With his help, I chose black-bean veneer for the cupboards and lava-stone worktops and splashbacks. The splashbacks continue up the walls to the height of the wall cupboards - which looks quite sleek. My appliances are all stainless steel, which breaks up the woodiness well, and in the middle is a long island, with a split-level worktop. I often come straight in from work, arriving later than planned, at the same time as my guests. With this layout, I can cook for my friends while they sit at the bar and watch me and gossip.The design for the kitchen was done by a fantastic designer, Rupert Lacey, who runs a company called Food Furniture, and who is an old Sussex friend of mine.
Lucy Gemmell set up the catering business Rhubarb 10 years ago. It provides food for celebrities, such as Elton John and the Earl and Countess of Wessex. She lives with her husband and two children in a six-bedroom terraced house in Balham, south London. We moved from our last house in Battersea, as we needed a bigger house and chose Balham because it's commutable. My business headquarters are minutes away, in Wandsworth, so the journey to work is quick and easy. At Rhubarb, we create beautifully presented, cutting-edge menus for top-end clients, catering for parties, premieres, weddings, corporate dinners and so on, for any number of people from 10 to 800. I employ eight of the best full-time chefs and have immediate access to 20 or 30 more.When we bought the house, it was perfectly liveable in, but soulless and very "Balhamish".
We immediately knocked the wall down to open up a huge kitchen and dining room and extended the kitchen into the side-return to widen it. I love the idea of open-plan living for this part of the house. Apart from all the fun they had in preparing and planting their plot, they were amazed at the amount for fresh fruit and veg it eventually produced. "We've been on a bit of a learning curve and didn't really know what to expect during the first year," explains Alex. "I think initially we overextended ourselves a bit by overplanting, which meant that it became a bit manic later on in the year."But all their hard work eventually paid off and they ended up with an astonishing variety of bumper crops including rhubarb, raspberries, herbs, potatoes, parsnips, onions, carrots, pumpkins, peppers, broccoli and courgettes.Their shopping bills were dramatically slashed, their culinary habits were seasonally adapted and their surplus supplies offloaded on to grateful friends or converted into Christmas presents in the form of chutneys and pickles."Looking back, we've absolutely no regrets about taking the allotment on," says Jonathan.
