The Go To Food Podcast

Today we're joined by one of the most important figures in modern Italian cooking in Britain, Jacob Kenedy, chef and co-founder of the legendary Bocca di Lupo and Gelupo. Jacob's journey is anything but conventional. Before becoming a chef he studied science, was a glassblower and a DJ, before a stint at Moro changed the course of his life and eventually led him to create the restaurant he simply wanted to exist in London.

Jacob takes us inside the extraordinary story of Bocca di Lupo, from opening in the middle of the financial crisis to becoming one of London's most celebrated restaurants. He reveals the brutal workload behind its early success, including the moment he became so exhausted he knelt down beside a customer's table and physically couldn't stand back up. We also get into the economics of restaurants today and why Jacob believes there is something about the industry that can actually “favour the worst”.

Plus, we talk pasta. Jacob reveals the biggest mistakes British home cooks make, why you should take pasta out of the water while it's still almost raw, the secret to seasoning properly, and the thinking behind his new book Pasta Tricolore. Over mezcal, tacos and a few strong opinions at Decimo at The Standard Hotel London, this is a brilliant conversation about food, creativity, restaurants and nearly two decades at the top of London's dining scene.

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Between Robert Reid and Jean-Christophe “JC” Slowik, you have nearly 80 years of extraordinary restaurant history. From Roger Vergé and Raymond Blanc to Marco Pierre White, Harvey’s, The Oak Room and some of the defining restaurants of their generation, the pair have witnessed first-hand the madness, brilliance and brutality of elite restaurants. They join us to share incredible stories from those years, including life inside Marco’s legendary kitchens, the intensity of three-Michelin-star cooking and how London’s restaurant world has transformed since the 1980s.

Then, in their mid-50s, they decided to start again. During Covid, a phone call between two old friends became Les 2 Garçons, the tiny French bistro they built largely themselves, initially cooking with IKEA induction hobs, a £150 Argos oven and no dishwasher. What followed was extraordinary: huge demand, national acclaim and the creation of one of Britain’s most celebrated neighbourhood restaurants, built around simple French cooking, great wine and the belief that a restaurant should above all be somewhere people actually want to spend their time.

This is also a brilliantly funny and candid conversation about everything they have learned along the way. Robert and JC discuss why fine dining became too complicated, why chefs are returning to simplicity, whether Michelin stars still matter, what restaurants get wrong about wine, the importance of value for money and why getting older completely changes the way you think about cooking. After decades spent chasing perfection at the highest level, their conclusion is refreshingly simple: forget most of what you learned, keep the best bits, cook things people want to eat and enjoy the good summers you have left.

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🔥 Two of the most exciting names in London restaurants join us this week as David Carter and Sertaç Dirik reveal the story behind KID, their hugely anticipated new Turkish restaurant in Soho. David has built an extraordinary run of restaurants including Smokestak, Manteca, OMA and AGORA, while Sertaç transformed his family restaurant Mangal II into one of London’s most acclaimed dining rooms. Now, after nearly three years of planning, travelling and eating their way around Turkey, they’ve finally joined forces.

We hear how a casual two-hour coffee after Sertaç left Mangal II eventually turned into a partnership, why they waited patiently for the right “unicorn” site, and how trips to Turkey shaped everything from the food to the design. Sertaç tells us about cooking with his dad, meeting legendary Turkish chef Musa Dağdeviren and being handed a collection of historic Turkish cookbooks, while the pair explain how KID tries to respect Turkish tradition without simply recreating what already exists.

Plus, David reveals the surprisingly emotional philosophy behind the economics of his restaurants, including why he often prices dishes according to what feels right rather than meticulously costing every plate, and why he believes the bill itself is part of the emotional experience of eating out. We also get into the explosion of Turkish food in London, the changing perception of the cuisine, Instagram restaurants, restaurant design, and what it really takes to build places people actually want to return to.

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In his first interview since his shock departure from MasterChef, John Torode joins us for an exclusive and deeply personal conversation about the end of his extraordinary 20-year run on the show. He reveals whether he was surprised by how it all came to an end, reflects on what MasterChef meant to him and the thousands of people involved in making it, and explains why, despite everything, he is determined to hold on to his “professional pride” and look towards whatever comes next.

We also go back to the very beginning. John opens up about losing his mother as a young child, finding comfort in the kitchen alongside his grandmother in rural Australia, and the remarkable journey that eventually brought him to London. From working with Terence Conran at Le Pont de la Tour to the madness of opening Quaglino’s and Mezzo during the restaurant explosion of the 1990s, John takes us inside the kitchens, characters and extraordinary moments that shaped both his cooking and his career.

Plus, John talks candidly about his 20-year working relationship with Gregg Wallace, the extraordinary impact MasterChef had on British food culture, his life with Lisa Faulkner, his years as a restaurateur and why he never wanted a Michelin star. Funny, reflective and at times incredibly moving, this is the story of John Torode’s life and career, told at a moment when one huge chapter has closed and he is figuring out what comes next.

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We travelled to the shores of Loch Fyne to sit down with the brilliant Pam Brunton, chef and co-owner of Inver, one of Scotland’s most remarkable restaurants and the first in the country to receive a Michelin Green Star. Pam’s extraordinary career has taken her from dropping out of Edinburgh University to cook on Scotland’s west coast, through the kitchens of Tom Aikens and The Greenhouse, before stages at Noma, Fäviken and In De Wulf helped shape the restaurant she would eventually create.

Pam takes us inside some of the toughest kitchens of her generation, explains what she learnt from the New Nordic movement, and reveals the extraordinary amount of work that goes into Inver, where the team make everything from cheese, yoghurt and charcuterie to miso, bread and butter. We also get into the brutal economics of running an ambitious rural restaurant and why Inver’s rooms now help fund the kitchen and the team behind it.

Along the way there are incredible stories, strong opinions, scallops pulled almost straight from the loch, tales of disastrous customers and a fascinating discussion about what sustainability actually means in a modern restaurant. Funny, thoughtful, outspoken and completely original, Pam is one of the most fascinating chefs we’ve had the pleasure of sitting down with. 

https://inverrestaurant.co.uk/

https://canongate.co.uk/books/5025-between-two-waters-heritage-landscape-and-the-modern-cook/

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Lorna McNee joins us at Cail Bruich to tell the remarkable story behind becoming the chef who brought a Michelin star back to Glasgow for the first time in 18 years. She takes us from washing pots in a small Italian restaurant and a teenage stage at Gordon Ramsay, to walking into Andrew Fairlie’s legendary two-Michelin-starred kitchen as an apprentice and immediately wondering whether she was good enough. Lorna spent the next 12 years working alongside Fairlie, who became her great mentor, and opens up about the moments she wanted to quit, what made him such an extraordinary teacher and why his death ultimately made her realise it was time to step out and discover what her own cooking looked like.

We also hear how Great British Menu transformed Lorna’s career, from the devastation of narrowly missing out first time around to returning and becoming Champion of Champions, before taking over Cail Bruich and winning its Michelin star within just five months. She reveals the bizarre way Michelin broke the news to her over FaceTime during Covid, why the restaurant subsequently became fully booked for two years, and argues that even established head chefs should still disappear for a month to stage, learn new techniques and come back better. Plus, why she hates matcha and hot honey, the night vegan protesters invaded her restaurant and had to be removed by police, and plenty more from one of Scotland’s greatest chefs.

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This week we’re joined by one of the most influential chefs of his generation, Josh Niland, the Australian chef who has completely changed the way the restaurant world thinks about fish. Josh tells us why our obsession with ultra-fresh fish may actually be holding us back, how learning to treat fish more like meat transformed his cooking, and why a piece of advice from legendary fish chef Stephen Hodges changed the course of his career. He also reveals the influence of Heston Blumenthal on his thinking, why so many chefs initially thought his ideas were completely mad, and how he went from questioning everything he’d been taught about seafood to building Saint Peter around an entirely new philosophy.

But some of Josh’s greatest innovations came out of necessity rather than ambition. He takes us back to the terrifying moment his accountant told him, “You’re not even going to make it to August,” and explains how the financial pressure of running a restaurant forced him to confront just how much valuable fish chefs were throwing in the bin. That obsession with using the whole animal has since produced some extraordinary dishes: tuna treated like beef and turned into everything from ribeye and sirloin to cheeseburgers, sobrassada and Wellington, fish eyes transformed into crackers, and matured kingfish kept for more than two weeks until its skin becomes dry and crisp while the flesh develops remarkable flavour.

We also hear about the experiments that pushed even Josh’s philosophy to its limits — from making ice cream from the fat surrounding fish eyes to turning fish fat into soap and candles, and even finding uses for the bones that would normally be discarded. Josh explains why ageing fish can make it better rather than worse, why chefs could effectively be throwing away half their profits every time they fillet one, and why insecurity and convention have made the industry so resistant to change. It’s a fascinating conversation about creativity, failure, waste, money and the extraordinary possibilities hidden inside the parts of a fish most of us have spent our lives throwing away.

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Welcome to a special edition of Go-To Food where Freddy and Ben ditch the guest and get into the industry gossip, rumours and behind-the-scenes stories that normally don’t make it onto the podcast.

From the guests we’ve chased for years, the interviews that nearly never happened, awkward encounters with some very famous chefs and what really goes on before and after the microphones are switched on, we’re spilling a few stories from behind the curtain.

We also get into the chaos of actually making Go-To Food — the shoots that have gone wrong, unexpected moments with guests, the things people have said off-air, restaurant-world whispers and some of the more ridiculous situations the podcast has landed us in over the last few years.

Plus, who’s been brilliant, who’s been elusive, who we’re still desperate to get on and a few bits of gossip we probably should have kept to ourselves.

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This week we’re joined by Jack Coggins, the chef behind Goodbye Horses, Stable Wines and The Dreamery, for a brilliant journey through one of the most unconventional careers in London food. Jack started helping out in an East London café at just 12, studied English with dreams of becoming a food writer, then found himself unable to afford the entry-level jobs in publishing and instead earning his living in kitchens.

We hear about the moment during lockdown when Jack decided to take cooking seriously, the glorious lawlessness of Hot 4 U, and the extraordinary night out that ended with him having what he describes as “half a fight” with Matthew Scott, only to be offered a job by him the following morning. From there came pop-ups around the country, Papi, and eventually Good Boy Horses, where Jack has built one of London’s most distinctive restaurants alongside the wildly successful ice-cream parlour The Dreamery.

Over an outrageous spread of raw beef, tomato tart, cheese toasties, chicken rice and plenty of wine, Jack explains the childhood food memories that still shape his cooking, why hospitality should offer genuine escapism, and why familiar food done brilliantly beats novelty for novelty’s sake. Plus, he has plenty to say about chefs and food creators lifting other people’s recipes without giving them credit. A funny, thoughtful and wonderfully unfiltered conversation with one of the most exciting young cooks in London.

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Gordon Ramsay told Aktar Islam he needed to break free. What followed changed his life and helped set him on the path to two Michelin stars — and now he wants a third.

In this episode of The Go-To Food Podcast, we sit down with Aktar Islam, one of the most influential figures in modern British Indian cooking, for a brilliantly candid conversation about ambition, Michelin stars, Gordon Ramsay, the British curry house and the brutal economics of running restaurants today.

Aktar made his name at Lasan, winning both The F Word and Great British Menu, before walking away to build something entirely on his own terms. He went on to open Opheem in Birmingham, the first restaurant in the city to receive two Michelin stars and one of only two Indian restaurants in the country to hold two stars.

He reveals the advice Gordon Ramsay gave him at a crucial point in his career, why he believes that intervention helped transform his mindset, and why Gordon remains one of his greatest inspirations.

Aktar also explains why Opheem is run almost at cost, claims the government made 90 times more from the restaurant than he did last year, and argues that Britain’s tax system is pushing independent hospitality towards breaking point.

We also get into the evolution of British Indian food, why Aktar became frustrated with traditional curry houses, his belief that chefs should be able to cook across cultures regardless of their background, and his extraordinary claim that Indian chefs have been copying his approach for decades.

Plus, Aktar opens up about walking away from Lasan, turning down opportunities abroad to remain close to his son, building Birmingham’s food scene, the dish that generated hundreds of complaint emails when he removed it from the menu, and why three Michelin stars remain firmly in his sights.

A fascinating conversation about Indian food, ambition, identity, Michelin stars, Gordon Ramsay and what it really takes to build a world-class restaurant.

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