A Palace Chef on What the Royal Family Really Eats

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Robb began her royal career in the Kensington Palace kitchen. There, from 1989 to 2000, she fed Prince Charles, Princess Diana, and Princes William and Harry.

After leaving the palace to work in catering and as a personal chef, Robb finally wrote a cookbook of her own. Titled "The Royal Touch," it hits shelves today and includes favored recipes from her time with the royal family. Racked chatted with Robb to find out how she got the gig, which ingredients were verboten, and what it was like teaching a young Harry and William to make spaghetti.

How on earth did you land a job at Kensington Palace?

While I was at Cordon Bleu Cookery, just outside London, a job came up at Kensington Palace with the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester, cousins of the Queen’s. I was invited to interview for that. I got the job and they lived right next door to the Prince and Princess of Wales (in the palace, in their own apartment). After about 18 months cooking for the Duke and Duchess, Prince Charles and Princess Diana came for dinner. Shortly afterwards, I was offered a job with them! I was in the right place at the right time.

Did you only cook at the Palace?

Wherever they were, I went and cooked, so at Kensington Palace, at their country house at Highgrove. They traveled a lot so there was plenty of packing and moving food around. We might have had lunch in London and dinner in Scotland. We had to be really organized and a little bit ahead so we could plan.

A letter from Diana. Photo: The Royal Touch

Was there anything you were told never to make?

The only thing that was forbidden was garlic. And the reason for that was that they obviously did a lot of public engagements and were in close proximity to people and never wanted to have garlic.

What were some of their favorite foods?

Prince Charles loved to have game from his hunting. At Highgrove, they’d grow their own fruit and vegetables, so almost everything was homegrown. That was the kind of thing he liked most of all—things from the garden, from the estate. Both he and Princess Diana had a really healthy diet.

Did you have to count calories to make sure they stayed trim?

No, nothing like that. But it was a healthy diet in terms of everything being homemade. Everything was from scratch: bread, pasta, ice cream, as well as ingredients like mayonnaise. As a chef, it’s a real privilege where you’re in a job where you’re able to do that type of stuff!

Would you consider the cooking to be super fancy?

Surprisingly [not]. A lot of the product came from the garden. Lamb would come from the estate, milk would come from the cows on the estates. The pheasants and game were shot so that was no cost and the wild mushrooms, we’d pick and use them throughout the year. It was quite economical, the way the kitchen was run. We would do more extravagant things if we were entertaining.

Photo: The Royal Touch

What were meals like? I’m picturing a formal event, like something on Downton Abbey.

It depended. If they were entertaining then yes, it was much more formal than you and I would have: butlers would serve the meal to the table and the food was on silver platters. But if it was just the Highnesses' meal for two in the evening, it was much more informal. It would possibly be sitting on trays in the front of the fire.

Did you ever use any ultra-luxurious ingredients?

A lot of people’s impression of [their] food is that it’s upscale, like always with caviar. But they really didn’t have that kind of diet at all. When they were home, they preferred really simple, fresh, homemade meals. We had things like wild mushrooms, though, that we’d actually pick on the estate in Scotland. Each summer we’d go out there and pick them and dry them and freeze them so we’d have them throughout the year. Sometimes they were given caviar and truffles as a gift and so we’d use that, but we would never buy [those]. I think it might surprise people that [Prince Charles] was conscious of things like that.

Is it true the royal family packs up leftovers in Tupperware?

Yes, the prince was very economical and very much believed that nothing should go to waste. If there were leftovers, they’d be used one way or another. If not for him, then rehashed and used for a meal the following day. But we were always quite careful: he never wanted to have huge amounts of food on the plate. They were always very thrifty and economical. If we made roasted lamb and there was leftovers, we’d probably go and make Shepard’s pie the next night.

Talk to me about Prince Harry and Prince William; were they picky eaters as kids?

They were amazingly good. Princess Diana was the one who decided what they were going to eat. Like all children, they had their things they liked to eat, but they’d eat roast chicken, Shepard’s pie, homemade fish fingers. And quite early on, they started eating game. At a young age, they tried to get the boys to eat things that everyone was eating so that later on in their lives they could go off and be in weird, wonderful places eating weird, wonderful things.

Photo: The Royal Touch

Did you cook for the queen? What did she like?

Yes, I did a few times. She came for lunch at Highgrove and to a few major charity events at the Buckingham Palace. I think she has a fairly simple, traditional English diet. I remember cooking pheasant on one occasion. Like Prince Charles, she enjoyed eating produce that was from one of her estates and things that were home-produced.

Was it scary to cook for the Queen? Or Princess Diana?

Yes, it was pretty terrifying, really. But you’re so busy working hard to make sure that everything was perfect that there really wasn’t any time to be nervous.

Did you ever have any massive screw ups?

Well, no—never any major disasters. Once, we had a trip to a castle in Wales and I hadn’t been to that castle, but I obviously had to plan the menu before we got there to bring all the ingredients and equipment. When I got there, the kitchen was an absolute broom cupboard—and a lengthy walk from the dining room. But obviously the menu had been decided and printed already because we had formal dinners. I had a soufflé on the menu the first night, and things like that can be a nightmare because they have to go straight from the oven to the table. I had the butler literally running down the corridor trying to get the soufflé to the table. You don’t really envision getting yourself into that until you visit one of these old castles and find yourself down in the dungeons.

We had a big charity event in a tent in a field in the middle of nowhere once, and we rented equipment and had these massive ovens. When we tried to get the dessert out, the handle broke off and we couldn’t get them out! We had a bit of a mad dash to try and quickly throw something else together in ten minutes.

Was there anyone in the royal family that wanted to cook? If they did, could they, or was that not an option?

Yes. The kitchen was there and they could have cooked if they wanted to. When the boys were quite young, they used to like to come into the kitchen and we did stuff with them like cookies and meringues. As they got older they were really quite interested in learning to cook, even in college. They had access to a kitchen, I think, at the age of 15. When they came home from school on weekends they’d ask me to teach them how to cook spaghetti bolognese or other recipes they were allowed to make themselves. For the most part, they didn’t cook on their own.

Photo: The Royal Touch

Do you know anything about the current royal chef for Kate?

As far as I understand, they don’t have a chef at the moment. They have a small household and can fend for themselves. They’ll probably want to do that for as long as they can. Have a normal family life because that will really change when you have butlers and nannies and cooks around, the house is no longer your own. I'm sure they want to just be leading a normal family life.

Wait, so Kate is cooking for her family?

Yes, Kate does quite a lot of the cooking at the moment. You have to remember that she’s not royal. She comes from a normal background and a normal home where she’s always cooked for herself. And what I’ve always heard is that William enjoys spending time with her family because they just eat together at the kitchen table like a normal family. I’m sure that that’s what they still do.