Marcus Wareing: 'I've had to learn to be a team player'
We asked the chef, 47, what his younger self would make of him today...
My childhood was very disciplined. My family were very hardworking and I was influenced by my father’s work ethic and mother’s houseproudness. Dinner was on the table at 6.45pm. There were always lots of vegetables, meat or fish.
From the age of 11 onwards I would go and see my father at his place of work after school. He was a merchant and had a warehouse in Southport that provided the fruit and vegetables for school meals in the North West, as well as hotels and restaurants. I’d go with him to visit the farmers and pick up the produce. The warehouse, with its forklift trucks, was a cool place for a kid to hang out.
One thing I felt when I won the star is that someone had put a very heavy bag on my back
Marcus Wareing
I also did boxing. My older brother was a boxer and a chef; he was a great inspiration and we’re still close. I never really used to have a collection of mates; school was school and then I would either go to a boxing gym or the warehouse. Then I’d go home and have my dinner and that was it. I was very shy and did things on my own. I still love watching boxing and I train with boxing bags in the gym. It’s a fantastic discipline and my go-to sport.
What I’ve had to learn, though, over the years, is how to be a team player. Running a business, I have to be able to communicate. I knew I wanted to be a professional chef at the age of 13, but there was never a plan. One thing bowled into another.
My brother and two sisters and parents are still in Southport. I’m the odd one out. I didn’t ever intend to come to London. I just had a work ethic and the doors kept opening in front of me. I got my head down and was recognised above the people around me.
I never thought I’d meet a Gordon Ramsay or an Albert Roux. I never thought I’d work in Paris, New York and Amsterdam. When I came back from Paris, Gordon helped me open my first restaurant, L’Oranger. I won the Michelin star seven months later, aged 25. At that point the penny dropped. All that training, all that hard work had paid off.
It was exciting, but the one thing I felt when I won the star is that someone had put a very heavy bag on my back. It was pressure and I just had to carry it. Gordon always said to me, “It’s about great consistency”. That attitude, that continuity, came from one person: my father.
When my old man put me on a train to London when I was just 18 and on my way to my first big job at the Savoy Hotel, he said: “If you ever get married, marry someone who understands your industry and believes in what you believe in.”
My family are an amazing team and we work very hard at it. My wife Jane and I met when I was a cook at Gravetye Manor and she was on the management team. My children are aged 16, 13 and 10 – they’re crazy and they’re lovely; they make you cry with joy. They’re open-minded and wide-eyed and that’s what I was like when I was seven years old. When I look at that photograph of me on holiday in Spain, I can see my son in that. I want to spend time with my kids growing up.
My dad was a workaholic and that’s why I used to go to see him at his warehouse. But I love being one of those dads who shouts on the side of the football pitch. I still love being in the kitchen and being on MasterChef: The Professionals is brilliant and exciting. I won’t retire at 55. I’ll carry on doing my job because I don’t want that journey to stop. But having children was a pinnacle point. They’re just the best thing.
MasterChef: The Professionals knockout week begins on Tuesday at 8pm on BBC Two
