long and hard. As one of the first to be ordained in 1994, what does it mean to you to now be a bishop? It's something that I never imagined would happen. One doesn't think of the future like that when you're ordained as a priest. At the time, of course, it was a moment of tremendous rejoicing across the church, that at last women who felt called to exercise this kind of ministry were allowed to do so.

Great celebration, and that remains a very vivid memory in my mind. But nobody who is ordained either as a deacon or as a priest will have in their mind that one day I may be a bishop. It just doesn't work like that. Indeed, I think if you would have asked me this time last year, I would have said exactly the same. It just wasn't something that I was expecting. But it feels the right place for me to be. I'm very happy in Wales.

I've been made to feel extremely welcome, as has my partner. And I rejoice that this is where I am and look forward to all that the future holds. Well, there's now gender parity between men and women on the bench of bishops in Wales. To what degree is that accepted by all the parishioners? Do they think, oh goodness, that's okay, men and women equal? Yes. I mean, it shouldn't be a story, should it really? No, but come on, 1994 is not that long ago. It isn't, no. And I think it's wonderful that I think it's probably the first province in the Anglican Communion that has parity of men and women on the bench.

And that's really good news. I do believe that teams work best when there's diversity there. And, yeah, I've been made very welcome on the bench. And we will work very well together. Bishop Cherry Van, thank you very much indeed for being with us this morning and congratulations on your appointment. Thank you. Now yesterday we heard from Sarah in a new series exploring family secrets. Last summer at the age of 44 she discovered that she was adopted she'd stumbled

across the truth of her background as a result of going to a genealogy website and taking a dna test a difficult conversation with her adoptive father followed as he put it you're our daughter but you were not born of us well sarah talked to joe mor Morris about how she felt after that bombshell. I thought there's some secret but I honestly didn't think that it would that I would be the secret. I really did not think that and it's it's funny because my best friend refers to me as Miss Marple for my sleuthing powers and if you want some dirt digging up on your ex-boyfriend I'm the person that you would come to and I would get to the bottom of it for you. And I said to her, isn't this the most delicious irony, the biggest secret of all?

It took me 44 years to find out. How could I not have discovered this sooner? Hello. OK, let's feed some chickens have they got names the chickens yes they have they're all named after various divas this one is barbara streisand but she's known as babs then we've got whitney um beyonce yeah so where's your mind been at then since this discovery oh gosh it's been all over the place it has been consumed by finding the truth and by getting to the bottom of things

and finding answers i mean you found them i think i found lots i think i found lots. I think I've found lots, yes, but not quite everything yet, but almost there. It feels like I'm not who I thought I was, and so every day I have to readjust how I think about myself. Oh, that's who I am. It was deeply, deeply shocking to hear that name, that actually I'd been born with a different name. The same first name, but obviously a different surname I remember feeling very hot and the air sort of around me sort of almost rushing in there was a rushing sound in my ears that moment is completely frozen in time standing in the spare room of my in-law's house, trying to get my head around this bombshell.

I desperately wished it wasn't so. I said that to my dad, and my dad said he wished that too. And I didn't speak to my parents again for a couple of days. I had to really decide how I felt about all of this but in the meantime my husband was talking to them my dad was very very anxious that you know this was going to be there was going to be a rift and we weren't going to see each other anymore he was still very really concerned about that and I think that Rob was able to reassure my parents that that wasn't going to happen but that it was going to take some time I then became immediately obsessed with finding answers and and tracking down my

birth family and that's what you've been doing since that's what I've been doing since when I did speak to my dad again my mum didn't want to come to the phone. She was very, very upset. I could hear her in the background crying. She was really, really worried that this would mean the end of our relationship. And she just didn't want to talk. And we've still not talked about it really. I've seen them since. And we've just not really talked about it. Did you ask your mum and dad why they didn't tell you? My dad said that as far as they were concerned there had been a scandal and that my maternal grandfather was a head teacher of a school and he was very concerned about scandal locally and he was a mason and he had absolutely insisted that there was a closed adoption and that I was never to be told who my birth mother was.

And my dad said that as a young couple, he and my mum were worried by this. They had to go to court. They had to sign all of these legal documents. They felt quite intimidated by that. And they were genuinely worried that if I found out that I'd be taken away from them. My dad described that for the first couple of months that they had me, there was a period of time when the birth mother could come back and claim me and the adoption wouldn't go through. And he said those were the most stressful three months of his life

and they couldn't really relax until that period was over. And after that, they, I think, just decided they were going to abide by that and they weren't going to tell me that's me and my my dad I like the way he's wearing his anorak hood me too we've both got our hoods up we're both in navy blue both eating ice creams we often went to north wales on holiday how old are here? I'm about five there. We're sitting on a bench in front of Beaumaris Castle in Anglesey which is actually where

my birth father's family come from. But of course you didn't know that. I know and that's why I find this picture so odd looking at this and I know that that's taken in Anglesey and now I know that those times when I was there I had all of these blood relatives probably down the road that's that's very strange

to think that now looking at this picture and of course my parents were blissfully ignorant of that as well otherwise I guess we probably wouldn't have gone there. Because the town that I was born in, I had never been to until recently. Never. Now that makes sense as well. My parents kept me away from there. Moved away from that area, kept me away from that town. Because they were obviously worried that I might bump into my birth parents. It was always a source of confusion about why it had that name on my

passport for place of birth. Why was I born there? My mum would say, well you were born early and we were just passing through, that's why you were born there. It's a nice photo. I don't have that many photos of my mum, she doesn't like to be photographed so that was another slight hint when I was growing up there were never any baby photos of me the only photos were of me slightly older one of the funny things was when this happened I wasn't going to tell anybody and my husband said no you must tell people this is such a big thing How can you have normal conversations with your friends and keep this from them? You need to talk about it. And the more you talk about it, the better you're going to feel. And they were terribly shocked. And actually, one of the things

that most people said was, but you look like your parents. Now I've been thinking they got really lucky because they could have had some baby that didn't resemble them at all but they picked the right one because we do look very similar. You were the subject of a closed adoption in 1977 what does what does that mean? There's minimal information and there's no contact afterwards and the child doesn't have to be told that they're adopted and I believe from what I've since learned that this was one of the last closed adoptions because the following year 1976 there was a new adoption act and also social services best practice from that time onwards was that children have to be told as soon as possible and that's what they do now any child that's adopted now is told as soon as possible that they're adopted and what that means, and they're given support and counselling.

And that telling children when they're older, or in my case, as an adult, can be psychologically damaging. So what's changed for you since this revelation? When I look in the mirror, I now see my birth mother, but I've never met her, so that's weird. That's very weird. It's changed the way that I looked at my children in terms of where they get some of their features from.

This was the first picture I saw of my birth mother. Wow. Which her husband sent to me. What did you think when you saw it? I thought gosh I can really see a resemblance. I must admit I can see a resemblance. Did you deliberate about finding your birth parents? Some people do don't they? I did for a split second I think and I said to my dad I'm not going to do any more I'm going to put a stop to it I did say that to him but I think I said that because my gut reaction has always been to protect my mum and dad from any upset then I thought who are you kidding of course you're

going to do this and I wasn't sure if I actually wanted to meet them but I certainly wanted to find out the truth. My birth mother was 14 when she became pregnant, my birth father was 15. My birth mother's parents were very angry when they discovered that she was pregnant. They discovered that she was pregnant when they saw her one day coming out of the shower and realised that she had a bump. And they were absolutely furious. She was shamed. They were Catholic. My grandfather was a Freemason and a headteacher.

And she was basically put under house arrest. She didn't hold me. I was taken away immediately. And she didn't tell anybody apart from her husband, who she met the year after I was born. She kept it secret all of these years, even from her own brother and her daughter. My birth father was her school boyfriend.

And he was gobsmacked when I finally tracked him down. He didn't really believe it at first. So your birth father had no idea you even existed? He says not. And from his reaction, I believe him. And I asked him if he'd take a DNA test and he said yes. But as soon as he knew, he was really keen to speak. So we did talk on the phone for about 40 minutes or so.

And that was utterly... ..mind-blowing. Because I was speaking to a stranger but this stranger biologically speaking was my father birth father and that was very odd his reaction was different of course to mine and he'd got quite angry he said at points thinking oh I had a daughter all this time and I didn't know and I said to him you know I'm not looking for new parents I've got parents and they're really good ones I'm just looking for some answers and I'm looking to find out where I came from maybe we could become friends of a sort and, you know, be in touch occasionally and maybe that would be a nice bonus to come out of this major bombshell. And he said yes, he would like that.

Have you met your birth mother? She does not want to meet. She's been very upset by me coming forwards and she's had to tell her daughter, which she was very upset about. Her daughter doesn't want to know and I, which she was very upset about. Her daughter doesn't want to know and I don't have any contact with her. I had some contact with her husband initially. So how did you find her?

I found her on social media. She has a similar name to her brother, so I actually contacted him thinking it was her. And then he contacted me again and said, it was such a dismissive message he wrote back and said I've spoken to her but we can't help you any further and then a couple of days later I got an email from her husband and he said don't contact her brother again because he's been really shocked by this but I'm her husband and I can help you with some of this information. And we did speak on the phone.

And he seems like a nice person. And he did give me quite a lot of information and it was very useful. But as we continued talking, I felt uncomfortable about some of the things that he said which I don't think were meant to be malicious at all and I do believe that he had good intentions but he had told his wife that he was in touch with me and she had been very upset at that and quite angry and didn't want him to speak to me and some of the things that he'd said such as she's cried every day since you got in touch and you know she's really hurt and traumatized and her parents treated her very cruelly and this has brought all of this up for her again it made me feel bad about myself it made me feel as if I was somehow to blame for existing

I had to just say please don't contact me again because it's too much. And obviously it must be really upsetting because it's sort of a rejection of someone you didn't... Yes. You've been rejected by someone you didn't even know existed. Exactly, yes. Are you angry? When I was told the story about my birth mother and being treated cruelly by her parents, that made me feel angry the thought of shaming a frightened teenage

girl and forcing her to give up a baby but I'll tell you what else this made me feel that I'm actually really lucky to be alive because I could never have existed you know she could have had an abortion and gosh it makes me realize that life is so fragile sarah was talking to joe morris still to come in today's program katherine phipps cooks the perfect winter salad of red leaves mackerel and orange from her new book leaf and the serial the fourth episode of girls of riad now don't forget tomorrow's program is devoted to Phoebe Waller-Bridge. We'll talk about what she's learned since that first season of Fleabag, including what writing Killing Eve and the character of the contract killer Villanelle has taught her about

women and violence. For me, Villanelle is interesting because she's so incredibly vulnerable and childlike. Moments before or after she commits this heinous act of violence for me that's what makes it interesting i'm not interested in a character who's just a he's just gonna go and murder lots of people or shoot lots of people if she's just brutal i want to see the whole picture and i also i'm excited by extremes as much as the detail the fact that she can be so gentle with a piece of clothing that she adores and then just like smash somebody's eyeball with a pin. Yeah. Phoebe Waller-Bridge on the programme tomorrow, the whole programme tomorrow. Do join us then.

Now, I stumbled across the Doris Day film Move Over Darling on a lazy Saturday afternoon last weekend. I'd seen it in the cinema in 1963 at the age of 13 and suddenly all the memories of how much I'd begged my mother to buy me one of the gorgeous, colourful suits she'd worn in the film came rushing back. Jacket with slightly nipped in waist and skirt just on or just below the knee. The mini hadn't quite made it yet.

Of course I didn't get one and the fashion changed pretty quickly but what does a suit say about you and when did women begin to wear them? Well Dr Lydia Edwards is a fashion historian and the author of How to Read a Suit. Well in terms of women's suits as we would imagine them being today, it was around the 1910s, and this was largely because of the advent of the new woman and women being in the professional workplace a lot more. And it was kind of born out of sportswear for women.

Bloomers and jackets for cycling kind of progressed into skirts and jackets of a suit. And this became also seen in women wearing many more separates, so blouses and skirts as well. So it kind of ushered in a whole new era of clothing for women. But what was the impact of Sarah Bernhardt, who in the 1870s wore a custom-made trouser suit? Yeah, she's one of those really interesting sort of pinnacles in fashion history when we're looking at the suit for women. Because though she claimed that she wore it for practical reasons in her sculpture studio,

but she did appear in public wearing it. And I think it's really important to remember that although this is a really interesting and pivotal moment, it didn't reflect what happened for most women. Because she was a celebrity and she had the opportunities to be braver, but it was a very one-off example. I know she called them her boys' clothes. Yes, it was great. Yes, she did. And she did play Hamlet as well.

She did, yes, she did, absolutely. So, you know, it's understandable when we look at her repertoire and her background. What was Chanel's influence on women beginning to wear trousers more commonly? I mean, certainly it's sportswear, but making them fashionable. Yeah, she certainly did spearhead that. The first suits that were commercially produced by her were skirts and jackets worn with blouses. But she, I think, in the popular press started to talk about women wearing trousers as something more natural and more expected but this was in the 1920s and 30s and it was still a long

time before it became widely acceptable. I think it was Rocha who created the first pantsuit. Was that in 1932? Yes, and this was around the time that Hollywood superstars like Katharine Hepburn and Marlene Dietrich were wearing trouser suits. And again, I hate to hark back to it, but it was such a one-off. You know, it was a really brave,

bold statement. It was seen as very transgressive and it was seen in keeping with their very bold, masculine really, personas that they were seen to have. So again, I think it was something very, very specific to these women and very brave. And it certainly set the scene for trousers becoming much more common. How quickly then did the trouser suit catch on? In terms of women feeling comfortable and wearing it to work and wearing it on a daily basis, not really until the early 70s, I would say. And even then you see in news clippings saying the CEO turned up to work in a trouser suit and this was, you know, frowned upon by her male colleagues and talked about in

the office. By the time we get to the 80s, it's much, much more commonplace. Although for women with power suits, it was still much more common to see a skirt with this very broad-shouldered, masculine-inspired jacket. But I think what's really interesting in the 80s is that as women wear these power suits, we get men wearing looser, unstructured, much softer suits. What influence have politicians such as Hillary Clinton and notably Angela Merkel had? I mean, she has dressed in simple suits for a very long time. Yes, and I think it's interesting that, of course, we hear a lot more about what women politicians wear than what men choose to wear. But, yeah, it's interesting with Hillary Clinton,

I think the fact that she's an older woman often comes into play in that it's not always talked about as much as if she was younger, I think. It's seen as being part of her image, but it's not always commented upon in quite the same way as it would be, I think, if she was 20 or 30 years younger. But what do we read into those very senior politicians wearing suits? What are they saying about masculinity and femininity? And what's acceptable in politics? I think the whole idea of masculinity and femininity is key in this because male politicians wear suits, we expect men to wear suits. For women, I think wearing suits, it's accepted, but suits are still modified for women. It's not obviously the same garment as it is for a man. So I think when a woman politician chooses to wear a trouser suit, as we still call them, we don't just call it a suit often,

she is saying that she is on the same level as a man, but also that she's wearing something that has been modified from a man's suit. I think that's still very much the way we view women's suits, however they're being worn and in whatever kind of circumstance. So for female politicians, I think it is a statement of power, but it's also still a statement of deference, I think, for many women. Which style has more status as we move on in time? The suit or the very smart, beautiful dress?

I think the dress, because it is now an option, it's no longer required everyday wear for women. And because you can get it in such a huge array of styles these days, you can dress it up, you can dress it down. I think if a woman chooses to wear a dress, certainly to a public political celebrity event, it's much more commented upon. You know, it's discussed in the media, it's unpicked. It's got that optional feel about it because it's not something that women are expected to wear and for centuries it was, it was the only option women had. In this era of gender fluidity,

what's the influence on who wears what? Well, I think choice again and options is the key word here. I have a feeling that for the future with our ideas of gender not being binary and gender fluidity becoming the norm almost, what we'll see is the creation of new garments, not necessarily suits and dresses being modified. I think we'll see new, specifically gender-neutral, unisex garments coming to the fore. And Billy Porter in his amazing tuxedo and skirt is an amazing example of how people can get out there

and show fusions between masculine and feminine, but it'll be very interesting to see where it goes, I think. Now the fashion is more for these skinny you know, very tight fitting very structured armour like suits almost and interestingly yes, I mean I would say it would stand to reason that they would go out of fashion because

of that issue of comfort but I think comfort does take second place still when we want to be fashionable. If you think of women wearing stilettos and you know pulling ourselves into spanks and dresses that are too small we don't stop sacrificing ourselves for fashion I think. I was talking to Dr Lydia Edwards. Catherine Phipps new cookery book is called Leaf and it took me right back to the days when my grandmother would cook nettles

as a cheap vegetable and make me eat them and drink the water in which they'd been cooked saying it would give me a beautiful skin Well nettles appear in Catherine's book as do other weeds, herbs, lettuces and greens and today she will cook or at least put together a perfect winter salad of red leaves mackerel and orange and she's also brought a pear and rosemary upside down cake which I will try

later. Catherine why leaf? I like tackling large subjects with ingredients that I use a lot and I've always had a fascination with different leaves. I grew up on a small holding where we grew a lot of our own fruit and vegetables. We foraged a lot for various things, including nettles, of course. And I was a child who was obsessed with food and obsessed with books. And I was always fascinated by the story of Rapunzel. And not many people remember that the reason Rapunzel ends up in the situation she's in is because her mother had a craving for greens and she's seeing these greens in the witch's garden over a high wall and I just loved the whole image of

a walled garden the greens growing within, and that craving really fired my imagination. Now, as I said, nettles do appear in your book. You have to be a bit careful with nettles, don't you? Well, yes. Only take the very fresh, young, green ones from the top. Yes, it's best to forage before they flower. They get a bit strong. And, yes, as you say the tips wear gloves

obviously because they do have a sting um people say grasp firmly by the base but there's no need to be grasping firmly by the base of them anyway because you want the tips so i think that's nonsensical and yes in spring sometimes there's a second growth later in the year which always happens in my rather overgrown garden but yeah um be careful as far as the winter salad is concerned what leaves have you been putting in there so so far i've got some shredded red cabbage and some celery leaves that just came from the centre of a big stem of celery. And this time of year is an amazing time of year for leaves. People don't usually think of winter as being the best time for leaves.

But we have all these really beautiful, colourful, slightly bitter leaves coming in from Italy. Endives, chicories, that kind kind of thing and i think they're really really good this time of year for kind of waking up your palate a little bit well that's a whole lot of red cabbage a very small red cabbage well this is actually an endive oh so it will taste like a red cabbage it does it looks like a very miniature red cabbage. And this is completely other end of the colour spectrum, a really pale, delicate rose pink. And what is that? And that is another kind of chicory that's, again, from Italy.

And the reason I pair it with the blood oranges, because the blood oranges are coming in from Sicily and Spain at the moment and they just work absolutely beautifully together. How easy is it to find some of the leaves you include in the book? I mean, baby beetroot, I suppose that's not difficult, but fig and something Japanese called mitsuna. You can actually find those quite a lot in the supermarkets now. Mitsuna is one of the leaves that will appear in those bagged salads of mustard leaves

because it's a mustardy leaf. So there's so many different ways of finding leaves. A good green grocer in a farmer's market is really good for the kind of leaves that we associate with other plants. So for example, just now talking about celery you can buy celery with the leaves attached you can buy beetroot and turnips and radishes with the leaves attached which are all really really good in salads and they're all also very very good for wilting down as an alternative to regular greens that you have to buy separately. So it's a cost thing as well.

They're very economic to use. Because a lot of people throw those leaves away. You just chop them off the top and throw them away. I shan't do that in future. The orange is going in now, is it? The orange is going in. I'm just going to segment it. Ooh, really dark one. I love the drama of these.

You never know what you're going to get because it never really coincides with exactly what colour the peel is. I've never seen such a dark one in. Yeah, I must admit, I'm quite surprised. You never know. So I've topped and tailed it and I'm just following the contour of the orange round to get rid of all the pith

because I'm not a lover of the pith I was always one of those fussy children that always used to have to peel every little bit off when I was eating a satsuma or something it can be a bit bitter it can and then I'm going to hold this over the salad so none of the juice escapes and I'm just going to segment it in like that it's a really nice thing to eat this time of year when you want to come out start come out of the comfort food and you want something I mean I just find February so gloomy and dark but you know I'm coming away from wanting to eat nothing but carbs and the fish that goes in next does it yeah so pre-cooked yeah so really i mean it's quite

it's a salad yes but it's quite a well-balanced one because although there's not really much of a carb element, just a little bit in the carrot, it's got richness and oiliness from the fish and the dressing has got a bit of creme fraiche in it and is mustardy. And it should satisfy all your taste buds. There's a really good sweetness and zing from this orange. There's bitterness, there's savoriness and i'm going to put in now all of these really fresh herbs so a few came out of my garden this morning i had a little um tramp through the mud to pick some chervil out which is often dead this time of year but we've had such a mild winter um it's it's managed to survive in fact some of the

oriental and more tropical herbs that i usually expect to be dead this time of year is still going strong in the garden so there's a whole range of herbs there and then the fish and then yeah you put the dressing on it yeah we'll try that later um i i am interested in the cake um i've never been known not to be interested in cake um so what how have you done this i'm going to taste this and then i'll have the salad later so that's made with ginger rosemary which is a ginger rosemary so it's a hybrid rosemary which has what i think is the best of both ginger and rosemary can you taste it oh yes it's subtle i would have thought you'd put ginger there's no ginger in there it's just the herb you can make this cake using ground ginger

powder and regular rosemary as well it would be a bit more hard-hitting if you did i think this is quite a nice warm subtleness it doesn't have the same heat delicate it's it's i've never heard of ginger rosemary i really haven't how easy is that to find online very easily and it grows really well in your garden so yeah the other thing we must talk about just before we finish um and i will stop eating the cake and eat more of it during the cereal um we were talking about fermentation and making things like sauerkraut how easy is that to do unbelievably easy i was really put off from it years ago by being told in a book that you had to make really big quantities and and i guess if you live in germany they will eat masses but it is simple as shredding up whatever

you want to use usually cabbage or brussels sprouts or kale anything works really adding salt rubbing it in and then leaving it with weight it, and liquid will come over it, will cover it, because the liquid comes out of the cabbage. You don't need to add any water to it? Occasionally, yes, and if you do, add filtered or spring water, you don't want the chlorine. And then pack it into sterilised jars, leave it for three or four days until the fermentation starts, and then you keep tasting it.

And when it's got to the sourness you like, you then put it in the fridge, and then that will slow the fermentation right down. It's very good for the stomach, isn't it? Very, very good, yes. Catherine, thank you so much. Do carry on with the salad. I'll have some more of that for lunch.

And the book, of course, is called Leaf. And thanks ever so much for being with us. And you can find the recipes on the Woman's Hour website. And you can download the Cook the Perfect podcast through BBC Sounds. Catherine Phipps, cooking the perfect. And that, thanks to Catherine Phipps, is my lunch done. The winter salad with leaves, mackerel and orange was as pretty as it was delicious.

And the pear and rosemary upside down cake is amazing. I didn't know there was such a thing as ginger rosemary and I thought she'd put ginger in it. She hadn't. It was just ginger rosemary. Gorgeous. So thank you, Catherine. We had lots of response from you on the adoption

question. Someone who didn't want us to use a name got in touch to say, I too discovered a family secret which changed my life. My mother left when I was six and I didn't see her again for 33 years until I found her. We had a short, unconventional relationship for a couple of years and then she left again. It was only after she died I found out about my background. I found out that her parents were Russian Jews who fled the country at the beginning of the 20th century. My mother was given away on a temporary basis as a baby and never returned to them. She married three times and had five children by three different fathers. I've subsequently met three of those half-siblings. My mother abandoned us all

at different times, usually when she met another man. These events do rob you of your identity and leave psychological scars which, however hard you attempt to rationalise them, do have an impact on you for the rest of your life. Then on suits. Elizabeth emailed to say, as a young teenager in the 60s, I was the proud owner of two trouser suits. One was, yes, rather a copy of a man's outfit, being brown check with tailored trousers, and a wide lapel double-breasted jacket. I remember my father shaking his head and saying, I was expected to show my sons how to fill their trousers, but not a daughter. But my other trouser suit was magenta wool trimmed with black and white check. The jacket was a cape with a zip front and the trousers were bell-bottoms.

The ensemble was completed by a baker's boy cap and I thought I looked the bee's knees. And then Dr Sarah tweeted, I resent the use of copycat regarding trouser suits in the trailer for today's programme. If wearing a suit is just copycatting then it implies that we are poorer versions of men just trying to emulate their greatness. Can't we just wear a trouser suit and benefit from the same sense of authority that it bestows on men? And Marjorie emailed, I was the first woman to wear trousers at the Medical Research Council in 1968. I was only a lowly clerk and my immediate superior had to ask someone higher up if it was all right. He said it was because he was clearly open-minded. Now, do join me tomorrow for our special programme

where I'll be talking to Phoebe Waller-Bridge. She of Fleabag fame and, of course, the writer of Killing Eve and some sort of contribution to the new Bond film as well. That's two minutes past ten tomorrow morning. Join me then. Bye bye. What are you interested in? And I mean really interested in. Really into box certificates. Pencils. Crinoline mania. So much so that if you see it or hold it or just think about it, then everything stops. And then, one day, it just vanished. Each week in the Boring Talks podcast, join me, James Ward, as I introduce a guest speaker

to share their own fascination for a very niche subject. But what could it possibly be? From the personal joys of pencils and teletext to the expectant sounds of old computer games loading, every talk is a varied and surprising treat. Hear that? Lovely. The Boring Talks. Subscribe right now on BBC Sounds.

I'm Sarah Treleaven, 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.