Nigella Lawson: "How I healed after heartbreak"
Nigella Lawson has forged out a career as one of the world’s most popular celebrity chefs, but most people don’t realise that she’s encountered more than her fair share of heartbreak.
In an interview with Now to Love, the celebrity chef explained how her culinary pursuits had helped her deal with the passing of her sister Thomasina, who died tragically young at 31 from breast cancer in 1993.
"I like cooking with people who know me well and know my kitchen well," she explains.
"I used to love cooking with my sister, Thomasina. I loved cooking for her and with her and just talking to her while I cooked."
"I have a very good friend and we sometimes cook together. It's a lovely thing to do," she says.
"I also think it's a wonderful way of talking with people generally. A lot of people are more comfortable talking when your attention is a bit elsewhere.
"It's rather like the way people sometimes feel they have important conversations while they're driving. People are more relaxed when you haven't got full-beam on them. So I quite like chatting while I cook. The other person doesn't need to be cooking with me. Sometimes they can just be there, having a glass of wine while I'm chopping and stirring and unwinding. I like that."
Nigella’s first husband, journalist John Diamond, was also taken by cancer before his time.
"I don't want to waste life," she says.
"It feels so ungrateful not to take pleasure. You have to take pleasure in life while you can because people have that ripped away from them."
"One of the reasons I like cooking is that it forces me into the moment, and that's good," she adds.
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