We must, he advises, start with the lamb chops (£4.80) and chicken tikka (£2.80) The chops are large, splendid, wonderfully spiced The chicken tikka comes in fat, juicy chunks Charles loves this place. More miraculous still, the prices have stayed lower than you would believe possible.”The place is absolutely heaving A small plate of salady things is put on our table Always look closely at salady things, says Charles You can tell a lot by salady things. Do they look fresh? Are the colours good? If they look as if they’ve been chopped hours ago – have that slightly opaque sheen – then forget it These salady things, I agree, are as zingy as anything. Anyone who says I have already cheated by hiding a round of fried bread under my napkin doesn’t know what they are talking about.LUNCHLunch is at the New Tayyab, (page 170, 83-89 Fieldgate Street E1, 020-7247 6400), which is described as offering: “Straightforward Pakistani fare: good, freshly cooked and served without pretension.

“A personal fitness trainer?” “A personal fatness trainer, more like!” He says he does usually go to a gym three times a week, which is a good job, “As otherwise I would be seriously overweight, ha, ha!” We don’t have to wait long for a cab, which is excellent, as we have a lunch to get to, and it is bad to skip meals. It’s not a wig, I know, but he does have that ability some men have to make their own hair look like one “It’s good to have a little walk,” he says “It clears the tubes.” “What are you?” I ask. Bit dull, the people of Derbyshire.”We clean our plates, wipe our greasy mouths, pay and walk to the corner for a cab Charles walks like a lovely big bear wearing a small toupee. “I cooked modern British, which was just too far ahead for the people of Derbyshire They judge everything on the size and quantity of the chips Something to do with carbohydrates and feeling the cold. “Wonderful things, trotters,” he exclaims.After a successful career in advertising – hard work, you know the sort of thing, taking four birds off to the Maldives to shoot a Bounty ad, but someone had to do it – he did, for a few years, run his own hotel/restaurant in Buxton Alas, though, it was a disaster, and he ended up going bust It wasn’t his food It won acclaim from critics It was the customers.

Will you forgive me if I just have a quick retch? He is fond, he continues, of slow and double-cooked dishes, the kind that take two or three days to prepare He always does his own oxtails, tongues and trotters. Take a bucket of pig’s blood, wait for it to congeal, remove veins with fingers…” How utterly charming, Charles. “I always do a Sunday lunch and there is always a guest, even if it is only granny.” He probably has 2,000 cookbooks but his favourites are The Gloucester Catering College Manual and one called Farmhouse Fare “It’s recipes from farmers Good for black pudding. What did they do? Sneaked off to make themselves beans on toast, the ungrateful toads.Anyway, Charles is certainly the cook at home. The other evening he made steaks, with spaghetti carbonara as an alternative. The teenage children can drive him potty, as teenage children always can. She also made wonderful sweetbreads casseroled in a parsley and onion sauce which I still make today.” He lives, now, in Worcester with his wife, Sylvia, two teenage children, four chickens, five ducks, two cats and a dog.

“My father’s favourite dish was kidneys turbigo, which she would make for him, and it’s a very advanced dish. “Lovely creamy egg.”His mother, Meriel, was the most wonderful cook. “People will ask: ‘Why isn’t such-and-such restaurant in it?’ Why? Because I don’t bloody like it.” As for Michelin stars, well. “Why should a French tyre-maker have an opinion on British food?”We order, at £12 a go, the “Full Borough”: streaky bacon, Cumberland sausages, black pudding, tomato, field mushrooms, fried bread (two rounds), scrambled eggs I think it is only about 67,000 calories Just something to take the edge off, really “Really good sausages,” remarks Charles.

“A good restaurant is written on the faces of the customers.” He further adds that you should never, ever trust internet reviews. “Restaurants watch the sites and if they get a bad review they merely write two or three new ones to push the dodgy one out of sight.”His own guide, he continues, identifies only the London restaurants he considers to be the best If a place isn’t any good, then it simply isn’t in. He adds that you can often do 80 per cent of a review simply by walking into a restaurant. He later says he has never encountered any food he couldn’t eat. Although, that said: “I’m not too keen on chicken’s feet.” On a brighter note, though: “I do like duck’s tongues.” Are you a beer, wine or spirits man? “Yes,” he says.