Mary McCartney debunks claim mum Linda forced Paul to be vegetarian

Mary McCartney has shared her fondest memories of mother Linda with her father, Paul McCartney, in a new interview.

Speaking to The Times, Mary and Paul reflected on family Christmases and how Linda helped raise awareness of vegetarianism.

Mary argued that many of Paul’s fans disliked Linda because she “didn’t fit the mould of the woman they wanted” him to marry.

“Being a vegetarian family in the late 1970s marked you out as different,” she said. “Everybody said it was all Mum’s idea and she’d forced Dad to stop eating meat, but they did it as a team. I remember them discussing recipes and Dad saying he still wanted something he could slice for his Sunday roast. Mum was always excited about cooking and she inspired me.

“Dad’s pretty good in the kitchen — he’d make a great sous-chef,” she added. “If you ask him to sort out the mashed potato, it’ll be the best you’ve ever tasted. He’s meticulous, just like he is in the studio.”

Mary recalled people making fun of Linda for “a lot of things, saying she wasn’t a real musician, she wore odd socks and charity-shop jumpers”.

“The real problem was that she didn’t fit the mould of the woman they wanted Paul McCartney to marry,” she said. “They wanted someone who went to all the chichi parties, but Mum was more interested in feeding the animals on the farm.”

Paul and Linda recorded their album Ram together, following the 1970 breakup of The Beatles. They formed Wings in 1971, and continued to tour together after Wings split in 1981, up until 1993.

A devoted animal rights activist, Linda founded the vegetarian Linda McCartney Foods company with Paul and published several vegetarian cookbooks. She died from breast cancer in 1998, aged 56.