Page 59 - People (February 2020)

for eight years, and we struggled for four years,” says A
Oliver. Though he says the demise was “tough on
Recipe
every level,” Oliver also feels a sense of relief since
entering administration: “The pain’s gone. The for Love
hemorrhaging of cash is gone. And there’s a result.
It’s not the result I wanted, but now you move on.”
Before owning restaurants, Oliver grew up in
Now Until
them. The son of Trevor and Sally Oliver, who own Forever
the Cricketers pub in Clavering, England, he start- “She still makes me
ed busing tables at age 8. After culinary school he laugh,” says Oliver
(at his wedding to
landed a job as sous-chef at the River Café in Lon- Jools in 2000).
don, where he was discovered by a BBC producer. They plan to renew

The Naked Chef, named for Oliver’s stripped-down their vows in June.
approach to cooking, aired on the BBC in 1999 and
hit the Food Network a year later. As his popularity
Family Man
grew, he opened the Barbecoa and Jamie’s Italian
Fatherhood is
chains in Britain as well as Fifteen, a nonprofit eat- “joyful, traumatic,
ery that trained underprivileged youth—all now wonderful and
closed. (Oliver continues to license his name to 70 terrible,” says Oliver
(with Jools and
restaurants globally and still has three locations at kids River, Petal
London’s Gatwick Airport.) But it was hard to make and Buddy).
a profit from selling high- quality ingredients at a
mid-market price, says Oliver, who also blames the
economic slowdown caused by useful,” he says. “You do wise up. Hopefully I won’t
‘I’m really the anticipation of Brexit. He make the same mistakes, and I’ll keep being cre-

excited put more than $15 million of ative and trying to make positive change.”
By his side from the beginning has been his wife,
his own money into the busi-
for the ness in a last-ditch effort and Jools. The onetime high school sweethearts will
next personally paid every employ- celebrate 20 years of marriage in June. “It’s not
decade’ ee until the doors shut, he says: always easy,” he says. “She probably hates me 40
“I feel grateful for a master percent of the time, but 60 percent is pretty good.”
— J A M I E
O L I V E R class in the best and the worst. They have five kids—Poppy, 17, Daisy, 16, Petal, 10,
If you haven’t been tested, Buddy, 9, and River, 3—and Jools, 45, a kids’ cloth-
you’re not trying hard enough.” ing designer, is trying to persuade him to have a
Now Oliver is concentrating on his cookbooks— sixth. “Can someone please have a word with her?”
he’s the bestselling nonfiction author in the U.K.— he jokes. “I am so done, but I like to support her.”
and starring on the British TV series that accom- Amid his restaurants’ downward spiral, coming
pany them. He’s also continuing his crusade to home to his family was “the best antidote in the
make food healthier for kids. His latest project, world,” says Oliver. He cherishes the moments
Bite Back 2030, aims to cut childhood obesity in when he can give Jools a foot rub or watch Bud-
the U.K. in half in the next 10 years. “I want to be dy fillet a fish better than any chef twice his age.
“When you’re tested like I’ve been,” says Oliver,
•
“all that matters is friends, family and health.”

His Career in the Kitchen

1999 2005 2008-2019 2020
a
The Naked Chef Feed Me The Rise nd all f Ultimate Veg
F
o
With a personality Better His Restaurants “I’ve been asked
as unpretentious Oliver became By offering quality food at an to do a vegetarian
as his cooking, an activist with affordable price, Oliver aimed cookbook for
a fully clothed this campaign to “disrupt mid-market dining basically 20 years,”
Oliver won over to educate kids in the high street”—and he says Oliver. Now felt
audiences almost about food. He’s did, for a time. At its peak the like the right time,
immediately. continued to fight restaurant group operated 42 as awareness about
“In the second year childhood obesity restaurants in the U.K. “I know food consumption
it was already in by supporting a I got a lot right,” he says of and the environment
20 to 30 countries— sugar tax on soda closing all but three locations. continues to grow.
and it wasn’t and changes to “But the bits I got wrong are “I think this is a really
slowing down.” food advertising. the reason that we’re dead.” positive thing.”

(BOOK) PETER ZAMBOUROS February 17, 2020 63