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I am seated in a swish leather banquette, discreetly tucked away in the alcove of a bustling, sun-streaked restaurant in Waterloo, South London, just a stone's throw from the Old Vic Theatre, lunching with a very attractive, dynamic Welshwoman called Patricia Llewellyn—“Pat” to her friends—one of Great Britain's most enterprising independent television producers. I have known Pat for some time, having met her through her boyfriend, Ben Adler, also a television executive, with whom I had worked on a television project one year earlier. Pat owns a thriving company, Optomen Television, which supplies programs to the major terrestrial broadcasters in the United Kingdom, such as the British Broadcasting Corporation and Channel Four Television, and recently she has begun to conquer the world as well. Hugely creative, energetic, and successful—as well as charmingly self-effacing—Pat has specialized in making cookery programs, and in her time, she has discovered some of Great Britain's major chefs, most particularly Jamie Oliver—“The Naked Chef—now a super-chef here in the United Kingdom, and also the “Two Fat Ladies.” More recently, she has served as the brains behind several series of “restaurant transformation” programs featuring the increasingly popular entrepreneur, ex-footballer Gordon Ramsay, the twenty-first-century equivalent of Julia Child or Delia Smith … with bite.
In spite of having had years and years of psychoanalysis, I cannot boil an egg without experiencing high levels of anxiety, and so I remain very uncertain as to why this high priestess of grand cuisine has not only invited me to lunch, but seems intent on paying for it as well.