It’s mum’s world for bold cooking

Great British Menu judge Nisha Katona tells Lauren Taylor about pivoting careers later in life and why mothers make great bosses

Nisha Katona never bowed to the expectation put on women with children to be risk-averse – with a huge career shift in her 40s, she felt a duty to show her daughters: “There is nothing you cannot be.” The TV chef and restaurateur opened her first Mowgli restaurant this time 10 years ago and gave up her 20-year-career as a child protection barrister to do so.

She says “the noise against which I built this business” was women saying “you need to be there for your children” – not have ambitions for yourself.

Katona now has 21 restaurants across the UK and three more due to open this year, alongside a charitable arm, The Mowgli Trust, which has so far donated more than £1.6 million.

The mum-of-two is a judge on BBC’s Great British Menu, a regular on ITV’s This Morning, picked up an MBE in 2019 and has just released her sixth cookbook, Bold.

“Life, for me started in my 40s,” she says. “Within the four corners of motherhood, there is also a duty to demonstrate that there is nothing you cannot be.

“My little, half-brown girls are growing up thinking: ‘She’s on telly as well talking about Italian food – that means there’s nothing we cannot attempt at least,’” says the 52-year-old, who was born in Ormskirk, Lancashire, to Indian parents.

“As an older woman particularly, you’ve had your corners knocked off, you know which battles to fight, there’s no pride, you’re not there to flex your muscles and strut, you’re there to make it better for the people around you.

“Particularly if you’ve had children and you’ve been through the warfare of making them happy, you understand diplomacy like no one else, you understand humility and open-mindedness like no one else – the business world needs you.

“We are so under-represented, it’s appalling,” she adds.

Indeed, Katona – who now employs 1,000 people – wanted her maternal side to be a big part of Mowgli.

She says: “What you saw on the television (a decade ago) was the brutal nature of kitchens and you still see it to an extent – this military, macho way of running a kitchen.

“I bring a zero-tolerance policy to any shouting, bullying or aggression. Any of that testosterone dripping off the walls, I have no time for you, go find somewhere else to work,” she says.

Katona’s new cookbook has classic recipes with an usual twist – think cauliflower and dark chocolate risotto, chicken and banana korma, or anchovy and cheesy pineapple croquetas, alongside puddings like thyme apple tart cake, and Marmite caramel blondies.

“It really is that phrase of ‘just trust me on this’,” she laughs. “Just leading you by the hand into that step of boldness and bravery.

“It’s that reaching into the back of the cupboard or fridge and seeing what there might be – there’s miso and Parmesan, would that work with something sweet?” says Katona, in reference to a recipe for miso Parmesan

doughnuts.

Zero tolerance to any bullying or aggression. Any of that testosterone dripping off the walls, I have no time for you

• Bold: Big Flavour Twists To Classic Dishes by Nisha Katona is published by Nourish Books, priced £30. Photography by Martin Poole. Available now.