Desert Island Dishes

Fred has become known as the nation’s favourite maitre d’ and TV personality. He initially wanted to be a chef, but having decided that the repetitive nature of professional cooking would stifle his creativity, he switched his attention to the front of house and has never looked back. Fred worked in Michelin-starred restaurants in both France and the UK, and rose to fame back in 2013 on Channel 4’...

Hi I’m Margie Nomura and welcome to another episode of our side side dish: The Dream Dinner Party. This is the mini episode where we invite a guest to tell us their dream dinner party.  A returning guest today in the very lovely form of Tom Kerridge. I really truly appreciate so much how much thought the guests are putting into their answers and Tom was no exception. I think a lot of people would...

I'm so excited that today Diana Henry is sharing her Desert Island Dishes with me. Diana is one of my favourite recipe writers and it was a total joy to sit down with her. Diana is a multi award-winning food writer, journalist, broadcaster and cook book author. Described as one of the most prolific recipe writers of a generation but also one of the most beloved. She is the Telegraph’s much-loved c...

This week we have the boys from Bosh! Henry and Ian telling us all about their dream dinner party. They take two slightly different approaches – just because you’re best friends doesn’t mean you will have the same dream dinner party so that was quite interesting to hear their different apporoaches. Would love to know who you would choose to invite to your dream dinner party. I think it's impossibl...

If you were on your phone through lockdown, there is no doubt at all in my mind that you will have seen today’s guest across your screens teaching us how to make potatoes all kinds of delicious ways. Poppy O’Toole, also known as Poppy Cooks, is a Michelin-trained professional chef, who turned to tiktok upon losing her job in 2020 to fill some time. 3 years later, Poppy has amassed over 4 million f...

Millie Mackintosh joins us for The Dream Dinner Party this week. I know so many of you enjoyed her episode of Desert Island Dishes so we persuaded her to share her Dream Dinner Party with us too! This is the mini episode where we invite a guest to tell us their dream dinner party. The only rule is that they are only allowed to invite 4 guests – but they can be anyone they like dead or alive. And t...

Will is the founder of Deliveroo – the food delivery company he launched in 2013 with his childhood friend Greg Orlowski. After coming up with the idea for whilst working 100 hour weeks as an investment banker – the two friends seized on the opportunity to pair newly emerging technology with restaurants in order to enable people to order restaurant food straight to their door. A simple but genius...

Sophia Money-Coutts joins us today to talk all about her Dream Dinner Party. Sophia is a British journalist and author. She writes regularly for The Telegraph, has written 5 novels and has been described as the new "queen of rom coms". Her latest book Looking for Love is out now. Sophia did her own brilliant podcast a few years ago on freezing her eggs, it's honestly fantastic and I really recomme...

My guests todays are Henry Firth and Ian Theasby Broadcasters, Sunday Times best sellers and vegan chefs extraordinaire, you may know them by their other name BOSH! The vegan food empire they’ve been growing for the last 7 years. From what began as a successful Youtube channel, these boys from Sheffield have now gone on to host their own ITV show, Living on the Veg and now have more than a million...

Welcome to another episode of our side side dish: The Dream Dinner Party. This is the mini episode where we invite a guest to tell us their dream dinner party. The only rule is that they are only allowed to invite 4 guests – but they can be anyone they like dead or alive – and it’s 4 guests because really I think personally 5 people is the optimum number for a great dinner party. And they are also...

My guest today is Millie Mackintosh Millie first made her name as part of the original line up of made in chelsea in 2011. After 5 seasons she descided to embark on a career spanning from beauty to fashion, to lifestyle and fitness. She’s been in the public eye for over a decade – she’s a business woman, and health and wellness advocate – having been on the cover of Womens Health a whopping 4 time...

I'm excited to share a podcast recommendation with you this week. It's a podcast from America called The One Recipe. From the team that brought you The Splendid Table at APM Studios, The One Recipe is a podcast devoted to that one recipe you keep in your back pocket. The one you send to friends, make for your mom, the one you entirely depend on because you know it’s going to work. Host Jesse Spark...

Jimi is a writer, broadcaster and food critic. He is the chief restaurant critic for the Evening Standard, a regular guest judge on the BBC One series MasterChef and was also one of the judges on Channel 4’s The Great Cookbook Challenge with Jamie Oliver.   In 2021, he won Restaurant Writer of the Year at both the Fortnum & Mason Awards and the Guild of Food Writers Awards and as an interviewe...

My guest today is Ravinder Bhogal Kenyan born, raised in the UK by Indian parents, Ravinder Bhogal is one of the UK’s most successful food writers, restaurateurs and chefs. Calling her food and menus “proudly inauthentic”, Ravinder’s work and food spans flavours and culinary traditions from the Asia, The Middle East, East Africa and Britain – celebrating the idea of immigrant cuisine. She opened h...

This week cook and food writer Sophie Wyburd tells us all about her Dream Dinner Party. This one has it all! Popstars, cooks and wizards! Sophie has the most infectious laugh and her passion for food and for feeding people really comes through. If you heard Sophie’s episode of Desert Island dishes then hopefully you will enjoy a little encore from sophie and if you haven’t listened to her full epi...

My guest today is Claire Thompson otherwise known as the 5 o’clock apron. Claire is a chef, food writer and the author of 8 cookery books. Her writing is focused around the idea of creating proper food for modern families. And she aims for her food to Inspire but it’s also down to earth enough not to be intimidating  She was born and raised in Zimbabwe and Botswana and over many generations her fa...

Welcome to another episode of our side side dish: The Dream Dinner Party. This is the mini episode where we invite a guest to tell us their dream dinner party. They are allowed to invite 4 guests – dead or alive because really I think personally 5 people is the optimum number for a great dinner party. And they are going to be talking us through their dream menu. My guest this week is Nina Parker ....

Amelia is the founder of the Bold Bean Co. She’s on a mission to make us all obsessed with beans by bringing us the best of beans. She launched the business officially in 2021 following what she describes as a bean epiphany in Spain when she decided that the UK both needed and deserved better beans. Amelia is also passionate about sustainability and sees beans as the future of food. Now listed in...

This week John Torode talks us through his Dream Dinner Party and we are off to Singapore to board the Orient Express! All aboard! John is one of the food world’s most recognisable faces. He grew up in Melbourne, Australia, starting his career in the world of food at the age of 16. He credits his love of food and passion for cooking to his grandmother, who raised him from the age of 4. After appre...

My guest today is David Gandy. After winning a televised modelling competition at the age of 21 he went on to become the world’s first and most successful male supermodel. David’s big break came in 2007 in the form of his first Dolce & Gabbana campaigns, which saw him become a global sensation overnight when the iconic image of him wearing tiny white trunks in a boat in Capri shot by Mario Tes...

Julius Roberts is a cook, farmer and gardener and he's talking us through his Dream Dinner Party today. I think it's impossible to listen to this and not think about your own answers. So if you were to host your own Dream Dinner Party with 4 people who were dead or alive, who would you pick? Julius picks some amazing guests and his menu sounds absolutely delicious too set against the backdrop of t...

You may know Emma from her work as a model and TV presenter - she is afterall one of the most experienced and versatile broadcasters in the UK.  Across her incredible career, Emma has presented juggernaut shows such as Big Brother for six series, The Circle , and Celebrity Big Brother’s Bit on the Side. Alongside her radio and reality television credentials, Emma was not only a a contestant on The...

We have a returning guest for you this week on our side dish in the form of the Gennaro Contaldo. Gennaro is one of the UK’s most loved chefs - widely known as the man who taught Jamie Oliver everything he knows about cooking and he's going to be sharing his Dream Dinner Party with us. Referred to as everyone’s favourite nonno – he’s written more than a dozen best selling Italian cookbooks includi...

Sophie is a cook and recipe developer. Her passion for food shines through and we love to hear that on Desert Island Dishes. We talk all thing sandwiches, whether it's worth going to cookery school, life in a restaurant and why pies are the greatest. After deciding to embark on a career in food while in her final year at university, she then trained at the world-famous Leith’s before working as a...

When it comes to dinner parties – no one is better equipped to talk to us than Rosie Mackean. Very excited to have Rosie on The Dream Dinner Party. Rosie is a chef, food stylist and pasta and dinner party queen. She is doing a dinner party pop up on the 7th July in London which I wish I could go to as I know it will be delicious and tickets are available so if you're around definitely check that o...