Cooking soul food never gets old for Miss Robbie and her son Tim Norman, nor does the drama of owning a restaurant.
The fourth season of the reality series premiered on the Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN) Saturday night, and revealed that this time, it’s all about setting a game plan, mending broken relationships, and keeping those mother-son tiffs in check.
Fresh off filming, the duo came to Los Angeles last week to do press for the new chapter, and of course, made sure Miss Robbie got her fill of meats while in town.
“I was driving us around L.A. in this Escalade getting lost,” Norman tells theGrio about the previous night. “Our friend offered to take over, and I dozed off.”
“I woke up, and I’m not gonna say we were in the hood, but I don’t know if this was one of the best neighborhoods,” he recalls. “It’s turning dark, and I see people and their shopping carts and guys with squeegees trying to clean the windows, like where the hell are we at?”
Turing to Miss Robbie, he rolls his eyes, “She’s out there standing in line at a cart trying to get a pastrami sandwich.”
“I was right at home,” Miss Robbie replies. “No problem. Wasn’t scared. Nothing.”
Cheers meets The Cosby Show
While the feisty head of household spent decades in the City of Angels as a backup singer for Ike and Tina Turner, Miss Robbie now calls St. Louis, Missouri home.
It’s a place where she and Norman have spent the last 15 years building their restaurant Sweetie Pie’s from the ground.
Established in 1998, Sweetie Pie’s opened as a home-cooked, home grown soul food bistro with a cafeteria-style setting. It has since expanded to three branches around the city, and became a backdrop for the OWN docuseries in 2011.
According to Miss Robbie, going Hollywood was all her son’s idea, and Norman takes credit.
“It’s a combination of Cheers and The Cosby Show because of the atmosphere we have; the customers that come in every day just to sit and hang out, interact with waiters, and watch me and Ma argue,” Norman explains.
After three seasons on air, the two say business for their restaurant has tripled, and meanwhile, everybody trying to get on TV has either stopped by to eat or apply for a job.
In order to get hired at Sweetie Pie’s, nevertheless, you must know how to work the stove. Even a degree doesn’t help.
“Soul food is cooked to taste,” Miss Robbie points out. “You can’t just open up a bag of green beans and put them out there…I find that, with people who have been to culinary school, it’s a different ball game. They have been taught to do a whole other kind of preparation.”
A door sadly closes
Though the venture has proven fruitful, mother and son face the decision of whether or not to close their first chain when season four of the show begins.
A sentimental landmark, the prototype restaurant shows signs of age and dilapidation, and has become too much for Miss Robbie – whom Norman dubs a “control freak” – to maintain.
“She wants to be able to have her hands on everything,” he observes. “It’s hard for us to be at all the different places at one time. We’re not a chain. We don’t know the process that most chains use. We’re not trying to operate like that.”
Even with the cameras rolling, the two feel little has changed since they became reality TV stars, though Norman says he’s become self-conscious about his attire.
Miss Robbie claims the show hides very little about the way they do business, but admits to screening her words on occasion.
But only on occasion.
“Now you can’t sweep the dirt under the table because the camera’s looking,” she jokes. “You got to clean it up for real.”
No more baby mama drama
Norman’s relationship with his fiancé Jenae, the mother of his child, takes a rocky turn with the new installment.
In the earlier season, the two were engaged, but along with the bond came further complications.
“We’ve gone through some drastic changes in our lives in the past two years,” Norman remarks. “Whereas if you go back and watch episode one of Sweetie Pie’s everything was all love and birds and bees and roses. Through the business, there are a lot of factors that came in that altered our relationship. I am not opposed to marriage. It’s an individual preference…I’m not going to say it’s not happening, but right now I don’t know.”
Immediately, Miss Robbie chimes in.
“I’m for marriage, and I’m for Jenae because she had that little baby, and they went through a lot, “ she comments. “That deserves something. Now if you don’t love her, I don’t say marry her. But being the mother of your child is due some respect.”
She adds, “I’m always in his business. He tells me to stay out when I’m his mother, and I’m telling him right.”
Iyanla fix their life?
Part of the intrigue with Welcome to Sweetie Pie’s centers around the volatile dynamic between Norman and Miss Robbie, and their bickering escalates this season.
In fact, reports came out in December that there was so much drama on the set between not just the family, but the production crew that the show was at risk of cancellation.
Life coach Iyanla Vanzant was brought in as an intervention.
“I have to accept him as my son,” Miss Robbie comments. “I don’t like his ways of doing things, but I have to accept them…If I had my way, I’d fire him.”
At present (or at least on this particular day), the two appear relaxed and affable. Thus, the quarrelling plays on, albeit with a sense of humor.
“Expect the same rollercoaster ups and downs in the business, and ups and downs in the families,” says Norman. “We could go on forever and ever.”
Sympathizing with Paula Deen
Despite their constant wrangling, both Norman and Miss Robbie share similar opinions on the Paula Deen scandal, and express sympathy for their fellow Southern chef.
They describe the events as unfortunate.
“She’s worked so hard to build her empire,” Norman says. “I personally don’t think it’s fair. Her legacy is what’s happening right now, and unless something drastic comes that changes the way people feel, she’s going to be remembered for that.”
Furthermore, Miss Robbie points out that Deen’s slanderous words occurred in the past.
“I sympathize with her,” she remarks. “We’ve all done something we regret. I have a lot of guys I wish I could not have slept with, but you can’t take it back.”
Though they find fault in Deen’s public assassination, they understand how a lack of conscientiousness led to her fall from grace.
“You really have to be careful of what you do or say because people are waiting to throw stones,” Norman observes.
‘Welcome to Sweetie Pie’s’ becomes a brand
Like Deen, Miss Robbie and Norman have managed to utilize their natural abilities and cultural spices to create a developing brand.
In its successful run to date, Welcome to Sweetie Pie’s has not only enhanced the family business, it has fostered high-ratings for OWN and earned an NAACP Award for “Outstanding Reality Series” in 2013.
Moreover, the restaurant announced in July it would be releasing its first cookbook through publisher HarperCollins, which as Miss Robbie describes it, will contain recipes for Southern “down home meals” from her Mississippi family archives.
What’s left to do now is just keep on cooking, deal with the personal day-to-day, and more importantly, speak their mind on all the above.
Like how Norman would prefer to outlaw the term “baby mama” because it rubs him the wrong way.
“It’s one of those words I think should be stricken from the Ebonics dictionary,” he explains.
And how Miss Robbie thinks it’s funny.
“[Jenae] is your baby mama!” She laughs. “And when I talk to her, I say it’s your baby daddy!”
Alas, the search for middle ground resumes.
Welcome to Sweetie Pie’s airs Saturdays at 10 p.m. ET/PT on OWN.
Follow Courtney Garcia on Twitter at @CourtGarcia