If you keep tabs on job vacancies within the royal family, you might have spotted that The Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall are on the lookout for not just one, but three chefs to keep them well fed.
The heir to the throne is after a head chef, a chef de partie and a sous chef to take over the kitchen at Highgrove House, in order to feed the Royal Family as well as all other employees at Charles and Camilla’s royal residence in Gloucestershire.
An advert on the royal website says: ‘The chef’s team is responsible for the preparation, cooking and presentation of food for the Royal Family and employees at all royal residences.’
Charles is famously passionate about food, both in terms of production and his own diet. The Duchy of Cornwall operates Duchy Home Farm, a 900 acre farm on the grounds of Highgrove House that grows a wide variety of organic produce, which is then sold to supermarkets and restaurants. The Prince of Wales is widely regarded today as having a huge impact on the uptake of organic, biodynamic agriculture in the UK.
Speaking to National Geographic in 2006, Prince Charles said: ‘In farming, as in gardening, I happen to believe that if you treat the land with love and respect (in particular, respect for the idea that it has an almost living soul, bound up in the mysterious, everlasting cycles of nature) then it will repay you in kind.’
The Prince’s eating habits have also become more specific in recent years. Speaking to the BBC last year, Charles admitted that he has reduced his meat, fish and dairy intake in order to lower the carbon footprint of his diet. ‘For years I haven’t eaten meat and fish on two days a week, and I don’t eat dairy products on one day a week,’ he told BBC Big Interviews. ‘Now, I mean that’s one way to do it - if more did that you would reduce a lot of the pressure on the environment and everything else.’
So, what does HRH like to eat? In the past, breakfast has included anything from fruit and cereal to boiled eggs and Darjeeling tea with milk, according to a variety of sources. He’s also a famously light eater during the day - former Telegraph royal correspondent Gordon Rayner said of the Prince that, ‘lunch is seen as a luxury that gets in the way of his work, so he eats a late breakfast and works through.’
As for dinner, arm yourself with a bank of classic recipes. When Prince Charles guest-edited Country Life in 2018, he spoke warmly of a few of his dinner favourites, which included pheasant pie, moussaka, and braised grouse, cooked in the style of a coq-au-vin.
The Prince of Wales isn't the only one who advertises for chefs through the Royal website - HRH The Queen herself was looking for a travelling chef not too long ago, so it's always worth keeping an eye out if you dream of cooking for the Royal family.
Image credit: Clarence House Instagram