Gino D'Acampo on his new book Gino’s Italian Family Adventure: Easy Recipes The Whole Family Will Love

Virgin Radio

14 Oct 2021, 17:39

The firecracker joined the Chris Evans Breakfast Show with Sky to talk about his new mouth-watering offering inspired by his whole family and how our Chris gave his career the kick start it needed.  

He told Chris about his go-to place: “I only discovered Sardinia 12 years ago... I'm thinking, wait a second. This is paradise... you have Italian food, Italian wine, Italian people, so you really have the best of everything in one island and it's very affordable as well."

On Chris giving him a break at the start of his career, he said: " Not many people know this story. When I started my career over 20 years ago, Chris was the one who saw me first who believed in me and he took me onto a show called the Terry & Gabby show with the almighty Terry Wogan and for me it was the first time ever to be on a big channel... I was in a dark place.

"I was in awe because you're the ultimate rock star and I remember I said, Mr Evans, are you sure that this is what you want for your show? And he went, I don't care what people have done in the past, I care what people can do today, and that is something that I will never forget, and he got me on the show and that's when everything started."

On the pandemic battering the restaurant world: "As you know we had to put a lot of money in to make sure that the restaurant survived and nobody lost their job. When we came back, very excited, the problem is we can’t find staff. It’s the most crazy thing ever. Yeah, I mean I know that in the next 10 years it's going to be better probably for the country because we now train British people, which is going to be better for the future because we relied far too much on foreigners before...

"The government needs to remember that this is a tough job and sometimes when you have a tough job you need to be tough.”

On working on This Morning, he shared: “I still talk to Philip and Holly so when I go on This Morning, it's not really work for me, it's just good to see some mates. Like right now. In the galleries they are always ready to press the red button on me. But you know what, we did 14 years now on This Morning and never got in trouble."

On his new book, a family collaboration, he shared: “They’re not only my recipes, they’re my wife’s recipes, they're my kids recipes, so when we wrote the book it was very interesting...

"I wanted to write in a really different way, but she said chefs don't buy your book, other people only buy your book so we're gonna have to start to write it in a different way. So this has been written in a very D'Acampo style. 

“I like it because it's very personal to me and people can actually taste what we eat.”

Gino’s Italian Family Adventure: Easy Recipes The Whole Family Will Love hits the shelves on Thursday 28th October.

For more great interviews listen to The Chris Evans Breakfast Show with Sky, weekdays from 6:30am on Virgin Radio, or catch up on-demand here.