Antonio Carluccio

Presenter0:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in two thousand eight.

Presenter0:26

My castaway this week is the cook and restaurateur Antonio Carluccio. Self taught, the methods and flavours he holds dear are those he learned at his mother's knee as he was growing up in northern Italy.

Presenter0:39

He relished the food she made, high quality, locally produced, and carefully prepared. Now, that's every Keen Cook's mantra. But when he brought his culinary skills to London in the 1970s, it was considered groundbreaking. For more than a quarter of a century, he was the man behind the Neal Street restaurant. He made it into an institution, and has been hailed as perhaps the best Italian chef in Britain along the way. Antonio Carluccio, you once said it wasn't your intention to educate, but to enthuse people about the taste of Italian food. What's the difference?

Antonio Carluccio1:12

There's a big difference. If you transmit to other UN users, this much better. It comes down uh simpler. And the people they receive it and then they adopt that. My personal motto is MOF MOF, which is minimum of fuss, maximum of flavor.

Presenter1:31

I've got that simple, yes easy to remember.

Antonio Carluccio1:32

It is that simple.

Presenter1:33

Okay, but but I mean you do take a lot of care. I mean many of your essays I've been reading them are

Antonio Carluccio1:36

Even if it's just a very simple dish, uh even it's only if it's for you, uh and I do it for myself, I can I take all the cares to to choose the best and to treat it as best. You see, when you taste something that your mother cooked about twenty, twenty-five years ago, I assume that it's the a the age where you were very small, then then immediately the taste buds they react, and it's not the look of the food that you remember, but the taste.

Presenter2:09

And so it was nineteen seventy five, then, when you first came to London. What was the food like when you arrived?

Antonio Carluccio2:16

I find it very sad actually.

Antonio Carluccio2:19

The Italians they were in offering this sort of classic uh for ages food, uh just chicken kievo, poldo sorpreza was called, but when you pierce it, butter comes all over the place. The arancho caramellattas a dessert. Which was what, that was the sliced up orange. Sliced up and with a little syrup of orange.

Presenter2:34

Which is what the

Antonio Carluccio2:39

And then what did they yeah? Well, see it's avocado pier gamberetti, they discovered the avocado pear and they put in the holo a little bit of um gamberetti with prawns and the aurora sauce, which was nothing else but mayonnaise with a bit of ketchup. Not the best of Italy, though.

Speaker 12:45

Yeah.

Antonio Carluccio2:58

And I was wondering, what the hell is that?

Antonio Carluccio3:01

All the funny stuff.

Presenter3:01

Yeah.

Presenter3:02

W would you eat any of it?

Antonio Carluccio3:04

Well, I tried and and the chicken here was quite a good idea, but it wasn't Italian somehow.

Antonio Carluccio3:09

But the British cuisine, that was a little bit sad for me, because it wasn't there.

Antonio Carluccio3:15

So it was a bit of French and and uh Chinese and Indian, but no uh British, and I was wondering why.

Antonio Carluccio3:23

I blame a little bit Elizabeth Davis also for the rest of the thing. This was the lady who introduced.

Presenter3:28

This was the lady who introduced the idea of foreign food to Britain in the 50s and 60s.

Antonio Carluccio3:32

In the fifties and sixties. In a time after the war where perhaps English food, which is fantastic, so the ingredients are fantastic, yeah.

Antonio Carluccio3:41

They could have been treated a little bit better. Um no, it was the foreign Greek, uh French, Italian that had the novelty.

Antonio Carluccio3:51

And doing so, uh people they uh forgot the um own dishes.

Presenter3:57

Lots to talk about, lots of foodie things to talk about, I hope. But before that, tell me about your first piece of music today.

Antonio Carluccio3:59

Oh, yeah.

Antonio Carluccio4:03

The first piece of music it's the Il Posino. It's so tender, the music. I mean it it's a sad story somehow.

Presenter4:11

And it's a story of old Italy, really.

Antonio Carluccio4:13

Yeah, more less here.

Presenter4:43

The theme from the film Il Postino and memories there of old Italy, romantic Italy for you and to me.

Antonio Carluccio4:48

Extremely romantic, but there's still something that would would be uh today.

Presenter4:53

Let's talk about old Italy for a moment. Let's talk about your childhood. You were born a couple of years just before the war, and then you grew up in northern Italy.

Antonio Carluccio4:59

Yes. Papa was station master of the railway and I was born by pure coincidence in Beatri Sulmara on the Amalfi coast because papa was there at the time. So I was a happy child actually. I grew up then in an area where there was truffles, uh moscato.

Antonio Carluccio5:18

And the moscato is such a sweet wine that can ferment in your tummy, and very often I was coming home a little bit

Antonio Carluccio5:25

was very funny.

Presenter5:26

So from those early years then, you you had a a sort of underlying interest, an underlying passion for food and taste?

Antonio Carluccio5:30

I didn't

Antonio Carluccio5:32

Well, it all came to the fact that my mother was a genius in in the kitchen without to wanting to be a genius.

Antonio Carluccio5:39

But she had to cook food for six people.

Antonio Carluccio5:42

We were six children.

Antonio Carluccio5:44

And wartime was pretty difficult, but he always managed to do something fantastic.

Presenter5:49

What sort of food did she cook? What are your earliest food memories?

Antonio Carluccio5:52

Uh we could cultivate a little bit of cabbage in this nearby the station. We could keep some few animals. You see, the pig for an Italian family, it keeps you the whole year practically with the fat, with lardo, with ham and with sausages. The fresh part they are eaten, those that can be preserved, they're eaten immediately, like liver, heart and all of that.

Antonio Carluccio6:15

with wonderful ragus.

Presenter6:17

Was your mother showing you the dishes and how she cooked them or were you just arrived?

Antonio Carluccio6:19

No, are you just a Russian? She wouldn't it wasn't a teaching, it was an involuntary teaching. Uh we were just watching, tasting. We were engaged in getting produce. For example, I was engaged in getting Rukhola rockets.

Presenter6:34

Yeah

Antonio Carluccio6:34

And you would go and search for it. Yeah. There's plenty there in the railway. Dandelion, when it was the time in March.

Antonio Carluccio6:42

Then I had the luck to know somebody picking truffles, and I went with him, and I was coming home with a little truffle in that, very proud, and I was very proud to come home and bring something to the family. That was the sense.

Presenter6:56

Tell me about your second piece of music then.

Antonio Carluccio6:58

The second piece, it's the molda of smettonite.

Presenter7:01

And why have you chosen this?

Antonio Carluccio7:03

First of all, it was given to me as a a desk in Vienna, I remember, by a girl.

Antonio Carluccio7:10

Until then I had the caruso disc and all of that in a big gramophone that I was playing all the time, about Italian opera and so on. But that was the first piece for me of foreign music.

Antonio Carluccio7:24

The Moldau is the story of the river that goes through Poland.

Antonio Carluccio7:31

And it reminds me from the beginning, exactly the same in Austa Valley, where we used to live.

Antonio Carluccio7:38

the little rigorates of uh water coming from the glacier and then enlarging, enlarging, enlarging. And that was my memory, and I find it really fascinating.

Presenter8:46

The opening of Vilteva from Smitna's Mavlat, played by the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Václav Talich. So you were Antonio Carluccio, one of six children, as you say it, and mamma and papa.

Antonio Carluccio8:56

Uh the number sixth came ten years after me. And it was really funny, we know what he was expecting. As in a family like that, the bigger brother or sister take care of the next one. And it was my turn of taking taking care of him.

Antonio Carluccio9:17

I saw in him a little bit my image coming up because he was athletics and so on. It was very nice.

Presenter9:24

And much to the devastation of the family he he he died, he had a terrible accident.

Antonio Carluccio9:26

And then

Antonio Carluccio9:29

Yeah. No, yes, indeed I drowned in a lake. Um

Presenter9:33

And how did that affect the family? I mean, profoundly.

Antonio Carluccio9:34

Oh, that's my mother when mad.

Presenter9:37

And you were in were you just leaving your teenage years, you would have been by the time?

Antonio Carluccio9:40

I was about twenty or something. And in fact, after that, I left for Vienna. I went to Vienna.

Presenter9:46

Did you leave because you you couldn't bear the the sadness of the situation or you left for other reasons?

Antonio Carluccio9:48

The sadness of the situation.

Presenter9:54

And why Vienna?

Antonio Carluccio9:55

Ah because on holiday he met a girl. Not the same from you. A girl. Yes, a girl. that lived in Vienna. She came first to Ivrea, where I was living there at the time.

Antonio Carluccio10:08

And then we decided both to go to Vienna because I didn't finish my A levels and I did it in in German. I was very proud of that because I had to learn uh German and do the the the exam.

Presenter10:21

And what about ca I mean, I this might be a bit naive, I imagine, cafe society.

Antonio Carluccio10:24

Oh, that's wonderful. I spent so much time in the cafe.

Presenter10:24

Ah, that's a

Antonio Carluccio10:27

Because in Vienna if you're going to a cafe

Antonio Carluccio10:30

You don't go and and they are almost all empty table, but one or two people. You don't go on an empty table. You go to a table with one person.

Antonio Carluccio10:38

To have a discussion, to note.

Presenter10:39

Not very British at all, then.

Antonio Carluccio10:40

No, no, no, exactly opposite. Then you have your paper and uh you have your cafe. There you have about twenty five different type of cafe. Einspenner and and and Kurzen, Braun and all possible. Because Vienna was the recipient of the Turkish uh invasion and uh the cafe was built there.

Presenter11:02

And what about the love that you went for? Did that last?

Antonio Carluccio11:05

Uh no, too greedy. Other people were around.

Presenter11:10

Greedy and not with the food, I understand.

Antonio Carluccio11:11

That out.

Presenter11:12

Tell me about your next piece of music, then.

Antonio Carluccio11:15

Tschaikovsky, Vladimir Ashkenazi. I met Ashkenazi people in in Vienna.

Antonio Carluccio11:22

The Tchaikovsky piano concerto, it was given to m to me also, together with the moldo.

Antonio Carluccio11:27

I don't know if Inge wanted to make me cultured.

Presenter11:32

But you enjoyed it.

Antonio Carluccio11:33

I enjoy it very much.

Presenter12:22

Vladimir Ashkenazi playing the opening of Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto, Number One. So there you were, Antonio, in Vienna.

Presenter12:30

Um when you look back at that time, I mean you're in your early seventies now. Do you find that your memory comes back in flavors? Do you think and feel in flavors?

Antonio Carluccio12:37

You think and feel and flavour. And in fact they try to achieve those flavors in memorizing them. But it was very interesting because I called the other day actually a chap called m Michael von Wolkenstein.

Antonio Carluccio12:53

And at the time he didn't have very much money. And in fact I lived for a month or two in his flat and I was cooking there. That was my first cooking.

Antonio Carluccio13:03

I was cooking pasta and he was the happy recipient of that. And then we discovered that with that we could invite people on board, and it was a fantastic thing to do. So I became a sort of cook.

Antonio Carluccio13:17

And I remember that I was calling my mother because um I wasn't very knowledgeable. And and I create recipes, Oh yes, that would go this way this.

Presenter13:26

And as you began to cook in Vienna, people began to come to want to eat your food. I get that impression that people came to your kitchen. So it was a clear that you had a skill.

Antonio Carluccio13:28

Yeah.

Antonio Carluccio13:32

So it was clear.

Antonio Carluccio13:37

Yes, well, they said yes. I I didn't know about myself, but they did yes.

Presenter13:42

So you obviously, as I've said before, you had no technical professional training, but you

Antonio Carluccio13:46

No, but

Presenter13:47

You knew you could cook and you were a good cook.

Antonio Carluccio13:49

I didn't know it at the time. I thought it was completely normal for for for me to cook.

Antonio Carluccio13:55

It's only later than that it specializes in insisting, insisting, insisting during the the year afterwards.

Presenter14:01

And and what were you working at? Were you still working at Olivetti when you were a young?

Antonio Carluccio14:04

No, no. In in Vienna, I was working at a company, Vienna by night.

Presenter14:04

No.

Antonio Carluccio14:09

with a bus going with the tourists in Moulin Rouge and this and this, where, by the way, I discovered for the first time that the people behind the Moulin Rouge, they are wonderful human beings, all of them family, uh, mothers, doing the job because they wanted money.

Presenter14:25

Now it it's working itself as something as a theme here, the girls. I mean, are you a romantic?

Antonio Carluccio14:31

I am romantic and the girls they are

Antonio Carluccio14:34

For me at the time it was something to bring on.

Antonio Carluccio14:38

one palm of the hand always has been action.

Presenter14:41

What do you mean? You have to explain that to me. Keep it on one palm of the hand. I don't know what you mean.

Antonio Carluccio14:45

Carrying it like this.

Presenter14:47

Well, that's a precious thing, I see.

Presenter14:49

So have you had your heart broken a lot?

Antonio Carluccio14:52

Yeah, quite sometimes. And a couple of times I broke it myself, quite. But mostly it was me that was suffering. That's funny. One assumed, you know, you macho man, you know, nobody can hurt you. Wow. You have quite um tender

Antonio Carluccio15:14

The

Presenter15:15

Let's take a break for some music. Tell me what you've chosen next.

Antonio Carluccio15:19

Now I was in Vienna and I was listening to this music. They are sort of local music that they sing in in in the Heuregen.

Antonio Carluccio15:28

And there usually was this chap, Paul Herbiger, which he was singing all the melodies of Vienna.

Antonio Carluccio15:36

One of them was really to nourish a Kastani bomb.

Antonio Carluccio15:41

It's the story of a tree which all of a sudden s sprouts and and and flowers in August. We should have done it about two or three months before. And he believes that the tree believes that he wants to show off. It's a very similar thing to man and uh obviously. A sad but lovely uh story. And the melody is lovely.

Speaker 115:57

Yeah, okay.

Speaker 116:04

Come on. From Stottpur State who are levelled.

Antonio Carluccio16:07

Or live it.

Speaker 116:08

We were gate and bomb their list set longer.

Speaker 116:13

The bleta trau rich angel, doch bledsnicher, aufgewach, and kerzuch.

Speaker 116:24

Of Arden, Seinen Zweigen.

Speaker 116:28

It's volley er sicht zeigen.

Presenter16:33

Paul Herbiger singing Dunarishta Kashtanenbaum

Antonio Carluccio16:36

Tanya

Presenter16:37

Taste them.

Presenter16:39

Dunanusha Kastanenbaum.

Antonio Carluccio16:40

Castanien. You have to pronounce it. Castanien bar.

Presenter16:44

Thank you.

Presenter16:49

This is gonna go on and on. I can't do it as well as you can do it.

Presenter16:54

Dunarisha Kastanyan Baum. You foolish chestnut tree.

Speaker 116:58

Chestnut tree.

Presenter17:00

Perfect. We have it.

Presenter17:02

Cut. So, Antonio Carlucci, you were in your mid-thirties when you came to London. Why did you come to London?

Antonio Carluccio17:09

Uh that was a person that I met. Was it love again?

Presenter17:13

Was it Love Again?

Antonio Carluccio17:15

Uh

Antonio Carluccio17:17

What else?

Presenter17:19

And what happened in London? I'm talking about what happened in terms of your life. What were you working at? What was the date of the life?

Antonio Carluccio17:24

I was at the time wine merchant after Yen. I lived in Berlin and

Antonio Carluccio17:29

Uh humboy?

Antonio Carluccio17:31

For twelve years.

Presenter17:32

Yes. So you were a wine merchant? Were you selling uh promoting Italian wine?

Antonio Carluccio17:35

Italian one is.

Antonio Carluccio17:37

And here I f the first two or three years I was working and in a similar situation. Then uh my brother in law offered to me to run the nearest field restaurant.

Presenter17:47

Now, let's just be clear about this because you met and married Priscilla, who is.

Antonio Carluccio17:48

Do you

Antonio Carluccio17:50

Who is the sister of Terence Conrad?

Presenter17:51

The sister of Terence Conrad, who at that time owned the Neal Street restaurant.

Antonio Carluccio17:54

Right stones.

Presenter17:55

And he said to you, Do you want to run my restaurant?

Antonio Carluccio17:57

Yeah, because we were on holiday together in Sardinia, I remember, and he saw that I could cook.

Antonio Carluccio18:02

And we agreed that I would run it only under the point of view food and PR, nothing else, because I am very bad in in uh administration.

Antonio Carluccio18:13

And so we did. And so I for three years I was managing the Rector and then I bought it of him.

Antonio Carluccio18:19

and then became what I wanted to become, a real Italian restaurant. So practically from eighty one I took over in eighty four. And I'm very sad that it's closed.

Presenter18:29

I'm ready.

Presenter18:31

Yes, it's no longer there. The developers got the better of it.

Antonio Carluccio18:33

Yeah, it was an idea, it was a sort of uh believing in food and most of the um sort of restaurant they are run by accountant and I didn't want that. It was run by me and it was just the pleasure uh to to to bring something to the customer.

Presenter18:52

And you made this great success of it. People loved the Neal Street restaurant, and it was always busy. I'm wondering about getting.

Antonio Carluccio18:52

The

Antonio Carluccio18:54

Yeah.

Presenter19:00

In to bed with the family and business, that can sometimes be difficult.

Antonio Carluccio19:02

No, that was a bit worried, but that's why uh I try to um sort of divide things. I said, Look, I buy it now. So because going to bed with family it's a little bit um

Presenter19:13

And was Priscilla involved in the business?

Antonio Carluccio19:15

No, at the time not. She became involved then when we started to open next door, I wanted to have a little shop, which was the initial thing of Carluchos and the initial shop, um, Delicatesen.

Antonio Carluccio19:28

She collaborated on that very much and she was very, very good at it.

Presenter19:32

Was it Priscilla, your wife, who was the sort of powerhouse behind getting the brand up and running?

Antonio Carluccio19:38

Because he's only the powerhouse of everything.

Presenter19:40

So she's very much her brother's sister in that.

Antonio Carluccio19:42

Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah.

Antonio Carluccio19:44

Yeah, she's my precious thing.

Presenter19:46

Yes, that's interesting, because she is she is your third wife. You had two very brief marriages.

Antonio Carluccio19:51

One in Germany. One is not mentionable because it was only very, very few months. And this is twenty six, twenty seven years now.

Presenter20:00

So what has ha is it just that you met precisely the right woman, or did you learn from all these affairs of the heart?

Antonio Carluccio20:06

Well, there comes a point in life where you have to draw the line and say, Wait a minute, what are you looking for? Are you looking for for a little thing? No, you're looking for an intelligent person, nice and beautiful, and and that's what I find.

Presenter20:22

Tell me about your next piece of music, then.

Antonio Carluccio20:24

uh the uh C V McPy.

Antonio Carluccio20:27

I like the magpies, I don't know why.

Antonio Carluccio20:31

They they steal, but uh and Rossini, I love Rossini he died with food actually.

Presenter20:37

What happened?

Antonio Carluccio20:38

Well, he died with with l lots of food.

Presenter20:41

He died from eating too much.

Antonio Carluccio20:41

He died from eating too much.

Antonio Carluccio20:44

Yeah.

Presenter20:44

It's a very Italian way to go.

Antonio Carluccio20:46

Fantastic way to go. Either that or with sex. One or both. Very sad if you die for nothing.

Presenter21:53

Part of the overture to Rossini's The Thieving Magpie, played by the Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Herbert Moncarian.

Presenter21:59

Now the cooking that you do, Antonio Carluccio, there is almost I've been reading the books and and looking at the programmes you make. There seems to be an almost hypnotic quality in the amount of time that you are happy to take. You know, you you like to touch it with your hands, you like to get involved in the texture.

Speaker 122:01

And yeah.

Antonio Carluccio22:13

Gaylines

Antonio Carluccio22:16

It is visual. I find it uh very central actually to touch food. For that reason I uh carve also sticks. I I sort of whittle wood.

Presenter22:26

To say you carve sticks is somewhat to underplay it. These are very beautiful things that you make from wood.

Antonio Carluccio22:30

Make from woods. Yeah, that it's a fantastic thing for me. I I g ours I get

Presenter22:36

And you whistle them with great detail.

Antonio Carluccio22:37

I will yes. And you have to have patience with that, otherwise you don't have the results. And similar thing is food. I tried with clay and it's exactly the same. I did once the head of the Dorado Palazzi stood uh modeled for me for two hours. You didn't find that intimidating? No, no, because

Presenter22:51

You didn't find that in?

Antonio Carluccio22:55

The intimidating bit is for somebody that is shy and uh I was born

Antonio Carluccio23:03

Not as a shy boy.

Presenter23:04

And when you're doing this whether it's the the cooking with g great intricacy and love and sensuality, or whether it's whittling the stick, are you thinking about other things, or are you lost in the moment of doing?

Antonio Carluccio23:16

While I'm doing the sticks actually and very seldom I think of something else, because I really I concentrate to the per person that I do it for, because I give some as a present. Some I have a collection of about three hundred of those and but I make some for people that I like and and I give it to them.

Presenter23:37

People who are good at cooking often say that that they see it as a way of expressing their love for people.

Antonio Carluccio23:42

And yeah.

Presenter23:44

A concrete way of saying I invest this time and this thought and I've created something for you. Do do you find that expression in food?

Antonio Carluccio23:50

The mother that cooks uh seriously food for her family, she gives love to them.

Antonio Carluccio23:58

Dru cooking.

Antonio Carluccio24:00

You know, the cooking is sometimes quite heavy, you know, the preparation and this and this and that. And who would do it for n for nothing? You know, you do it just because you uh want to make people happy. And this is my uh sort of twist that sometimes I make happy myself.

Antonio Carluccio24:18

It's win-win. Yes. To communicate with others. It's fantastic. I did it in television, and when I do something like that, I really communicate to others. I don't like to as we said before, to be the teacher or something like that, because I can't be the teacher. I am one like you, like anybody.

Speaker 324:19

Yeah.

Antonio Carluccio24:37

When does it?

Presenter24:38

You talked about the television shows and they were over the years very well received. And of course there is this huge rash now. There are whole television networks that are dedicated to cooking for goodness.

Antonio Carluccio24:49

Everywhere now. Some of them no, not really. Some of them it's uh uh still positive, but most of them it's so banal that it's you know.

Presenter24:51

Do you want to go to the bottom?

Presenter25:00

And what about cooking as an expression of machismo? You know what I mean by that, this idea that the chef is in the kitchen and he's throwing pots and pans and he's effing and blinding.

Antonio Carluccio25:04

This idea that

Antonio Carluccio25:07

That's a lovely thing to do with cooking. So why do you uh t translate it in a slavery uh sort of kitchen with you with a with a whip?

Presenter25:29

Tell me about your next piece of music then.

Antonio Carluccio25:32

The next piece of music is uh Yesterday. Now I am enough in uh England to appreciate all the music and this is a gentle, gentle, wonderful song. For me i it's a classic, not pop at all.

Presenter25:50

Yesterday.

Presenter25:53

All my troubles seem so far away

Presenter25:58

God looks as though they're here to stay, Oh I believe

Presenter26:04

Yesterday, suddenly.

Presenter26:10

I'm not half the man I used to be

Presenter26:15

Does a shadow

Presenter26:17

The Beatles and Yesterday. So, Antonio Carluccioi, you've made a number of TV series, you've written a lot of successful books that.

Antonio Carluccio26:23

I was fifteen years without BPC.

Presenter26:25

And y they all extol the virtues of uh not just Italian cookery and all its deliciousness, but the the Italian way of life. And yet it's what, is it fifty years since you've actually lived in Italy? Does Italy still

Antonio Carluccio26:37

Fifty years, yeah.

Presenter26:38

Does it feel like home to you, Italy?

Antonio Carluccio26:40

Not really. I can tell you one thing, that the umbilical code is cut forever when your mother and your father died. So I go to Italy now and uh I see my brother and my sister. Then on top of that, after fifty years in Ivrea, where we the last time I lived there was Ivrea, I don't know anybody anymore.

Antonio Carluccio27:00

So you are relatively solo and alone there.

Presenter27:03

You're the only mem member of the family who has gone abroad, yes.

Antonio Carluccio27:06

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I was the only one that uh Carlo, my brother still there, my sister, Gracia and Anna, they're still there.

Antonio Carluccio27:14

And oldish, but uh okay.

Presenter27:17

And what do they make of you as success? Because of course you're very successful here, but you've also been honoured in Italy the equivalent of a knighthood for your services.

Antonio Carluccio27:19

You know what?

Antonio Carluccio27:22

Yeah.

Antonio Carluccio27:23

Oh no, they're very, very sort of and they're very sour that the local paper they didn't discover me yet.

Antonio Carluccio27:32

But I don't mind. In fact I am known all over the world, with the exception of Italy.

Presenter27:37

Uh what do you make of your success? Are you satisfied with with your life's work to date?

Antonio Carluccio27:43

First of all, it doesn't go into my head at all.

Antonio Carluccio27:46

I think that probably there there are many, many other people that could have done the same.

Antonio Carluccio27:50

Only they didn't have the occasion. It's very difficult, you know, to to judge yourself and say, Well, what what what makes, you know, ticking, you ticking? I believe that I have the patience uh to show to others without arrogance that food is a good thing, you can prepare it without to be uh the king or feeling the king. And if incidentally they give you prizes for that, that's fine.

Presenter28:16

Uh

Presenter28:17

And what also do you get from we were talking earlier about um you know the activity of making things, of of the the clay that you sculpt with, of the whittling of

Antonio Carluccio28:26

That's a fantastic thing to play with your hand and transform material to produce something valuable.

Antonio Carluccio28:34

Either transform a piece of wood into something lovely to look at it, or useful as well, because the walking stick you walk with it.

Antonio Carluccio28:42

The the rest, the the clay, that give me a lot of satisfaction, but I still have to find time for that.

Antonio Carluccio28:49

I have a lot to do.

Presenter28:51

Tell me about your next piece of music, okay?

Antonio Carluccio28:52

The next piece of music, it's a wonderful one.

Antonio Carluccio28:57

Dance of the night, proc offev, uh Rome and Jules. And I was there in the celebration of um the the birthday. Do you know that I have an office answering all the letters of the lovers in the world?

Presenter28:59

Yeah.

Antonio Carluccio29:09

Have you got a

Presenter29:09

Have you ever had occasion to write to them on Monday?

Antonio Carluccio29:11

No, I'm afraid not. But they know me very well.

Antonio Carluccio29:14

Now, pro coffee is bum ba bum ba bum bum boom. Shall we hear it? Yes.

Presenter29:19

Let's do that.

Presenter30:14

Dance of the Nights from Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet. Now you don't have any children of your own, Antonia, but you do have step grandchildren. Five. Five. Is it right that they call you Grandpa Sep?

Antonio Carluccio30:21

Vi

Antonio Carluccio30:24

Yeah.

Antonio Carluccio30:25

Because they have to distinguish between the two grandpadres. I am the third one and they have grandpa sapp.

Presenter30:29

I see.

Presenter30:33

I think you would be pretty good on an island, because of course I'm going to send you to this island to be cast away. You would be a forager. You would be somebody who would find it.

Antonio Carluccio30:37

This island.

Antonio Carluccio30:40

Well, it depends where the island is, yeah. Oh, yes, I would, yes. Anything, herbs and roots and whatsoever. Even the top of uh thistle. Is it well pronounced?

Presenter30:51

Thistle, yes. Well it's nice to say thistle, I think.

Antonio Carluccio30:54

And you can take the top and very carefully peel it and it look just like an asparagus when it's very juicy and nice.

Presenter31:01

Antonio, I have to tell you, it'd be a brave man that would eat a thistle.

Antonio Carluccio31:04

Like this, yes, but when you peep it, it's okay.

Presenter31:07

And what about your your uh step grandchildren? Do you teach them? Do you teach them?

Antonio Carluccio31:10

A little bit at the time, yes. The other day I took one o to stealing.

Antonio Carluccio31:16

I can tell you that uh in

Antonio Carluccio31:18

Foraging for saints you don't refrain from stealing a little bit.

Presenter31:22

As long as the farmers don't catch you.

Presenter31:25

And on the island then

Presenter31:27

You'd be probably quite happy, would you happy with the one company you quite like? Yeah.

Antonio Carluccio31:34

Yes, I would.

Presenter31:34

Yes, I

Presenter31:35

And are you s are you somebody with a, you know, a happy disposition? I mean, would you get mel melancholic on the island?

Antonio Carluccio31:41

A little bit of melancholy is not bad, but um

Antonio Carluccio31:45

Um I will need another person, yes.

Presenter31:48

Too bad. You're not gonna have one. Tell me about your final piece of news.

Antonio Carluccio31:50

A piece of music.

Antonio Carluccio31:51

My final piece of music is very funny. I like animals and this is dedicated to them, the Carnival of the Animals by uh Sansong.

Antonio Carluccio32:01

Fantasy.

Presenter32:57

The finale to St. Son's Carnival of the Animals I'm going to cast you away, Antonio, and I'm going to give you the Bible and the complete works of Shakspere, and you're allowed to take another book. What do you want?

Antonio Carluccio33:09

Mm I will reread with pleasure the trilogy of Philip Pullman.

Presenter33:13

Ah well, you may have that his dark materials, indeed.

Antonio Carluccio33:16

Yes.

Presenter33:17

And a luxury too. What will the luxury be?

Antonio Carluccio33:22

Actually you said I can't take a person because luxury would be my wife.

Presenter33:26

Yes, you absolutely cannot do that, under any circumstances.

Presenter33:30

Bye.

Antonio Carluccio33:31

And he put to g

Presenter33:31

Any particular truffle? Any

Antonio Carluccio33:32

White Ruffle from Alba.

Antonio Carluccio33:35

One that lasts very, very long.

Presenter33:37

So would you like one big truffle or lots of small truffles?

Antonio Carluccio33:39

No, no. Lots of uh about fifty grams one. Fantastic.

Presenter33:43

And how would you store that truffle?

Antonio Carluccio33:45

Now there's a point, one that lasts very long. It would be very difficult. Probably I would have the pleasure for a few days and then that's it.

Presenter33:51

Okay.

Presenter33:52

But you'd have the memory. And if I were to force you to pick any disc of the eight, if you only had one to choose, which one of these eight

Antonio Carluccio33:59

To keep me very, very sort of happy. The last one.

Presenter34:06

The song

Antonio Carluccio34:06

Sounds so. Yeah.

Presenter34:07

Antonio Carluccio, thank you very much for letting us hear the president of you.

Antonio Carluccio34:09

Yeah.

Presenter34:17

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.