Antonio Carluccio
Desert Island Discs: Archive 2005-2010
BBC
4.4 • 804 Ratings
🗓️ 6 July 2008
⏱️ 36 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Kirsty Young's castaway this week is the cook Antonio Carluccio. He's been hailed as perhaps the best Italian cook in Britain today and the flavours and methods he holds dear are the ones he learnt at his mother's knee, growing up in Northern Italy. The food he ate then was high quality, locally produced and carefully prepared - now, that's every chefs mantra, but when he arrived in Britain in the 1970s it was ground-breaking. Within a few years he'd taken over the Neal Street Restaurant in London's Covent Garden and turned it into an institution and now his highly successful cafes are scattered throughout Britain.
For him preparing and cooking food is a sensual act, so perhaps it's no surprise that in his spare time he whittles wood into intricately-patterned walking sticks and tries his hand at clay modelling too. It's all part of a life that, at its best, is a tactile, sensual experience.
[Taken from the original programme material for this archive edition of Desert Island Discs]
Favourite track: The Finale to The Carnival of the Animals by Camille Saint-Saëns Book: His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman Luxury: White truffles.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | You're about to listen to a BBC podcast, but this is about something else you might enjoy. |
| 0:05.4 | My name's Katie Lecky and I'm an assistant commissioner for on demand music on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:10.7 | The BBC has an incredible musical heritage and culture and as a music lover, I love being part of that. |
| 0:17.4 | With music on sounds, we offer collections and mixes for everything, from workouts to helping |
| 0:22.7 | you nod off, boogie in your kitchen, or even just a moment of calm. And they're all put together |
| 0:28.7 | by people who know their stuff. So if you want some expertly curated music in your life, |
| 0:34.9 | check out BBC Sounds. Hello, I'm Krista Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. |
| 0:41.8 | For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music. |
| 0:44.9 | The program was originally broadcast in 2008. |
| 1:08.1 | Music My castaway this week is the cook and restaurateur Antonio Carluccio. |
| 1:12.7 | Self-taught, the methods and flavors he holds dear, are those he learned at his mother's knee as he was growing up in northern Italy. He relished the food she made, high |
| 1:17.9 | quality, locally produced and carefully prepared. Now, that's every Keen Cook's mantra. But when he |
| 1:24.5 | brought his culinary skills to London in the 1970s, it was considered groundbreaking. |
| 1:29.8 | For more than a quarter of a century, he was the man behind the Neal Street restaurant. |
| 1:34.0 | He made it into an institution and has been hailed as perhaps the best Italian chef in Britain along the way. |
| 1:41.3 | Antonio Carlucia, you once said it wasn't your intention to educate but to |
| 1:45.8 | enthuse people about the taste of Italian food. What's the difference? There's a big difference. |
| 1:51.1 | If you transmit to other, you enthused this much better. It comes down simpler and the people |
| 1:58.6 | they receive it and and they adopt that. |
| 2:07.5 | My personal motto is moth-moth, which is minimum of fuss, maximum of flavour. |
| 2:10.1 | That's simple, yes, easy to remember. That simple. |
| 2:10.8 | But I mean, you do take a lot of care. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.