You must – must! – stay inquisitive. It is probably the most important thing: stay inquisitive, like people, and keep knowledge flowing through your ears and your eyes. Listen, read and taste. Keep all that going and And don’t become old, fight ageing.
I was brought up in a farmhouse in the Irish countryside where there were rabbits, pheasants, butter-making, it was all going on. There was always a wild salmon coming and going into our house. But nobody intellectualised food: it was just food for the table. The smell of bread is the overriding memory: that’s why we make bread for all our restaurants. There’s something about the smell of freshly baked bread in a kitchen: it’s magic.
