Last updated 16:56, Friday, 23 May 2008

I was born five or six miles away from Sharrow Bay at Stockbridge, Tirril. It was a mixed dairy farm and my father worked there. I enjoyed making something and then eating it at the end of the day. We did breads. I can remember, all the girls’ came up and mine was still at the bottom of the bowl.

Colin Akrigg with sons Rhys and Kai

He was the tractor man. The first school I went to was just across from where the Oasis holiday park is now.

I can remember my first day, when I was five. It was horrendous. Going from the farm, where we were isolated, into school, was quite a shock.

I hid behind the teacher’s desk. It was a total shock seeing so many people coming in. That really sticks in my mind.

Another memory was that I was singled out because I wouldn’t really sing, and I was asked to sing on my own.

Then I went to the Boys County School, along from QEGS [Queen Elizabeth Grammar School]. I remember I got caught running over some desks and got the ruler across my knuckles.

I was quite shy. I used to have quite a bad stammer and had to go to speech therapy.

If you were asked a question you would never put your hand up – I was that type of character. It’s funny to think you can be so timid and then you can come into this type of world that I work in now and get near the top of the field. It just shows what you can do and how you can become more confident.

I took the 11-plus and failed it. I used to hate exams and used to get myself worked up about it.

I went to Ullswater school. It was a boys’ school with the girls’ school opposite. The move from a school with 80 pupils to the big school was an horrendous day. I just kept my head down and got on with the work.

I loved maths, history and geography and did extremely well in those, but I didn’t like English; I just couldn’t take the spellings.

I was going to be a carpenter. Then we had a careers film at the school and it showed the Royal Navy catering corps on the ships. I decided then, I’m going to go to catering school.

I went to see the headteacher to ask about going to the catering department at the girls’ school one morning a week for lessons.

It was Miss Armstrong who taught us there. There was only one other lad in the class. It was very, very strange in a class of all girls. It was quite daunting. But I enjoyed what we were learning. It was what I wanted to do.

By that time my father was a manager at the Milk Marketing Board. He had a choice of taking over my grandfather’s farm and if he had made that decision to go there that would have been it; I would probably have gone into farming.

I had never done any cooking at home. It came as a bolt out of the blue. I was good with my hands – I used to make chairs and bowls – and they thought I was going to do woodwork. So it was a bit of a shock to them when I said I wanted to go to the girls’ school and learn to cook.

I was 14 when I started that class. I decided to leave without taking my exams. I was 15. And then there was the opportunity for the job at Sharrow Bay. I had never heard of the place before that. I didn’t know anything about its reputation.

I had the interview and Francis Coulson was quite worried about the size of me and whether I would be physically strong enough, because I was just 5ft 2in, and seven stone.

I had to wait three months for my uniform because there were none small enough and they had to have it made.

I was just a commis chef, doing the washing up and cleaning. I was right at the bottom. It was good. I thought I was rich. I got £7 per week.

That first winter I started at Kendal College to do block release and get my catering exams. That was daunting going away from home. It used to be upsetting. I had to stay in digs in Kendal. It was quite an emotional time when I had to get the bus down there.

I finished the college course when I was 17 and just kept going up until there was Mr Coulson and Juan Martin (head chef). I worked with Juan for 38 years until he retired. I was about 23 when I was put up to come alongside Juan as second chef.

In those days you worked a six day, 60 hours plus week.

I never regret not going on at school or to university. I wouldn’t want to work anywhere else. I would never have wanted to go on a TV programme. You don’t have to be Gordon Ramsay.

I’m a behind the scenes man. I’m happy to do my bit and if people enjoy what we are producing here, that’s good; we do a fairly decent job.

It’s about being determined to succeed. And if you make a mistake you have to be determined to rectify it next time. Do not feel a failure. We have all made mistakes. Years ago I curdled some mayonnaise, twice. I ended up in tears. Mr Coulson was saying, how have you done that? But it just gives you determination to do better.