Tom Parker Bowles, son of Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, has revealed that his mother was ‘strict’ about the food she allowed her children to eat. In a recent article for You magazine, he shared some of his mother’s favourite family recipes and recalled the foods he wasn’t allowed as a child due to her disapproval.
He fondly remembered: “She is a naturally good cook, everything from roast chicken and pork chops to tarragon chicken, smoked sausages in cream, and asparagus drenched in butter. As well as serious scrambled eggs and a mean cheese omelette. We had vegetables from the garden, game shot by my father and fish that he had caught. The fridge was always full of good snacks.”
Tom also reminisced about his father, Andrew Parker Bowles’, cooking skills, saying: “My father’s one recipe involved steak being cooked in a wire toast rack on the top of the Aga. The room would fill with smoke, and the top was coated in burnt fat. But it did taste very good indeed. My mother, who had to clean it up, was less impressed and it was soon banned.”
Speaking about his childhood food experiences, Tom Parker Bowles reminisced: ” We grew up eating locally, seasonally and organically,way before they became the overused buzzwords they are today my mother shopped in the butcher, fishmonger, bakery and greengrocer. But when Sainsbury’s opened in Chippenham at the start of the 80s it was like that moment in The Wizard of Oz where it moves from monochrome to technicolour.”
“Ice Magic! Birds Eye Chicken Pies! Butterscotch Angel Delight and huge variety packs of Monster Munch! We wanted it all, although my mother was fairly strict in what we were allowed.”
The food writer made these comments while discussing his upcoming book, which delves into the culinary preferences of British monarchs throughout history.
He also shared fond recollections of rather disorganised picnics with his mum during his school days at Eton.
He recalled: “The fourth of June was our speech day, when parents came [to Eton] with picnics. And while some would haveafull three-course lunch served by butlers on a linen-covered table, my mother and aunt would do a last-minute rush around Sainsbury’s: prawn sandwiches, cold cocktail sausages, luridly pink taramasalata and pickled onion Monster Munch. Pure picnic perfection.”
“Tom’s Royal Table: Cooking And The Crown” by Tom Parker Bowles is set to hit the shelves on September 26.