What was your first job?
Pâtissière in Paris, aged 14
What do you do to relax?
I smoke a cigar - but I don't get to relax very often
Which is your favourite restaurant?
Any Bib Gourmand
What's your favourite hotel?
Michel Guérard's Le Couvent des Herbes
What is your favourite drink?
Champagne
Which ingredient do you hate the most?
Coriander to chew
Are there any foods/ingredients that you refuse to cook with?
Dog - I respect that in certain countries this is part of the culture, but I would never cook with it
What flavour combinations do you detest?
Too much fruit in savoury dishes
Who in catering have you most admired?
Willy Bauer and Michel Guérard
Which person gave you the greatest inspiration?
Alain Chapel
Cast away on a desert island, what luxury would you take?
Château d'Yquem
If not yourself, who would you rather have been?
Winston Churchill or Charles de Gaulle
Describe your ultimate nightmare
Cooking a great dish and someone changing the setting on the piece of equipment and ruining it
If you hadn't gone into catering, where do you think you'd be now?
I'd be a winemaker
Tell us a secret...
I love Magnum ice-cream and whenever I'm at a petrol station and no one is around who knows me I buy one. And I never share it.
What irritates you most about the industry?
The celebrity status of some chefs who are labelled celebrities without ever having even been a chef
What's your favourite film?
Chariots of Fire
What's your favourite book?
Marie-Antoine Carême - I have the whole series
What is your favourite prepared food product?
Pret A Manger sandwiches
Who would be in your fantasy brigade?
Nico Ladenis, Richard Shepherd, Sat Bains, Andrew Fairlie and Alain Roux
Michel Roux, chef-restaurateur