Back in Time for Tea (2018–…): Season 1, Episode 6 - Episode #1.6 - full transcript

The series concludes with the Ellis family reflecting on their time-travel adventure and exploring the legacy of 100 years of history on the northern diet today.

Meet the Ellis family.

Lesley, John,

Caitlin, Freya

and Harvey.

For one summer, this Bradford family
of five went on a time-travelling
adventure...

It's 1925!

..discovering how changing food
eaten in the north of England...

That is Scouse.

..revealed what life was like...

I think perhaps I do need to work on
my frying technique!

..for working-class families over
the last century.



I think it's just potato pie.

I think so.

Chicken feet!

Urgh!

From regional classics...

Pan haggerty for tea.

We'll have two chip naans.

..to dishes which expanded our
horizons.

I'm so happy. Honestly, this is,
like, amazing.

The Ellises' own home was
their time machine,

transporting them to a different era
each week.

It's 1985!

The family experienced the ups
and downs...

What the heck is tripe?



..of work...

This is so hard!

..rest...

and play...

..as they fast-forwarded through
100 years of northern history...

..and still got
Back In Time For Tea.

The Ellises and their home
have returned to the present-day.

I'm back with social historian Polly
Russell to see their house for the

first time in the 21st century.

Whoa! Gosh, it looks big,
doesn't it?

It's doubled in size, hasn't it?

Yeah. We left them in 1999,

with quite a few clashing man-made
fibres going on,

clothing and furniture, so it will
be nice to see what the Ellises...

how they really live in modern day.
Yeah.

Shall we go and see?
Yeah, I'm excited.

Oh, Polly, look, it's lovely.

Ooh! It's plush, isn't it?

It's really plush.

Sumptuous.

Over the course of the experiment,
the Ellises' home saw many changes,

beginning with the sparse furnishing
of 1918...

It's not very cosy, is it?

..to all mod cons.

Wow! There's a subtle pattern, if
you look closely at the wallpaper.

But whichever decade they were in,

one room was always the hub of
family life.

It looks like somewhere you might
actually want to spend some time.

Oh, Polly, it's beautiful.

I didn't know you could get so many
shades of beige.

In the 21st century,

the Ellises' extended kitchen is
still the heart of the home.

Oh. Oh, it's nice, isn't it? Oh!

I mean, I know and totally
understand how Lesley longed for her
kitchen so much,

when she was just in here with,
like, the meat safe.

She had her meat safe.

And something that's remained
constant,

although the kitchen has changed so
dramatically, in terms of, kind of,

space and decor and technology,
is the kitchen table, you know,

still at the heart of family life.

Yeah. And there's always this
kind of anxiety that, you know,

families aren't eating together
any more, and, you know,

this is kind of the crisis of the
family.

Actually, there isn't really
statistical evidence to prove that.

Every evening, we eat our tea
together, the kids,
around the table.

Yeah. It is lovely, because it feels
like you can just all connect

and chat, and I can shout at
my children, and nag at them
to eat properly.

I mean, one significant change is
that they've got their television

in the kitchen. You wouldn't
have seen that 30 years ago,

and so this kind of eating with
screens, whether it's, you know,

your phone, or the television,
you know, that's becoming a sort
of norm,

about two thirds of us do that
routinely.

I must admit, though, the kids
aren't too bad with that,

it's my husband I tell off, if I'm
really honest, more than the kids.

Today, Lesley has a whole plethora
of gadgets,

flavours and foods
at her fingertips.

Look at Lesley's spice rack, it's
like around the world in 80 spices.

I mean, it feels like food
has shifted from being just fuel
to, like, almost being a hobby.

Yeah, I think you're absolutely
right,

because the struggle for working
families has been about,

how do we get enough food on the
table to feed the family?

How do we, you know, sustain
the working body?

We haven't got enough food to go
around.

For the rich, for the middle-class,
for people with servants,

food's always been about pleasure
and leisure and entertaining,

but it's really relatively recently
that there's been enough

surplus income that food has been
inexpensive enough that working
people have been

able to also engage in food
as a hobby, and as a pleasure,

and as entertainment.

Food's not the only way the Ellises'
life today is different from the
families of previous generations.

The son of a painter and decorator,
John is now a company director,

and was the first person in his
family to go to university.

Daughter Caitlin is the second.

Lovely family! Hello! Come in,
the Ellises. You look amazing!

Wow! You look almost futuristic

cos I've not seen you in
modern day, it's so strange.

Is it nice to be back?
It's definitely nice to be back.

I keep finding myself just sat here,
like, looking at the kitchen or the
living room,

like, just in awe
because it's normal!

LAUGHTER

Lesley, how do you feel about
getting your kitchen back?

I'm glad to have the kitchen back,

I have to say. You're back in
control, aren't you?

Yeah, it's my space, I know what I'm
doing, I know where everything is,

I do find it's a lot easier.

Well, I can see you all having a
little glance at these cloches
in front of you.

We thought it could be nice
as a bit of a surprise,

even though you're loving
being back in the present day,

to take you on a magical culinary
journey. Isn't that right, Polly?

Are you ready? So grab
a cloche each.

OK. Three, two, one, voila!

Ooh! Oh! Oh!

This is your 100 years of time
travel encapsulated in five plates.

It basically looks like the world's
worst dinner party right now,
doesn't it?

If you walked into someone's house
and saw this, you'd be, like,
"OK, let's get a takeaway."

So, shall we start here?

What is this, and when is it from?

Do you guys remember? Is this lard?

I thought I saw the end of this.

It was a really emotional day,
that particular day in 1931,

when I fed the children
stale bread and lard,

because it's literally all that we
had in the house.

Things are looking up, because here
we have pilchards on toast.

Ugh, fish in tomato sauce?!

I really did not enjoy them.

Ugh, disgusting.

But what an amazing jump to go from
bread and lard to pilchards to then,

a decade later into the '60s,
steak, chips and peas.

I mean, you can see in that plate
that things must be getting better

for working families by the 1960s.

We've got a fridge, I told you!

Yay! We can have ice!

Weetabix, Coco Pops, spaghetti!

This honestly looks amazing.

This is like some next level
gourmet stuff.

You need to open your own
restaurant, woman.

Things felt good in the '60s
and '70s.

What is it?

We felt like things were changing
for us as a working class family.

But the good times
weren't set to last.

One of the things about being a
working-class northerner was you
never know

which way their scales are going to
tip.

As the Ellises discovered...

No!

Oh! That's grim.

..nothing reflects your family's
fortunes more than what's in your
larder.

I can't believe how empty it is.

We were just so dependent on what
was going on economically

and politically at the time that we
had no real control over our lives,

that's how it felt.

There are real fluctuations
for working families throughout this

whole period of time that you've
experienced, real ups and downs.

Things are precarious, things can be
difficult, and you, sort of,

lived that, through the diet.

It wasn't just what was affordable
that affected what the Ellises
ate -

the people and places around them
had an impact, too.

It's 1921.

We are going to be having onion
and bacon roly-poly.

Food was very simple, very plain,
very beige.

I think it clearly reflected
the status that we had.

Um... There was very little vibrancy
and colour,

and it was almost like a black
and white existence,

and I think that probably reflected
our lives at the time.

100 years ago,

our exposure to flavour didn't reach
far beyond our doorstep.

So we've got thyme and rosemary and
sage, so it will all be, kind of,

the local ingredients.

When you look back, I missed
having foods from other places,

I missed the spices.

To begin with, it did get boring,
and we did get hungry,

because we didn't like it, so we
didn't really eat that much of it.

Freya, you want a bit more,
don't you?

Do I? Yeah.

The food was really bland, and,
like, just grim.

It could genuinely be dog food.

But new flavours were on the
horizon.

In the '60s, services like
Dial-a-Recipe encouraged housewives
to expand their repertoire.

It's reading out a menu.

Go on. Quick, quick, quick!

It's already listed everything!

Well, what did it list?
I can't remember!

LAUGHTER

While the arrival of Chinese
communities brought new
dishes to try.

Enjoy your meal. Thank you!
Thank you, we will.

The outside world was arriving
on our plates.

Going to the Chinese restaurant,
I was so, so, so excited.

Me and Freya were giddy.

That's really nice.

The flavours really came through,

especially after we were eating
such plain food.

We really noticed how flavoursome
it was.

In a way, we've still got
English food, like,

we've got the bread and butter,

but this is definitely different
to what we've been eating,
prior to this.

Factory workers arriving from the
Indian subcontinent were also

spicing up our tea times, and by the
late '70s,

going out for a curry or the Chinese
had become the norm.

I think it took a while for us
northerners

to really embrace new foods.

Are you feeling the heat? Yep.

I am.

And the tank top as well...

Hiya, you all right? Hi, I think
you we'll two chip naans.

By the '90s,

our familiarity with new foods and
flavours inspired unique forms

of fusion cuisine to tickle our
taste buds.

I loved to see this diversity
emerge.

There's times when them foods
haven't been there,

and they're such a massive part of
life today,

because we live in such a
multicultural country, I guess.

Thank you! Thank you very much.

This is really nice.

Mm.

After doing this experiment,
after living through these eras,

you kind of felt like the world
of food was opening up.

And our tastes are still shifting.

Manchester's famous curry mile was
once home to 70 Indian restaurants.

Today, it's down to only eight,
with Lebanese,

Turkish and East African outlets
reflecting the change
in local population.

I've sent Polly and the girls there
to discover what this shift tells us

about our increasingly adventurous
appetites.

Shall we go and find some delicious
food?

Definitely. Yes. You don't
have to ask me twice!

Hello, there. Hi! I'm Haz,
lovely to meet you.

Shall we go find ourselves a table?

Yes, please. Yes. Thank you.

Great place.

Haz Arshad's family have been
serving Indian and Pakistani food
here since the '90s.

Haz, why is it that there are so few
Indian restaurants now
on Curry Mile?

So, I think there's a number of
different factors.

I think everything has its
golden age,

and I think the 1990s certainly was
for a certain era the Curry Mile.

It was a time when the older
generation, basically, knew that
curry, in its anglicised form,

would make a great source of revenue
for the families, so, you know,

you had all these restaurants
who were catering to a very
Western market.

And then I think more recently
there's been a kind of...

People have been travelling
a lot more,

there's a lot more of a focus
and interest in food,

provenance and diversity, you know,

different cultures
bringing in different ideas,

and I think that the older
generation just didn't want to
innovate.

They felt that they had
a good recipe that worked,

they didn't want to change it,

and they didn't really think that
people had much of an appetite

for truly authentic Pakistani
and Indian cuisine.

I mean, even me and Freya find that
you've got to be careful where you
go for curry.

Like, it's got to be well
thought-out,

because there's some places that do,
like, really, really creamy,
creamy kormas,

like, which seem to be from, like,
back in the '90s.

So, we look for, like,
good restaurants, because we're
from Bradford.

Even the students are discerning
now.

Yeah. So, you know...

If we have fussy customers
like this,

that's why we have to take it a step
further.

It's my favourite food.

Bradford's got a great
selection of restaurants,

for a similar reason, they had all
of the textile mills there, as well.

And, to be fair, it started off
in Bradford before it came to
Manchester.

The popularity of flavour-packed
meals like this reflect quite

how much the towns and cities of the
north have transformed over the last
100 years.

Thank you.

It looks so amazing.

Mm.

That is just... It's like with every
bite,

you get a different flavour
coming through.

And texture. Great, that's good
to hear.

I mean, for me, it was very much
a case of, if you don't change,

you won't survive in this industry,

because there are so many
restaurants now opening in
Manchester,

it's always great to do something
a little bit different,

to kind of spark a little bit of
interest, you know,

and get more people coming through
the door.

Tastes might have moved on
dramatically in the 21st century,

but there's one dish that's been a
firm favourite for working families

throughout the ages.

And as if by magic! Hello!

So what we got, guys?

Do you think it's pie?

One of the weird things for me
was the evolution of the pie.

This is really nice.

I think it's just potato pie.

I think so. We started off
with a plain potato pie,

meant to fill you up and provide you
with energy.

You wouldn't be demanding with food,
you'd just eat what you're given,

and you wouldn't really care,
you'd just eat it to survive.

In the '40s, the worker's favourite
became a ration-friendly tea

for the Ellises, made with potato
pastry and a frugal filling.

What is it?

Cow heel pie.

It's got cow heel in it?

Cow heel pie, at first you're, like,
you didn't want it to taste nice,

but then it did, and it kind of give
you a warm feeling.

It tasted pretty good.

I love pie, I love pastry,
I love that gravy,

so I like it.

Steak and kidney pie,
I'm all for that.

Next, the pie got a space age
makeover, coming ready-made
in a tin.

I think in the '60s, we saw
quite a change.

There was quite a bit of innovation
in food in the '60s, we found,

and some of it worked, some of it
didn't!

Oh, that one's burnt.

And after a spot of Northern Soul
shape-shifting in the '70s,

I introduced the girls to my
favourite way of enjoying the pie
as a grab-and-go snack.

Come on, girls. Oh, my gosh,
it smells amazing!

It's a Wigan Kebab.

So it's a pie, only one way
to improve a pie, though,

how can you improve a pie?

You put it in a barm cake.

I have never seen anything like this
before.

It's just so bizarre, like, you've
got all these different pies.

I guess it's still to fill you up,

but then it's more about taste
and enjoying it.

Bon appetit.

Savoury, sweet, hot or cold,

we Brits now spend around
£1 billion on pies every year...

..yet with the number of takeaway
options growing,

the northern favourite has had to
fight to hold on to its popularity.

The girls are in Blackburn, to meet
mother of five Zainab Bilal,

who is putting a fast-food twist
on the traditional classic.

Hi! Hello!

Come on in, welcome!

So, this machine is a simple
blocking machine,

and anybody who makes pies would
use this,

so, if they wanted a little bit of
help to make it faster...

I mean, traditionally, you can make
them by hand,

but this one makes it a lot easier,
and it makes them all standard,
they're all the same.

So we're going to get started on
making our burger pies today.

Whoa, it's got a burger in it?

It's going to have a burger in it!

Having launched her cottage industry
only a year ago,

today Zainab shifts between 1,000
and 2,000 pies every week,

selling to local punters, businesses
and pie connoisseurs
across the country.

As a pie enthusiast, which I
believe myself to be,

because I love eating pie...

That's fabulous, Caitlin!

A burger pie is, sort of,
a unique sort of flavour.

It's a modern twist on a British
classic dish.

We have some really quirky ones.

We even do pizza pie, and lasagne
pie, and we want to get quirkier,

because I think the people that
order it,

our customers that are ordering
them,

are going for these unusual
flavours.

Oh, these are going to be so nice.

Well, I don't know, we did make 'em!

By the end of the decade,

it's predicted time-poor Brits will
spend around £8 billion a year

on takeaways.

It makes it look so neat.

All right, OK, so we're just going
to set the timer going.

And now all you have to do is wait.

It's just nice to know that the pie
has gone through this journey
with us.

I know. Like, we've had pie
the whole way through,

and I feel like pie's never going to
go out of fashion any time soon,
is it?

The flavours have definitely all
changed, and they've all evolved,

but everybody still likes
a good pie.

TIMER PINGS

Oh, wow, they look really good!

What do you think of it?

Oh, it tastes really good.

And when you have a burger,
it falls out of the bread,

whereas when you've got a pie,
it contains it, like.

Yeah! Mm.

Pies aren't the only tradition the
Ellises have found worth holding on
to during their time travels.

1931.

One of the real things that came out
of the whole experience,

particularly in the early eras,
was the sense of community.

Forced to clear out their house and
cupboards after a
government means test,

it was the family's neighbours
who helped sweeten the pill.

Heard you had a visit from Old Nosy.

Rotten. Hope this slice of means
test pudding heartens you a bit.

That's friendship for you.

Yeah, you'll never keep
a northerner down.

Yeah. Yeah.

And as the Ellises discovered,

good neighbours weren't just there
for the bad times.

In 1953,

the Coronation saw communities
across the nation pool resources

to put on a spread fit for a Queen.

Where shall I put them?

Anywhere where there's space.

That was the first time I think
I associated food with fun and
friends,

and a social setting.

Oh, it's been lovely, I've loved it.

I think the Queen should get crowned
every day!

The day-to-day grind of working
lives was often lifted by those
sharing the same street,

the same jobs, and even
the same food.

Our neighbours would have been
our friends, our colleagues,

our support network.

They came together in the good
times, and the bad.

During the strikes of the 1980s,

it was food parcels sent by Russian
and French miners

that helped put food on the Ellises'
plates.

Hello, Mrs Ellis. Hello!

We know you're going through
hard times at the moment,

so we thought this might
help you out.

Thank you so much!

Wow!

It's got to a time now where the
sense of community doesn't feel
as strong

in the modern day as it did
so early on,

and I guess that's something
I've missed.

These days, around half of us
don't know our neighbours' names.

But the power of the community is
coming back.

Lesley and I are off to a small
bakery in Liverpool,

which is using food to try and
reinject a sense of belonging into
their local neighbourhood.

Morning. Oh, good morning.

Hi, you must be Sue and Luca,
I'm Sara, this is Lesley,

we're here for our first shift.

OK, and your first job is,
apron, gloves.

OK. Please. Good.

Chef Luca and volunteer Sue
are part of today's team,

making bread before the customers
arrive.

OK, so we are ready now to knead
the dough, the bread, OK,

so we have to do this for ten,
20 minutes.

This is the fun bit, though,
isn't it?

Yeah, exactly, that's the proper
way, you know.

Any anger or frustrations with
John or with the kids...

So, Sue, do you remember this bakery
when you were a little girl?

Do you remember coming here?
Yeah, I do remember coming here.

It was a big part of the community.

I think this is where you went every
single day,

and this is where you met your
neighbours.

This is where you talked.

This is where you made a community,
basically.

But, sadly, six years ago,
it closed.

For the residents, the heart of
their community was gone, and for a
year, the bakery's ovens were cold.

So, we're stood here today, while
I make hard work of this bread,

so this bakery obviously reopened.

How did that happen, what happened?

Well, it started off as an arts
project, so we had lots of meetings
here,

and while we were having the
meetings, people would come in
and say,

"Are you opening this as a bakery
again?"

Really? And we said, "No, no, we're
not, we're not," and then,
eventually, we thought, "Why not?"

So, this is a community bakery,
it's not-for-profit.

And also gives a bit of power back
to the people, to the local people.

Very much so.

Since reopening in October 2013, the
bakery has expanded into a cafe,

a pie shop, and a training hub for
the locals.

So, what are the plans, what happens
next?

We want to be an integral part
of what is happening in this
high street.

So, the council have got the plans
of what they want to do to build
businesses back into the area,

and we believe that we have set
a precedent, really.

I can see it's starting to come up.

There's hope, optimism, and I
thought, "I want to be part of that.

"I want to be there when it becomes
a community again."

It seems the community spirit the
Ellis family enjoyed in the past is

still alive and kicking, and just as
desirable today.

Oh, it's gorgeous.

I like the hot butter.

At the heart of the bakery is a
staple that the Ellises became only

too familiar with over their 100
years of time travel.

They're going to be eating bread
all the time.

I've got some bread.

I'll check if there's any jam.

I doubt it. There's no jam.

No jam. I've no jam, I'm guessing,
from that reaction, Harvey.

This is a bad, bad day.

I think what made up our diet
was bread.

I feel like I'm going to break
a tooth eating this bread.

Every era we had bread.

You can smell it burning, Leslie.

Johnny! It is not burning.

It's just bread and bread and bread.

You start off with it just because
it's a really easy thing to consume

and a really easy thing to keep.

But then you get to the '70s,
even '80s and '90s,

where you're just having bread
on the side,

just cos you feel like having
bread and butter with your tea.

It were weird to see that bread
has gone from being a meal

to bread being a side of a meal.

While bread wasn't always popular
on the Ellises' tea table,

another staple of working class
diets

never failed to hit the sweet spot.

# Sugar

# Oh, honey honey... #

And there was no-one more receptive
to its charms than the younger
members of the family.

Whether you earnt your pennies down
t'mill or you were starting to get

a bit of pocket money, kids like
Harvey would really try to tantalise
and tickle their taste buds.

Look what we've got, kids!

Hey, guys, look what we've got.

When the Ellises started
the experiment

treats like candyfloss were very
much for special occasions.

In our normal lives,

my mum's a very big health freak and
we don't tend to have sugary stuff
in the house.

I'm not going to lie,
I did enjoy it,

cos we don't get it in modern day.

Higher wages and mass-produced
sweets meant much more choice for
kids like Harvey in the 1960s.

Harvey! Yeah, I know.

Words can't describe how happy I
were when them sweets came in the
little box. I went crazy.

Even before I ate the sugar.

And by the '70s, manufacturers were
cottoning on to kids as influential
customers...

Please can I have dandelion
and burdock?

Yup. ..delivering Harvey's sugar hit
right to his doorstep.

Kids in the '70s, they had
a powerful voice.

Bye, now. See you.

By the '80s, food producers
were developing the weird and the
wonderful,

to keep attracting kids to their
brands.

Look! It's rock solid!

I do not want to know what's in this
to make it do that.

Me doing chores in modern day,

I get a bit of money at the end of
the month and I feel like kids still

have power over sweets.

Over the last 40 years,

pocket money has outpaced wage
growth in the UK by 255%,

making children a very lucrative
market.

I've come to show Harvey the lengths
modern manufacturers will go to

to convince them to part with
their cash.

But will he be won over?

Ah, hey, Mr Harvey. Hello!

How are you? I'm all good.

You? Yeah, are you good? Yeah.

Thought you might want to play a
game.

It involves eating, which is good.

Are you ready? Yeah. OK.

Ta-da!

So, you spin,

and whichever one you land on,
you've got to get that colour
of bean,

yeah, the little jellybean?

And it could taste of buttered
popcorn...

or rotten egg.

I remember, when I was little, like,
you must have had popping candy?

Yeah. That's a similarish thing,
isn't it?

I guess. Yeah. Trying to make
something a bit of an experience as
well as just the flavour.

Yeah. And, like, gobstoppers...

Yeah. There used to be ones
called Little Devils, I think,

which were red ones, and they were
really spicy.

See if you... Yeah, we have
them now. We have them,
called jawbreakers.

This will be good. OK, so I'm going
to spin.

Oh, my worst!

Bogies? Or juicy pear.

No spitting out, no spitting out.

Oh... Oh, bogey...

No, don't spit it out, don't spit it
out.

You have to keep it in.

There are now almost 400 sweet
manufacturers in Britain.

Go on, chew, chew, chew, chew, chew,
chew, chew.

Keep going.

They can't just rely on the old
favourites to grab their share

of a lucrative £6 billion market.

Oh, it stinks!

Oh, my gosh, it...

It really... I really like you,
Harvey, but you stink right now.

People who are making the sweets,
the manufacturers, they know...

They... They're after your
pocket money.

They have to... And then they keep
bringing out new sweets and new
inventions like this.

They're trying to find new ways to
make kids excited about sweets.

Because, when you think back to
simple, like, some fruit gums or
whatever,

or wine gums, and then to this...

I mean, this is, this is Charlie And
The Chocolate Factory sort of stuff,
this, isn't it? It is.

This is candy-tainment.

Have you been candy-tained?

No.

Attracting kids' attention wasn't
always so complicated.

Harvey Ellis, promising young lad.

Put a pig's bladder in front of him.

Is he going to score?
Oh, no, he didn't!

I saved it! No! There's only one
Sara Cox!

And while a pig's bladder football
might come for free,

with a few spare pennies, girls like
Caitlin and Freya could enjoy an

escape from their working lives.

Here, look at that. Rolos!

We haven't seen any, like, chocolate
up until now, have we?

Yeah. Aero! Can I have two Rolos,
please?

Yes, Miss.

Thank you. There was loads of things
opening up, like cinemas and cafes,

and I think that influenced, like,
the change of food as well,

because people were more prosperous
and could afford to go out and do
things.

As families became more affluent,

they found new and exciting ways
to entertain themselves.

Welcome to Mr Bradford 1968.

I think we've all made memories that
will last a lifetime doing this
experiment.

Dad's getting scared.

We've had some cracking times.

From caravans to canal boats,

the options for days out
and holidays got ever wider.

KLAXON
Oh, my God!

Everybody knows we're coming now.

Pressing that horn.
That was so scary!

I nearly jumped in there!

Whatever the decade,

the chance to kick back provided
a much-needed antidote to the
grind of working life.

# We're the kids in America

# Whoa oh!

# We're the kids in America

# Whoa oh! #

Dining out together for the first
time in the '80s,

the Ellises were reminded of just
how far they'd come.

We've got the traditional 83 combo.
Shall we put that one in front of
you to start off with?

How are the ribs, Harvey?

I think it's been good. As a family,
we've had a really good afternoon,

haven't we? It's the first thing
we've done together without arguing.

That's an achievement in itself.

It was a far cry from their
experience at the start of the
experiment,

when life was dominated by work.

At the beginning of the 20th
century,

the north of England was at the
centre of industrial Britain.

Whole regions were characterised by
single industries.

There was steel in Sheffield,
shipbuilding in Liverpool,

while many people in Yorkshire earnt
the crust at the local mill.

The more that I do, the more
that I get paid,

so I'm just going to keep going.

I'm getting better at this.

I'm cottoning on.

With the school leaving age as young
as 13,

Caitlin and Freya would have had to
work alongside their parents in the
1920s and '30s.

I think it would be a very hard
life. I don't know how they did it.

What this experiment has done for
the children is allowed them to see

how lucky they are now.

If they'd been born in 1918,
they would have had no options.

They would have just followed us
into the mill.

This is so hard!

To me, I'm still like a child
and I'm still in my childhood,

whereas then I wasn't.
I was working.

I think a girl in 1919 didn't really
get to have a lot of prospects,

cos they had hardly any career
options.

Pretty much this or being, like,
a housewife.

So, there weren't really any room
for, like,

promotion or to go up anywhere.

You're sort of just stuck.

And it's really hard cos I think so
many girls and women at that time
probably felt trapped.

Even with the whole family earning a
wage,

it was usually the men who felt the
burden of bringing home the bacon.

I felt throughout every year really
that, being the main breadwinner,

all the responsibility was on me.

And you never knew what was going to
happen the next day, really.

You've got to hand it... How do you
do this all day long?

It's really tough going but it does
get easier.

Once you've done about ten years.

As the decades moved on,

changes in the work available
saw the balance between men
and women shift.

While heavy industries like coal,

steel and manufacturing faltered in
the face of global competition...

..a growing public sector brought
new opportunities for women
like Lesley.

I feel like the '70s, it holds more
promise for women like me.

I think I would have been really
happy to have been a dinner lady.

And for teenage girls,

a typing course offered options
beyond the gates of the mill
or factory.

There must be an easier way to go
down the page without doing this.

For me, as a woman, I've seen
change.

I just thought I'd be doing the same
thing all the way through and
I haven't.

And you just see this build and
build of opportunities and more
things available to you.

The North isn't just an industrial
place,

there's a lot more to it than that.

Ooh!

But while opportunities for women
were opening up,

one of the biggest male employers in
the area was under threat.

The miners' strike is two weeks old
tonight,

and only 37 pits were open today.

In 1984 the longest strike in the
nation's history

saw 137,000 miners on the
picket line.

Industrial action by men like John
directly affected life at home.

You may have noticed your car, sofa,

freezer and washing machine
have disappeared.

No! Oh!

Why don't you just get a job
somewhere else?

It's not as easy as that, is it?

This stand has cost us a sofa!

Whilst the heavy industries rooted
in the North struggled,

the service sector boomed.

There you go, Freya.

The jobs the Ellises were doing
began to lose their regional
identity.

Come and get your spuds!

Best in the North! Come on!

Spuds! Spuds!

By the '90s,

men and women alike were making a
living in very different ways to
their grandparents.

Now, reflecting back,

I think the northerners have always
had to constantly adapt,

and I think that is the same today.

Get your spuds! Best in the North!
Come on!

But there are still some places
in the North where the region's

traditional industries
have weathered the storm.

I've sent John and Harvey to see how
Hainsworth's woollen mill near Leeds

has survived in an era of global
competition.

Hiya, it's John. Hi, Rob, nice to
meet you.

Thank you. And Harvey. Harvey,
hi, nice to meet you.

Do you want to come and I'll show
you the machines? OK.

Over 200 years old, the mill now
specialises in high-end textiles,

even making the material worn by the
guards at Buckingham Palace.

What's kept us going as much as
anything else is we're not the
biggest

bulk manufacturer and we don't want
to compete on the low-margin,

low-end stuff where you're churning
out tens of thousands of metres.

What we specialise in is much more
technical.

And whilst mills like Hainsworth's
may no longer dominate this region
as they once did...

..upstairs, there's a local business
taking their rich heritage one step
further.

Hello. Hi. Hiya. Rhian.

Nice to meet you.

John. Hello. Hi, Harvey. Hi.

Since 2013, Rhian Kempadoo Millar
has been redefining the traditional

Yorkshire flat cap, bringing it bang
up-to-date.

This is a design that you can plug
into your iPhone.

You look like Little Bo Peep, like a
cool Little Bo Peep.

What, jamming down the street
to your...

At the start of the 20th century,

hat making in the North was big
business.

Towns like Denton near Manchester
were producing over 100,000 hats a
week in the 1930s,

and no self-respecting northern man
would leave home without one.

But once manufacturers started to be
able to make them for less overseas,

northern hat making all but
disappeared.

Today, Rhian's modern designs are
tapping into this legacy,

to reach a new global audience.

I think they've got a bit of a bad
rap in Yorkshire,

so, people in Yorkshire don't wear
them cos they don't want to be

stereotyped, you know, flat cap
and whippet... Yeah. ..as much.

But you go to London or New York
or LA or, you know, China, Japan,

loads of people wear them.

They wear them more like a baseball
cap. I wore a lot of flat caps.

I used to wear a lot of my dad's
hats, and when I started checking
all the labels of, like,

my hats and my friends' hats,
everything was made in China.

But Yorkshire used to be the home of
flat cap making.

Yeah. And then a lot of them shut
down, sort of, ten, 20 years ago.

It mustn't be cost-effective to make
them in Yorkshire versus China,

so, how come we are still making...?

Cos, I think, again, like I am
saying about tradition and heritage
coming back round again,

I think it's the same with
provenance.

People want to know where things are
made, and the quickest way,

the easiest way for me to know how
something's made is to drive 15
minutes

to the manufacturer and go and have
a cup of tea...

Yeah. ..and see it being made,
you know?

And you can't do that if it's on the
other side of the world.

Is it quite helpful, you being based
here?

Yeah, it's been invaluable,
I would say.

Just being in a mill, you know, of
this calibre,

you get access to things like
their...

what you would call offcuts
or something, you know.

A piece like this which might
be a colour sample that they did
that they don't use.

But for me that's potentially
24 peaks underneath,

and so that's a whole range.

So, for them it's a product,

and they can say it's Hainsworth's
fabrics and it's quite contemporary.

So, I think it's been a great
partnership.

So, do we put a label on this saying
"Made in Yorkshire", then?

It does say "Made in Yorkshire".
Look. Does it? It says it there.

Brilliant. So, which one are you
choosing, Harvey?

I choose this one. The blue.

Yeah. Go for the blue.

Huddersfield Town. Yeah.

I'm going to go for this one,
I think.

The heritage of the North has left
a reputation that businesses like
Rhian's can exploit.

Very nice. Good, that, isn't it?

At the start of the experiment,

food as much as fashion was often
defined by where you lived.

What's that? Yorkshire pudding.

Looks like a pancake to me.

I feel that in the early eras there
was definitely more regionality to
our diets.

We're from Yorkshire, but we were
eating food we'd never heard of.

This is Whitby polony.

What's that? Never seen anything
like this before.

I don't like the look of it.

Pan haggerty for tea.

It's good to be home, and to have a
hot meal like this.

It's delicious.

That was really interesting -

picking out these regional dishes
that were alien to us.

I think the food and the way that
I've lived through all this
experience

has brought me closer to where my
roots are.

Doorstep sandwich, that's exactly we
want.

Oh, God, dripping.
Better than dripping.

Well, I'm going to break it in half,
then.

Aye, break it in half, right.

Seeing as you're gaffer, you can
have t'big bit.

You're a star.

By the later decades,

the Ellises saw convenience food
take over from the more regional
tea-time classics.

Right, OK.

So, since you're such an expert,
then, I'll leave you to do this bit.

I think the convenience food helped
Mum quite a lot,

because she had to do a lot less
work and it was a lot less hours in
the kitchen.

The convenience food revolution is
well and truly in swing.

I think she liked it because of
that, but she didn't like the food
itself.

In the '90s,

big national supermarkets were
selling the same quick and easy
tea-time meals.

That's the chips done.

I do think
as the eras went on

and I guess the whole country
was eating the generic foods

that came in the tins and
the packs and the freezer,

I felt a little bit sad about that.

We lost some of that regionality,
definitely.

But there was one regional dish the
Ellises were very glad to see the
back of.

Ta-da!

What is that?

That is... Fish pie?

Kind of. Without the fish.

But with tripe? Yeah.

Oh, the tripe!

This used to be a weekly dish?

Whoever decided to eat the lining of
a cow's stomach...

Is it that bad?

If Mum doesn't like it, you know
it's bad.

I'm going to have nightmares about
this tripe.

The smell was off-putting enough,
even without the taste.

I'm going to be sick.

You all right?

This is bad.

Tripe was awful.

The texture of it, the taste of it.

Who would want to eat that?

Some more? I'm still chewing!

Let's be realistic, there's no way
to make tripe taste good.

Like, at all.

For better or worse,

the Ellis family threw themselves
wholeheartedly into 100 years of

northern working-class food.

So, to help create a final
celebratory meal for them,

I've come to Hebden Bridge to meet
Chef Rob Owen Brown.

Originally from Manchester,

Rob's built his reputation on
reinventing regional northern
classics for the 21st century.

First thing on the menu today - yup,
you guessed it...

Don't know if I should shake
your hand...

No, don't, I'm all tripey.
That is tripe, then?

That is tripe. That's honeycomb
tripe, that, Sara.

Do you use a lot of tripe in your
cooking normally, at your
restaurant?

Yeah, I think we... You know, it's
one of those northern classics,
isn't it?

And it's about bringing it back
and showing people different ways of
eating it.

Rob, the family tried tripe in 1919
and they hated it.

We're not going to tell them it's
tripe, are we?

No, we're going to call it Yorkshire
coral.

Oh, OK. So, yeah, it does look
corally, doesn't it?

I've done a little menu. So...

Yeah. I love the menu.

OK, so we've got...
So, Yorkshire coral...

Yeah. Is there much flowing oceans
and coral and...?

No, but there's a stream out there -
we could pretend.

That'll do. Classic mutton
with capers.

Mm. And a not-so-classic Vimto
trifle.

Tripe, as the Ellises discovered,

used to be a cheap everyday
ingredient for working families
across the North.

Nowadays, the rising price of meat
means affordable ingredients
like this are ripe for revival.

Today, Rob's deep-frying the tripe
in breadcrumbs,

to see if we can smuggle it past
the Ellis family.

Shall I make you taste this?

Yeah, I want a bit. Do you?

Yeah, I want to have a go at this.

I think it's psychological,
isn't it, with offal and things?

It's all part of the animal, isn't
it? It's all meat. Yeah.

You know? I think it's down to
tastes, I think it's down to
textures.

I think if we were talking to your
grandparents they wouldn't have
a problem eating it.

It's only because people became
a little bit more affluent...

Yeah. You know, and started being
able to have a chicken every single
day... Yeah.

..that they sort of
turned their back on those things.

That actually looks gorgeous.

You're right, aren't you?
Deep fry something...

If you put some breadcrumbs on
something, you know,

it's not the most chef-y thing in
the world,

and it's not the most amazingly
technical things in the world...

Now, you didn't cook that for long,
did you?

What's that? About a minute?

Little bit of pepper.

I don't feel as gung ho as I did
30 seconds ago.

Has your bottle gone?
No, I'm going to have a go.

Ooh...

Oh, it's gorgeous. It's good, that.

Second course is another of the
restaurant's specialities,

using a meat the family sampled in
the early part of their time
travelling.

Right, Rob, so... Mutton, next.
Mutton.

All we're going to do is we're going
to take the meat off the bone and

we're going to dice it into decent
sized chunks - none of those mean,

little, horrible chunks, you know?
We're making something quite robust.

OK, so you're going to make it into
a stew?

It's a posh stew.

That's what we're doing.

While the mutton cooks,

we're moving on to a pud whose magic
ingredient is from Rob's hometown of
Manchester.

Oh... Yeah, it's great, isn't it?

Oh, it smells amazing.

Yeah. A little trip down memory lane
for you.

I think sense of smell is the most
evocative sense, isn't it?

For just bringing back memories,
just that rush of memories,

whether it's a bit of perfume or
your favourite dish?

Although it does look like it's
a fine wine!

Yeah. Oh, it doesn't swirl
very well.

I'm getting essence of Manchester...

Might be a bit of canal. A faint
whiff of Salford docks?

I'm sitting by a gas fire, wrapped
in a blanket...

Yeah? Yeah.

My socks are soggy... It's Vimto.

It's delicious.

Custard. Do I have to, like, do it
really neat?

I'd prefer it if you did it really
neat, but it's entirely up to you.

Or you could just pour it in.

It's all right, don't worry -
we'll clean it up.

That's about right, isn't it?

Yeah, they're level-ish.

I'm just saying that one's mine,
though.

An hour with a fire...
Glass of wine...

I'm joining Polly and the family to
celebrate the end of their century
of northern tea-times.

Before we have some lovely food,
I mean,

memories of your favourite food
over the decades...

My favourite food were the Scotch
beans.

They were good. Oh!

Mine was the tripe. Oh, sorry, no!

LAUGHTER

Oh, starters are here.
Right, this is delicious.

This is Yorkshire coral.

And it is fried in breadcrumbs.

It smells delicious, doesn't it?

It does, actually.

Is it tripe? It is tripe.

Is it actually? Look.

Is it? It's really tender, isn't it?

It's really tender.

If it's tripe, it tastes different.

So, Yorkshire coral, it's sometimes
called Yorkshire calamari,
which is...

tripe. What do you think, Leslie?

I think it's all right. I think,
now I know that it's tripe,

that tripe taste is really...

Do you know, before you said it I
thought it was like some calamari or

something, or, like,
chicken goujons.

It's much more appealing this way,

and you're more likely to eat it
than...

Well, much more likely to eat it
than when we had it.

If this had have been your very
first experience of tripe,

do you think you'd have really liked
it?

I really believe that I would
have liked it.

What I find amazing is tastes have
changed so much that we just think
of offal as something

that we don't eat, but actually
we've been eating it for
generations, it was a big part of

the diet - it was so important to
sustaining people.

But I wonder, like, can our tastes
be, sort of,

re-educated about eating this?

Looking at you, I'm not feeling
confident.

LAUGHTER

Next up is the mutton stew.

Oh, here you go.

Far removed in time and texture from
the mutton chops the Ellises
sampled in the '60s.

How do you cut this?

I'm going to break this plate.

It's like eating octopus.

Oh, look, it just falls apart as you
start to cut it.

This is nice. Very nice.
That is delicious.

Just falls apart, doesn't it?

That is absolutely delicious.

It's so nice to be eating
something that generations
have been eating.

Has this whole experience made you
think differently about how the

food we eat connects to the lives
that we live?

Does it make you think about the
people who've eaten this sort of
food?

I loved that. Somebody could have
been sat here,

eating this same food 100 years ago,
from food that came not far away.

Yeah. Probably, like,

the ancestor of that sheep was up on
that hill 100 years ago...

The great, great, great, great,
great grandfather.

Yeah. No, the grandmaaaaa! Sorry.

Finally, adding some vim to the
occasion, Rob's pud,

using a traditional ingredient the
Ellises are all too familiar with.

It wouldn't be my pop of choice.

You like it then, Freya?
Five sips later.

Yeah.

There's nothing like a good trifle.

Oh, it's gorgeous.
Well, a Vimto trifle.

Today's meal is a fitting
celebration,

not only of the Ellises' monumental
journey, but also of the North's
unique heritage.

Has it made you feel proud
about being northern, Freya?

I think it has, because before I
didn't really take it into
consideration that I was northern.

I think, when you're northern and
you're in the North it's hard to be
that aware that you're northern.

As soon as you leave the North...

you're fully northern.

I've definitely felt like a
foreigner for this whole experiment.

It's been very... Oh, Polly!

Have we not made you feel welcome?

Very welcome, but I'm not from the
North. Honorary northerner!

I'm not from the North.

We've adopted you now.
Yeah, we've adopted you now.

You're now a northerner. So, now
this whole experience is coming
to an end,

and me and Polly are going to leave
you in peace,

what have you enjoyed the most,
do you think?

I think one of the things that I've
really liked about it all is the

industry that we've been involved
in - in the mines...

It jerks a bit. Just beware.
It jerks a bit at the start.

Making me feel nervous now!

Yeah, that's it. In the mills...

It's pretty tough. It's hot.

And it was obviously prominent in
the North,

so, the history side of it has been
really interesting,

all the way through.
It's a story we don't often hear.

I think that's the thing - we do,
we hear about history,

we read about history and we watch
history on TV,

but we don't often hear OUR history,
our northern heritage,

and that's been really interesting.

I think we should raise a toast to
the Ellis family, shouldn't we,
Polly?

Yeah. For being such amazing sports
and throwing yourself into this

experience. And so I think we should
do a toast to...

What shall we toast to, to the last
100 years, to the last century?

Yeah. OK, then. Cheers. Cheers.
Cheers. To the last century.

Well done.

Cheers.

Cheers. Clink, clink.

Cheers.

Doing this experiment,

looking at it now I feel like I take
a lot of stuff for granted.

In modern day, it's changed the way
I have looked upon food that I love.

I definitely think the food we've
eaten reflects how far we've come.

It makes me feel warm and happy
inside.

It's like eating a rainbow full of
sparkles.

You don't realise how much it's
changed until it's all there

in front of you and you're actively
thinking about it.

It's been kind of empowering.

You're given that push to step out
of your comfort zone and be in your
ancestors' shoes.

KLAXON
Oh, my God!

I'm definitely optimistic for the
future of the North.

It's gone through change and it's
still going through change

and it will for many years to come,
I suppose.

And I just hope, going forward, that
it continues to develop and thrive,

because I'd like to see that for my
children.

What I do know is that people of the
North have always been adaptable.

They've always managed to overcome
difficulties and come out on top,

and that's what I hope will
continue.

It's really easy to think that the
changes that have happened to the
North

over the past century are now just
part of history and not related at
all to our modern day lives.

But what the Ellises' journey has
shown us is that our roots and our
past

leave a big imprint on us now, on
the food we eat, on the work we do,

even on our leisure time.

And what's really exciting is that
the North is still reinventing
itself today.