Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall is a multi-award-winning British chef, writer, broadcaster and campaigner, best known as the creator of River Cottage. He joins the Go To Food podcast fresh from the release of his new book, High Fibre Heroes, before settling into a gloriously wide-ranging conversation full of stories from a life spent cooking, eating, questioning and occasionally causing national outrage.

Hugh looks back on childhood in Gloucestershire, learning to cook alongside his mother, helping make shepherd’s pie from leftover roast lamb, and later becoming the “pastry chef” for her 1970s dinner parties. He shares tales from Oxford dinner parties, smoked haddock obsessions, and his time at the River Cafe, where he made lemon tart for Rose Gray and secretly doubled the chocolate in Elizabeth David’s chocolate cake — only to be politely rumbled by Elizabeth David herself.

The conversation also revisits Hugh’s early television years, from Cook on the Wild Side to TV Dinners, including the infamous placenta pâté episode that earned an Ofcom complaint and became part of British food TV folklore. He reflects on the beginnings of River Cottage, moving from London to Dorset, learning from farmers, foragers and local characters, and building a world that helped change the way Britain thought about food, farming and self-sufficiency.

Along the way, there are stories of roadkill rumours, wild boar charcuterie, Gordon Ramsay’s pigs, Jamie Oliver, school food, restaurant culture, barbecue hogget, decorative garnishes, and why you should never put an oyster shell on mashed potato. Funny, thoughtful and occasionally surreal, this is Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall at his storytelling best.

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Honey & Co founders Sarit Packer and Itamar Srulovich join us for a brilliant, chaotic and deeply honest conversation about food, marriage, restaurants, reinvention and the realities of building one of London’s best-loved hospitality groups.

From opening the original Honey & Co in 2012 without proper recipes, to turning family cooking, Middle Eastern flavours and sheer instinct into a restaurant empire spanning delis, restaurants, cookbooks, classes and podcasts, they tell the story of how it all began — and how it nearly broke them.

We get into the rebirth of Honey & Smoke, the closure of the deli, floods, wine, tablecloths, growing older with your customers, why London restaurants are having to change, and how they’ve built a business around care, quality and the refusal to cut corners.

Plus: childhood food memories in Israel, Ottolenghi, brutal old-school kitchens, the second-site nightmare, Greece, burrata backlash, banana hatred, vomit stories, legendary cheesecake and why hospitality needs to start respecting itself a lot more.

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Max Halley joins The Go To from Max’s Sandwich Shop in Finsbury Park — a place he describes as “a surprisingly serious restaurant masquerading as a silly sandwich shop.” From the ham, egg and chips sandwich Tesco tried to copy, to focaccia engineered for mayonnaise, juice and structural integrity, Max explains the thinking behind one of Britain’s most joyful food institutions.

In this episode, Max talks about his new book Cooking with Sausages, built on the revelation that sausages are really just pre-seasoned mince waiting to be liberated. He serves up a Morteau sausage, explains why he boils rather than grills, and takes us through sausage lasagne, Le Pig Mac, mortadella cheeseburgers, porchetta tacos and hangover macaroni designed to be eaten with a spoon.

We also hear how Max nearly made a TV show called Chicken Lips and Salmon Legs before losing out to Taskmaster, why his first sandwich shop idea was called “Out Here on the Dance Floor,” and how an awkward licensing dispute became one of his greatest restaurant moments: a customer told to “get up and fuck off” to a round of applause.

There are stories from Le Coq, Keira Knightley’s alleged praise, Raymond Blanc being angry about missing tarragon, electric toothbrushes for sale outside Finsbury Park Tesco, cold lasagne in a croissant with honey, and a childhood memory of eating sheep on a spit in a French village. Expect sausage philosophy, sandwich engineering, strong opinions on cheese, and plenty of Max’s “little pleasant splashes” of joy.

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Today we’re joined by Gary Usher — the chef behind a North West restaurant empire, award-winning gastropubs, and one of the most honest voices in hospitality today.

We sit down in Liverpool to talk about the evolution of his restaurant Wreck — from a derelict site to one of the busiest spots in the city — and the moment everything changed. After months of standing outside asking passers-by why they weren’t coming in, Gary discovered people thought “Wreckfish” was a seafood restaurant. A simple rebrand, clearer signage, and the business jumped 30% almost overnight.

Beyond the success, this episode goes deep. Gary opens up about crowdfunding his restaurants, selling meals in advance to raise hundreds of thousands, and how that early community became fiercely loyal regulars. But he’s equally candid about the darker side — closing multiple sites, navigating debt, and the harsh reality that many restaurants today aren’t failing because they’re quiet, but because they’re too expensive to run. It’s an unfiltered look at an industry under serious pressure.

We also get the full journey: from struggling with dyslexia at school to finding his place in kitchens, working at Chez Bruce, learning under Angela Hartnett, and even the wild years in Ibiza plus much much more....

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Chris Edwards joins the pod for a hilarious, story-packed episode from Belzan, covering the wild journey from all-day chaos at Filter and Fox to building one of the North West’s most respected hospitality groups. There are tales of 7 a.m. coffees turning into midnight Manhattans, meeting future business partners across the bar, and the painful but necessary decision to close beloved venues at the right time.

Chris reflects on Liverpool’s changing scene, the magic and madness of running restaurants, starstruck moments with Duncan from Blue and Lord of the Rings cast members, plus Will Ferrell’s visit during Eurovision. He also talks candidly about lockdown, break-ups, tough customers, staff loyalty, expansion, risk, VAT, and why giving great people room to grow is what keeps the business moving.

Expect plenty of laughs, martinis, cosmic Scousers, Guinness John, Amsterdam stag-do warnings, Marco Pierre White blocking the pod, New York pilgrimages, and the greatest play-out song choice in podcast history.

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Tony Allan joins the latest episode of the Go To Food Podcast for a no-holds-barred conversation that spans decades at the very top of British hospitality. From stripping lead off a school roof as a teenager to becoming one of London’s most influential fishmongers and restaurateurs, Tony’s journey is anything but ordinary. He reveals how he transformed the way chefs bought fish, built a booming supply business, and went from market trader to multimillionaire in what felt like overnight.

This episode is packed with incredible stories — from supplying legends like Marco Pierre White and Gordon Ramsay, to explosive fallouts, court battles, and chance encounters that defined his career. Tony shares what it was like opening the very first restaurant in Borough Market, the insane growth from one site to 25 restaurants in just a few years, and the brutal impact of events like September 11 attacks on the industry. There are also wild moments involving racing bets, celebrity friendships with Vinnie Jones, and behind-the-scenes chaos from the golden era of London dining.

It’s funny, raw, and brutally honest — from tales of late-night phone calls with fiery chefs to building and losing fortunes, then starting again. Tony also gives his unfiltered take on the state of hospitality today, from staffing crises to rising costs, and how he’s adapted with a booming takeaway business. If you want real insight, proper storytelling, and one of the most entertaining voices in the game, this is a must-listen episode of the Go To Food Podcast.

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Part two with the legendary Raymond Blanc is every bit as honest, funny and revealing as you’d hope. With nearly 50 Michelin-starred chefs having passed through his kitchens, we had to play our favourite game again: what were they really like before the fame? Raymond opens up on a young Marco Pierre White — the wild hair, the swagger, the intensity — and shares what it was actually like employing one of Britain’s most combustible culinary talents. From football-match bust-ups to kitchen power struggles, the stories are as outrageous as they are unforgettable.

But this episode goes far deeper than kitchen gossip. Raymond reflects on what separated the greats from the merely gifted, why Heston Blumenthal was one of the most unique talents he ever encountered, and the crucial lesson he believes he taught Marco: taste. It’s a fascinating look inside the mind of a chef who didn’t just mentor future superstars, but helped shape the DNA of modern British gastronomy. Expect brilliance, big opinions and some of the sharpest insights into cooking, leadership and creativity you’ll hear anywhere.

And because it’s Raymond Blanc, the conversation doesn’t stop there. He talks about the changing face of hospitality, the guests who left the biggest impression on him — from the Queen Mother to Stormzy — and the dishes, restaurants and food destinations he still dreams about. It’s warm, passionate, hilarious and full of wisdom from a man who has stayed relevant at the very top for more than four decades. Part two is a masterclass in food, culture and what it really takes to last.

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Few chefs in the world can match the Michelin legacy of Raymond Blanc. With over 40 years of continuous Michelin-starred excellence at Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons, he stands among the most consistent and influential figures in global gastronomy. Yet, as he reveals in this episode, he never chased stars—only excellence. The stars, he insists, were always a by-product. From the electric moment he was told mid-service that he’d earned his second star, to his conscious decision to walk away from a Michelin star at his first brasserie concept because it didn’t align with his vision, Blanc’s relationship with the guide is anything but conventional.

Behind those accolades lies a story that is equal parts grit, instinct and extraordinary luck. Blanc takes us back to his early life in France—hunting, foraging and selling wild ingredients as a teenager before stumbling into his first transformative restaurant experience. From there, his path is anything but linear: training as a nurse, talking his way into a restaurant job by boldly claiming he’d become the best chef in the world, and starting at the very bottom as a cleaner. He recounts learning wine from leftover glasses, studying cookery books obsessively at night, and enduring the brutal realities of old-school kitchens—including the moment a chef smashed a pan into his face, ultimately pushing him to leave France and start over in England.

What follows is a series of almost unbelievable turning points. Arriving in Britain to what he describes as a “frightening” food scene, Blanc quickly found himself cooking after a disastrous kitchen vacancy—despite never formally training as a chef. He shares vivid, often hilarious stories: witnessing chefs mixing trifle with their bare hands, opening his first Oxford restaurant in the economic chaos of the late 70s, scrubbing tar from the walls and discovering rats in the fridge, then somehow winning a Michelin star within two years. From there came the leap to Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons—funded largely on reputation and belief—followed by the pressure, failures and triumphs that built it into one of the most revered restaurants in the world.

Now stepping back after decades at the top, Blanc reflects with honesty and warmth on legacy, leadership and letting go. He discusses choosing his successor, the philosophy behind training dozens of future Michelin-starred chefs, and his determination to reshape kitchen culture into something kinder, more supportive and more human. Along the way, he shares the wild story of how a near-disastrous TV deal led to the creation of the London Cocktail Club, his deliberate reinvention of casual dining with Brasserie Blanc, and why hospitality, at its core, is about giving people the best moment of their lives. This is a portrait of a chef who didn’t just earn stars—he redefined what they mean.

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AdeJoké Bakare joins us for a truly special interview at Chishuru, the Michelin-starred Fitzrovia restaurant that has become one of London’s most exciting dining destinations. As the UK’s only Black female Michelin-starred chef, and only the second in the world, Joké’s rise is extraordinary not just for what she has achieved, but for how she got there: without the traditional fine-dining route, without years in elite kitchens, and while building a style of cooking that many people in Britain had never properly encountered before.

In this conversation, she takes us through the long road to Chishuru, from growing up in Nigeria and studying biomedical sciences, to moving to the UK in 1999 and spending years with food as a private obsession rather than a full-time profession. She shares stories of selling fish and chips from a cart at university, cooking around church communities, hosting punishing early supper clubs, and eventually taking a chance on a Brixton Market pop-up after winning a competition in 2019. From there, the story only gets wilder: learning on the job, persuading landlords to take her seriously, opening her first proper restaurant, and then winning a Michelin star just five months later.

But what makes this interview so rich is the way Joké talks about the food itself: the memories tied to it, the regional Nigerian dishes she felt compelled to preserve, and the resistance she faced from diners who expected one version of West African cooking and found something far more personal, historical and ambitious. She speaks beautifully about introducing guests to dishes they may not know how to approach, translating flavours that do not fit neatly into European ideas of balance, and protecting culinary traditions that risk being lost. The result is a conversation packed with humour, honesty and emotion — a portrait of a chef who has not only changed London dining, but has done it entirely on her own terms.

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In this episode of Mise en Place, we sit down with Jan Ostle of Wilson’s in Bristol for a conversation that stretches far beyond the pass. Recorded inside the restaurant’s remarkable 100-year-old bakery, this is a vivid, funny and deeply human story about how one of the UK’s most exciting restaurants came to be — and the messy, unpredictable journey behind it.

Jan takes us right back to the beginning: leaving school early, feeling out of place, and discovering a sense of belonging for the first time in the chaos of a professional kitchen. From pot-washing in Oxford to the intensity of kitchens like Restaurant Gordon Ramsay and The Square, he speaks with total honesty about failure, fear, addiction and the long, uneven path to finding his voice — not just as a chef, but as a person.

At the centre of it all is Wilson’s — a restaurant built not on polish or perfection, but on instinct, partnership and community. Jan shares the story of building it alongside Mary, taking on the old bakery next door during Covid, and shaping something that reflects their values rather than the expectations of the industry. It’s a story about family, about Bristol’s support for independent restaurants, and about creating a place that feels genuinely welcoming rather than exclusive.

This is Jan Ostle unfiltered: thoughtful, self-deprecating, chaotic and deeply sincere. He talks openly about the pressures of running a restaurant, the emotional weight of responsibility, and why — despite everything — he still loves this industry. Honest, moving and often very funny, this is one of our most revealing conversations yet.

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