NADIYA HUSSAIN

When I am scared, I push myself and get the best out of myself.

But I understand the importance of being a brown, Muslim woman of faith who is in the public eye, because there aren't that many of us.

For me, it's important to instil in my children that they can do whatever they like, that no matter what their religion and colour, they can achieve what they want through hard work.

I really want my daughter to see that she can go out to work, but equally I want my sons to see it.

I'm forever making it out like I have got it all together and I know what I'm doing. The truth is I haven't got a clue what I'm doing.

I take everything out of the fridge and see what we can make. We talk about what we could possibly create, and if there is something on the turn that we could save, we chop it up and put it in the freezer.

How my parents are in the kitchen is a good indicator of their parenting style. Mum cooks for sustenance, wants to get in and out, the job done quickly. My Dad wants to prance around in the kitchen, create a curry - and a mess - and entertain everyone.

I bottled up all my emotions and forced myself to grow up faster than I needed to.

As a child, I loved being outdoors. Our house had a railway track going past it. Of course, Mum told us not to go near it and, of course, we did. There were amazing blackberry bushes growing all along it, and we collected the fruit.

Once a month we have 'dessert for dinner' night. I'll make four separate desserts. They'll come home from school and eat as much cake and custard and ice cream as they can physically get in their guts. Because sometimes I think, let them just be children.

I spent a lot of time with extended family when I was young. Every weekend, Dad would buy half a sheep and Mum would cook for about 50 people, and we would all eat on the couch, in the kitchen, spilling out into the garden.

Cod and clementine is one of the things my grandmother cooked for my mum when she was a child. Never one for waste, she'd keep the peel whenever she had a clementine, and this dish puts it to work.

Arranged marriages get a bad reputation. Do they always work? No, but that's true of all marriages. As long as you aren't forced, who cares how you get together?

I jumped off a 30ft diving board for a dare once and it wasn't fun.

We live in a world where we often get told what we should and shouldn't do. I don't think we should worry so much.

But Sunday is our cleaning day: we give ourselves only one and a half hours and we clean everywhere. We do that together because we made the mess together. I refuse to get a cleaner, although I'd love one, because I don't want to teach my kids that we make a mess and then we pay someone else to clean it.

Brexit makes me uncomfortable. It feels like we're in no-man's-land, and it doesn't feel safe. People who voted to leave did so because of the scaremongering. It was all about immigration, but immigration is a great thing.

The longest I've gone without a panic attack is about two months. Even then I can feel it bubbling away under the surface.

The only reason we had an oven at home was because it came attached to the cooker. Mum would keep her frying pans in there and anything else that would fit. Storage was its only use.

If I break my finger, I go to accident and emergency. If I have a cold, I go to the pharmacy. If I'm broken inside, where do I go? So, to help myself heal, I felt the best way to do this would be to talk, to share and to better understand what it is that I have.

I'm a morning person so I like to be up by 6 am to wash and pray before the sun rises, and then have a tea at the kitchen table.

Islamophobia first appeared in my life on 11 September 2001. I was coming back from college and didn't know what had happened. A white van stopped and a man got out. He spat on me, yelled a profanity, and then threw a can of coke in my direction. I cried as I walked home.

Everyone says my family are so lucky to be surrounded by so many sweet treats, but to be honest, the novelty has worn off for the kids.

Everything is tested in my little kitchen. The recipes are mine and that's really important to me. When I do a cookery show I know these recipes really well, because every recipe I've ever published has been tested by my kids.

Growing up, I didn't see that many Muslims on TV and we don't see many now. But essentially I am a mother and that's the job I know best.