Restaurants | 4 March 2006

Is it just me, or does everyone have a bit of a problem warming to Gary Rhodes? I know, I know, all celebrity chefs have their annoying shortcomings: Jamie’s wet lips; Nigella’s sloppy eating habits (sucking her fingers, juices dribbling down chin); Delia’s full-on, aproned bossiness; Rick’s silly dog, Chalky; Ainsley’s just about everything. And Gary? There is just something quite chilly and rather sinister about him. It doesn’t help, I suppose, that as time goes on he looks more and more like Freddy Kruger, possibly via a spring onion, what with the stupid hair. I don’t know what I’d put down first, Rick’s silly dog or Gary’s stupid hair. Still, Gary is said to be a far, far better restaurant chef (his London restaurant, Rhodes 24, has a Michelin star) than TV personality, so I think it’s only fair to let the food do the talking, something I always recommend unless I’ve got PMT, in which case the food may talk, by all means, but I’ll only snap back and tell it to shut up.