Men hated me when women saw partners could cook, says Oliver
JAMIE OLIVER has said men “hated” him and would be abusive in the early years of his career, because he made women realise that their male partners should cook for them too.
The TV chef and restaurateur, who rose to fame with his first TV series in 1999, said “women around Britain made me succeed”.
Speaking of the impact his show had, Oliver said: “I didn’t realise it was political at the time, but 20 years ago women, en masse, were going to work...
“Women and men, husbands, boyfriends were coming home from work, they’d sit down at six o’clock and go ‘Ahh, f ****** tired’, and men across Britain would look at their wives and go ‘What’s for dinner?’
“And they weren’t having And rightfully so.
“They had both done a 12-hour day, their feet both hurt, they’re it. both contributing to the rent – so I didn’t know it because I was too young and stupid, and I was just enjoying life way too much – but women around Britain made me succeed.”
Oliver said that when The Naked Chef was on TV, he looked “about one-year-old - almost like a foetus”, which then inspired women to tell their partners to cook more.
He said: “So, for the girls around the country, old and young, when their husbands said ‘What’s for dinner?’, they said ‘See that boy? He’s 23 years old. If he could cook for his missus, and all his friends, look what he’s cooking, it’s simple, look he’s getting his hand in there’, and they went ‘Go on’.
He continued: “And then that’s why, if you look back in the papers and study it, men hated me for two years, and I got chased and punched a few times, I had loads of abuse.”
Oliver, who returns to screens next week with his new series
along with longtime friend and mentor Italian chef Gennaro Contaldo, said the “Italian kitchen saved me a little bit”. starts on Channel 4 on Monday August 13.