JAMIE OLIVER is once again courting controversy in his quest to educate the nation about cooking. The dogged food fanatic tells HANNAH STEPHENSON about happy family life, how he feels about his recent headline-making comments and Jools' desire for more children.

NO sooner does Jamie Oliver's latest cookbook hit the shops, than the Naked Chef goes and says something which whips up a frenzy.

"Yeah, controversy," he says, laughing. "There's always a bit of that following me."

Despite the furore surrounding his recent comments on low-income families eating junk food and spending their money on huge TVs, and immigrants working harder in his kitchens than young Britons, the country's most famous chef arrives at his airy North London offices looking tanned and relaxed, having just returned from a family holiday in Cornwall.

"We had sun, the beach, surfing, great Cornish food, the kids seemed really happy. I feel really close to my young ones. My two eldest are turning into ladies which is baffling me and taking me on some different journeys.”

Oliver, 38, and wife Jools, a designer and former model with whom he has four children - Poppy, 11, Daisy Boo, 10, Petal, four, and two-year-old Buddy - have been together 20 years. So what's the secret of their marriage?

"When you're in the public eye, you annoy people if you just say, 'I'm really happy and in love', because everyone wants to go and throw up in a bucket. What I've tried to do over the years is balance it by saying, 'We're just normal, we still argue like normal couples', and this, that and the other.

"Actually, what I never get the chance to say is, I absolutely love and adore her. She can be a pain in the backside but she's pretty amazing and a good person."

He says he doesn't want more children, but Jools definitely does. "You think I'm the boss at home?" he asks incredulously. "I feel like I could be taken advantage of! I'd rather not have more children, because I think we've got enough and transporting them down to Cornwall was hard enough - with one more, we genuinely will have to get a proper, fully fledged minibus."

He doesn't have time to watch many food shows these days, but is hooked on The Great British Bake Off. "I love Mary [Berry] and Paul [Hollywood]. My whole family watches it. That's the sweet spot that they've hit."

He returned from holiday to a storm over his remarks about modern-day poverty and 'wet' work-shy British youths, and says he regrets the comments.

"I guess I should have known better because, more than most people, I pride myself on being involved, getting my hands dirty and seeing both sides of the coin," he says.

"The reaction is really divided. For the people who think I'm being patronising, rude or offensive, of course I apologise. At the same time, I probably said it because of my continued passion that the knowledge of how to cook is without question the biggest luxury now.

"It's about priorities. And priorities of any class - how you feed yourself and your children - is a massive subject right now."

His latest cookbook, Save With Jamie, he explains, is in response to the growing frustration of people who feel their supermarket bills have soared, and who want to make their food go further.

For the book, he wanted to devise dishes that were either a third or half the price of a takeaway. The result is meals that cost an average £1.32 a portion.

If people can't afford the cover price of £26, he and his publisher, in partnership with The Reading Agency, have donated a copy of his new cookbook to every library in the UK.

Over the years he's had his fingers in a lot of pies - campaigning to improve school dinners, placing disadvantaged young people in his string of Fifteen restaurants, preparing lunch for then Prime Minister Tony Blair, founding the Jamie Oliver Food Foundation charity and creating Jamie's Ministry of Food, a network of centres which aim to teach people about food and nutrition.

And of course, there have been countless TV shows - including his latest, Jamie's Money Saving Meals - all with the aim to reconnect us with food and teach us how to cook tasty, nutritious meals.

The Essex-born chef, who began honing his cooking skills in his parents' pub as a boy, may now be worth an estimated £150 million, but his endless energy surely comes from a genuine passion and serious work ethic.

So how can British youths learn a better work ethic?

"To be honest, I think mums and dads have got to kick them. As a regular parent, I'm really worried about having even my own kids wrapped in cotton wool."

Oliver says balancing his workload with family life is difficult. He spends more time at home these days - but maintaining his success and being the perfect family man was never going to be easy.

"I have very specific time off for holidays and very specific days off. I try and stick to it 98%.

"I largely work with ladies and a proportion of them have kids. Having a tight, great team, we all want to get that balance between working hard, being creative, and having time for yourself and your family.”