Sandwich man has an appetite for spreading
Financial Times | 6 Jan 2004
Niall MacArthur, the founder of Eat, tells Caroline Phillips about his ambitions to expand his 26-strong chain beyond its base in London.
View cutting image View PDF
“Caroline Phillips is a tenacious and skilful writer with a flair for high quality interviewing and a knack for making things work.”
Niall MacArthur, the founder of Eat, tells Caroline Phillips about his ambitions to expand his 26-strong chain beyond its base in London.
Caroline Phillips meets Heston Blumenthal, the Willy Wonka of modern British cooking, and samples his distinctive brand of innovative and investigative cuisine.
They call it, with some affection, Broadmoor. At least, that’s what they say in the family. To others, however, it is Broadlands, the stud farm belonging to the horse breeder and animal conservationist the Hon Patricia O’Neill.
She has 42 stray dogs who move in packs through her house, and a kitchen carpeted with yapping Pekingese. She also has a donkey, jackal, lynx, chimp, 200 parrots, 40 stud ponies, a cage shared by a tortoise, cockerel, monkey and rabbit, plus 19 rescued baboons – some living in a room with filing cabinets and books.
Complementary therapy gourmet Caroline Phillips has sought stress relief with pretty much every treatment going. Here, she describes the most effective.
The designer turned novelist tells how real life has inspired her first foray into fiction. Bella Pollen, once an internationally known fashion designer trading under the name Arabella Pollen, has just published her first novel, All About Men.
After three failed marriages, the time has arrived for Sian Phillips to dote on her cats.
For Joan Bakewell, it has been The Unmentionable. Ever since it was “exposed”, the broadcaster has refused staunchly to discuss her seven-year affair with playwright Harold Pinter.
Richard Ingrams, the former editor of Private Eye and now editor of The Oldie, has been dwelling on mortality.
Richard Ingrams, former editor of Private Eye, looks away as he shakes my hand. He’s imposingly tall and wearing his habitual cords, a jumper full of holes and undone laces.
The poster outside the Brighton theatre shows a tough, tight-lipped guy: Dennis Waterman playing an ex-con in the new thriller, Killing Time. The real Dennis stands in front of his image reading a review, wearing shades, loud check shirt and gold medallions. Dennis in this incarnation is lean and taut with a knuckle-crushing handshake.
If you encountered her as a character in a novel, you’d find her barely credible. “I’ve been stalked, battered, raped, bribed, attacked, kicked and threatened,” the prize winning author Lisa St Aubin de Teran mentions casually.
It’s important to know the etiquette when you greet a baby lion in the bush. A big-boned woman gets down on all floors on the dining room floor. “You’ve got to put your head down,” she demonstrates in a loud American voice, her long blonde hair tumbling to the floor. “Then the lion scrams your hair.”
Ronald Phillips never planned on dying, claiming he would live for ever. Even an Evening Standard cartoonist’s illustration of Ron (his preferred name) fishing an…
Sunday 14 December. It’s a perfect afternoon: sun, sand, surfers. I’m in Sydney visiting my two Londoner daughters who are here living the Australian dream. My 28-year-old, Ella, is at the beach with friends; her elder sister Anya, 30, is out with her boyfriend. So I go for a swim alone at…
My life is currently as challenging as a long-haul budget flight full of stag-party revellers, hope mislaid like lost luggage. The reason? My marriage is…