FOOD EXTRA Taste That S
The Take That star says: “I had a happy childhood in Cheshire. My parents were one of the few couples in history who never argued and we always had dinner together as a family.
“My older brother Ian and I were taught to sit at the table and eat with a knife and a fork. It was strict in a nice family way. We weren’t well off, but we weren’t poor.
“My dad had two jobs, so we had a colour telly before anyone else and a record player. My mum and dad loved music and we used to listen to The Beatles, Abba and the Bee Gees.
“Dinner had to fit between dad’s jobs, so we’d eat early at 5pm. He worked as a product manager, then in the evening he’d work on a farm doing tasks like getting the cows in from milking.”
Gary and his wife Dawn recently celebrated their 17th wedding anniversary and they have three children – Daniel, 16, 14-year-old Emily and Daisy, eight.
One of Gary’s earliest childhood memories is sitting at the table eating Cheshire potatoes. “Cheshire potatoes are the absolute best – light, fluffy and sweet,” he says. “In the first two or three weeks of the season, you get all the little ones, and you don’t have to peel them, just scrub, boil and eat with bacon and a bit of butter. You don’t need anything else: that is a dinner from heaven, right there.
“My mum was the cook and we had a rota of evening meals that never changed – Monday was fish fingers, Tuesday hamburgers. Friday was the night I looked forward to most because there was no school for two days and we had chicken pie.
“I love pastry, it’s warm, it’s filling, it’s British. A pie is a treat now but, whenever I go to mum’s, I always request chicken pie.”
But the star admits he has to watch his weight. “My greatest fear is going back to where I was in 2002, when I didn’t have a record deal and I was very fat.
“So Dawn and I are pretty strict with our own eating. At the moment we are loving Persian and Thai food. I often do a Thai fish curry. I know the basics and I make it up as I go along, and often cook one a day in advance.
“A curry always tastes better the next day and, because I’m out all day working, I cook stuff to take with me. I also do a really good spag bol and sneak in a bit of Worcestershire sauce; that always gets clean plates.
“I try not to be a food fascist around the kids. We’ve never forced them to eat anything they don’t want to.” 1 whole chicken, rubbed with butter or drizzled with olive oil, 1 tbsp olive oil, 6 rashers smoked streaky bacon, chopped into lardons, 3 leeks, sliced into rounds, 45g butter, 45g plain flour, 225ml milk, 200ml chicken stock, 100g petit pois, 1 tsp wholegrain mustard, 25g pack parsley, roughly chopped and 1 egg, beaten, to glaze
Heat oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 5. Season the chicken and roast for 1 hour 30 minutes until the juices run clear when you cut into the leg.
sift the flour and salt into a bowl, then grate in the butter and lard. Rub the mixture with your fingers into breadcrumbs, then add two tablespoons of cold water. Continue to add cold water, one tablespoon at a time, until the mixture binds together. Be careful not to add too much. Wrap in Clingfilm and leave to rest while you make the filling. (Alternatively you can use ready-rolled shortcrust pastry)
Heat the oil in a pan and fry the bacon. Once browned, reduce the heat, add the leeks and cook until softened. Mix the butter and flour into a paste and add to the pan, stirring to coat the bacon and leeks. Slowly add the milk, stirring constantly to ensure the mixture doesn’t get lumpy. Add the chicken stock and petit pois, cook for two minutes, then add the mustard and remove from the heat.
Once the chicken is cooked, remove from the oven, rest briefly and carve the meat, discarding the skin and bones. Add to the pan with the parsley.
Turn the oven up to 220C/200C fan/gas 6. Roll out two-thirds of the pastry and use to line a 25cm pie dish. Spoon your filling on top, then roll out the remaining pastry for the pie topping. Brush the edges of the pastry in the pie dish with water, then lay the top over it. Crimp and seal the edges and use any off-cuts for decoration. Brush with the beaten egg, then make an x-shaped cut in the middle for steam to escape. Bake for 45 mins until
golden. Boil 750g Cheshire potatoes (scrubbed but not peeled) for 30-35 minutes until softened. Fry six chopped rashers smoked bacon until crispy. Toss the cooked potatoes in a large bowl with the crispy bacon. Sprinkle with salt and top with 40g good quality butter cut up into pieces. Serve while the butter is melting.