Quote · The Louis Theroux Podcast
S8 EP2: Marco Pierre White discusses his rift with Gordon Ramsay, retiring from cooking, and having lunch with Margaret Thatcher
Where this was said
Back in the Kitchen: Christmas Gravy, Air Fryers, and Cooking for Joy
At 56:20 · chapter starts 52:55
The conversation's warmest passage comes when Marco talks about cooking now, away from the pressure of stars and critics. He helps the team at the Rudlow in Bath, he teaches his children, and on Christmas Day he goes into the kitchen with everyone and makes the gravy from giblets — gizzards, hearts, liver — diced fine and added at the last minute, with the turkey fat poured in as a split sauce, not emulsified, so it French-varnishes every slice with flavour. The fat, he insists, is where all the flavour lives. Louis tentatively mentions his air fryer; Marco, to Louis's visible delight, endorses chicken skin crisps and the rendered fat at the bottom. Marco's memory of his mother's boiled chicken — chunky vegetables, chicken legs, olive oil and parsley thrown in at the last minute, the best bit the bread dipped in broth — carries the episode's emotional centre: a Michelin-starred chef's deepest food memories are the simplest ones, and always about his mother.
Marco's Christmas gravy starts with giblets — gizzards, hearts, liver, diced small and added at the very last minute. Then comes the turkey fat from the roasting tin, poured in but not mixed: a split sauce, like balsamic and olive oil. The fat French-varnishes every slice. Flavour lives in the fat.
