The UK's swarthiest chef on getting fit at 50, spontaneous cooking and life at his award-winning cooking school.
‘The most important meal for me is when I feed my family,’ says Jean Christophe Novelli, confidently. ‘It’s the first thing I do every morning. We eat organic porridge with low fat milk, a bit of honey and banana -very healthy.’
The chef, once voted sexiest in the world by the New York Times, and who at one time held four Michelin stars, is currently on a health kick. He recently completed the London Triathlon with fiancée Michelle and is training for an Iron Man event.
The couple live together in Hertfordshire with their two year-old son Jean Frankie, and unsurprisingly, food plays an important part in family life.
‘The kitchen is the place I want to be,’ says Novelli. ‘For me it’s not cooking, it’s completing my role as a partner and a father. It’s a special touch - you can’t replace an exciting plate of fabulous food with words.’
Food beginnings
Born in the industrial town of Arras, in the north of France, it was Novelli’s mother who taught him the basics of cooking. ‘My mum ruled the kitchen,’ he says, ‘no one even dared to open a drawer.’
Novelli took naturally to cooking. ‘I automatically loved it,’ he says. And when he was 14, Novelli started out in the business as an apprentice to a local baker. He moved quickly to a local brasserie where he was put in charge of omelettes.
At 19, after national service and a stint working in a hotel in Corsica and as a commis in Paris, he became personal chef to aristocrat Elie de Rothschild. It was Rothschild who sent him across the channel to learn English.
Coming to Britain
In England, he landed on his feet. He earned some good publicity at his first job in Southampton and was snapped up to work as head chef at Keith Floyd’s pub, the Maltsters Arms, in Devon.
Novelli says that only once in the UK, was he able to properly express himself with his food, rather than sticking to rigid French classics.
Today he likes to cook spontaneously. ‘I don’t keep recipe books, because everything changes every day,’ he says. ‘Cooking is more than recipe books. I’m so spontaneous. Everything I do is very much improvising. There are no limits.’
Award-winning chef
Novelli won his first Michelin star at Marco Pierre White’s Provence in Lymington. In 1993 he added another as head chef at London’s Four Season’s hotel. Over the next five years, he built up a seven-restaurant empire in London, France and South Africa and pocketed another two Michelin stars. But such rapid expansion led to financial difficulties and in 1999 Novelli went bankrupt.
Since then he has worked as the directeur de cuisines at Brocket Hall’s Auberge du Lac and appeared on a huge range of television programmes. But his true love is his cooking school which he opened in 2005 at his expansive farmhouse home.
Currently it is spices which are inspiring his classes and his own cooking. ‘I’m so excited about discovering new spice combinations. And I love fresh herbs. I use more fresh herbs than anybody else.’
Teaching his art
Life at the cooking school is less hectic than the heated kitchens of the capital. Novelli says he has a huge kitchen garden, which makes for a fridge packed with fruit and veg, and lots of fizzy water. ‘We’ve got a massive fridge, it’s probably the size of a wardrobe,’ he says.
Cooking too has become simpler. ‘I’m trying to cook the food less and less, let it speak for itself,’ he says. As a dinner party host he wants to enjoy his company. ‘The dishes I cook have to be something where I can spend time with my guests,’ he says. ‘A dish not too impressive, but still something that can be a subject of conversation.’
Although he lives in an award winning cooking academy, filled with the latest equipment, Novelli says he likes to stick to basic tools in the kitchen. ‘I’m not Mr Gadget, but I do have the most excellent knives,’ he says. ‘They are Ziganof, and are made with the same technique used to make Samurai blades. They never have to be sharpened.’
Looking to the future
For now, alongside his sporting feats, Novelli is concentrating on the academy. He will also be appearing at food festivals across the UK and working on a new cookbook.
Above all he is settling down, and as he tries to simplify his cooking, he advises all amateur cooks that they should try it too. ‘Don’t try to cook to impress, cook to express,’ he says. ‘You can see clearly if someone is trying to show off.’
The key to creating good dishes, in his opinion, is experimenting. ‘Make mistakes, the more mistakes you make the better you get at cooking. The first time I did a soufflé it was a joke, but now I’m the king of soufflé, it’s true. It’s a good experience to fail and come back. Keep trying and you’ll end up with something brilliant.’
Jean Christophe Novelli is leading a Cancer Research UK campaign, encouraging the public to have a sort out at home and donate good quality home ware to their local Cancer Research UK shop. Visit www.cancerresearchuk.org/shopping for details.
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Jean Christophe Novelli’s salsa verde potatoes