Gary Barlow opens up about wife Dawn’s health battle that forced family to change diet

Gary Barlow has revealed how his wife Dawn Andrews’ health diagnosis prompted his whole family to changing their diet.

Gary and Dawn met in the 1990s when she was a dancer working with Take That. The pair wed in 2000 and share children Daniel, 24, Emily, 22 and Daisy, 15 together.

But, 12 years ago, Dawn discovered she was diabetic, leading Gary to wonder how they could “get flavour” into their cooking.

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It also meant he had to scale back his love of Italian cuisine, because of the carbohydrates in pasta negatively impacting Dawn's condition. It instead meant Gary and the family discovered a love of spices.

Speaking on the Table Manners podcast with Jessie and Lennie Ware, Gary explained: “When Dawn first got diabetes it took me ages, I was talking to so many people and we have a lot more information now than we did then 12 years ago, but I was like, ‘how the hell do I get flavour into food?'

“And I slowly realised, and you’re going to laugh at this, but it took me ages - spices - that’s how we get flavour out of food.”

Gary said it led the family to discover a newfound love of the dahl - a type of curry made with split legumes and coconut milk. The singer says he likes to serve the curry with a side of naan bread and often puts chicken in the dish as well.

And, while he could still enjoy a pasta dish with Dawn, Gary remains unimpressed with the gluten-free versions his wife eats.

He continued: “She doesn’t eat pasta unless it’s gluten free but half of them, now, we’ve found that most of the gluten free stuff is worse for you than the stuff with gluten in. I’ve often found taking out the sugar means, ‘we’ve put a load of c*** in’.”

People with diabetes often try to avoid pasta as it can cause a blood glucose spike, reports Diabetes UK. It says freshly cooked pasta causes the largest glucose spike.

Gary also reflected on his early days dating Dawn while speaking to Jessie and Lennie. He said: “We were in Manchester, and we'd been to a club, and we're all piled in this van on the way home.

“We were in the very back of this van, and we were sitting right next to each other, had my arm around her and I just thought, this is it kids, I'm going in."