I've always liked my Thai and Chinese, but if I had to choose a favourite food it would be Chinese. I first came to Lotus under a year ago. It's not in Chinatown, so it's off the beaten track in that way, but it's still in central Manchester, so it's an easy meeting place. Saturday afternoons I'm often here. I came in a little while ago when I took my girlfriend Jo's son to see Christina Aguilera. The manager is always good and looks after you; throws in a few sneaky bottles of champagne, which is always nice.

The good thing here is it's not too greasy, but I do like the occasional treat and that's where Lotus comes in. They do the best spare ribs ever. They do something called pork chops in a bag as well that are incredible, but their spare ribs are my guilty pleasure. Being in the music industry, we've been taken to lots of posh gaffes but, to be honest, I always find myself walking out and looking for fried-chicken gaffes or Chinese. I like places that are down-to-earth, that's where I feel most comfortable.

I've always had beansprouts in noodles, but it's only over the past five years I've eaten veg. A few years ago, though, I did get into making smoothies to get my fruit. I was putting in every fruit you could think of because it was healthy, but doing it with a large bottle of vodka.

When I grew up I thought prawns came out of a tin. At 16, I took my girlfriend out to a restaurant and ordered the prawns. The only prawns I'd ever had were the ones in the pink sauce; and these prawns arrived with a bowl of water. I didn't know what that was for, so I just ate the prawns with the shells on. The waiter was looking at me like I was an alien, and I'm thinking, 'These are fucking minging'. The girl didn't say 'owt because she was as backward as I was. We had no idea.

I grew up on stews, hashes, pie and chips, egg and bacon. It was my mam that did the cooking. She's a good cook, but again a Salford woman. She's a steak-and-veg woman; traditional fare. My old bloke travelled the world with us, and he'd get to Japan and he just wouldn't eat. I mean - at all. We'd get to places, and say, 'Go on', but because it was done different he wouldn't have it.

For years all I ever did was eat out, but over the past 18 months, since I've been going out with Jo, that's changed. She's a great cook, and she does all sorts of stuff I like - vegetable soup, potato hash, stew, shepherd's pie, curries and a nice full English on a Sunday. I've lost four-and-a-half stone in a year. I'd got up to 15 stone and was a 38in waist. I'm down to 11 now and back to a 32in waist.

I was skinny as a rake for a long time when the band, the Happy Mondays, started in 1985. I was plump at 13 - from my mum's Salford stews, hashes, pies, chips, egg and bacon - but, by 17, I was a full-time junkie; it was all heroin and speed and coke. You can eat on heroin but you can't eat on coke and speed. Methadone tastes really horrible, so it's full of sugar to hide the taste. When you're taking 330ml a day like I was, that's a lot of calories, it just bloats you. I gave up because I got bored of getting shit-faced. For years and years all I ever did was eat out on pies and kebabs.

I used to drink 20 pints of Guinness a day. I mean when you're using you just can; I never used to get drunk. I come from a family of huge drinkers. I've sacked the Guinness, although it has come back in a bit now, but it's nowhere near the 20 pints a day. The recycling bin used to be two big boxes of Guinness a day; now it's full of plastic Powerade bottles.

I do believe you are what you eat. I was a pie for a long time. I haven't really got a sweet tooth. It was excessive drug use and the lack of going to a dentist. Our school dentist when I was a kid was a butcher and I left school at 15, so that was it, my dentist days were over because I was frightened to death. So the only time I'd go is when my teeth got too bad. I'd go in, give him £50 and say, 'Take my tooth out'. In the end I had to get them done and it took 13 hours in two sessions. I got out the chair and the dentist was amazed, but I couldn't really tell him that, when you do 330ml of methadone a day you don't really feel fuck all.

I know plenty of musicians who cook. Bernard Sumner [of Joy Division] likes cooking and so does Mani [from the Stone Roses]. Believe it or not, Bez [also in the Happy Mondays] has got every Jamie Oliver cookbook. Jamie's type of cooking is my favourite. Bez is more adventurous than I am, I haven't got the coordination to get everything ready at the same time. But I am an absolute fucking wizard at microwave omelettes. I got asked to go on Gordon Ramsay's show to cook a meal for him, but I can't cope with TV now. I really struggle with nerves.

We used to take our own catering on tour with us, but I used to just make sure the caterers got shitloads of Holland's Pies, chips and curry. You get bands that put special requests on their rider, special food, but for us it was just panloads of weeds, coke and skag. This will be the first time out that I don't.

· Lotus, 35a King Street, Manchester, 0161 832 9742; www.lotusbyyangsing.com