At the Spanish Embassy in London, the chef José Pizarro looked visibly emotional as he was awarded one of Spain’s highest honours, the Royal Order of Isabel la Catolica. It was a frenetic Wednesday in March: cava flowed and jamón ibérico was plucked from trays, and fellow chefs and restaurateurs, friends and dignitaries heard about how, over the last 25 years, Pizarro changed the game.
When Pizarro first came to London, in 1998, the culinary landscape was tangibly different. “When I arrived, maybe you could buy chorizo in specialist shops,” he remembers. “But it wasn’t really known. Nowadays, it’s always on the menu. It’s everywhere.”
