Inside the world of Heston Blumenthal

Heston Blumenthal. Photo: Getty

He's a three-Michelin starred chef with an OBE who earlier this year sent a bacon sandwich into space for NASA, but Heston Blumenthal, 49, doesn't have expensive taste when it comes to his guilty pleasure. "Prawn cocktail," he tells WHO of what he craves, adding that if it's in his fridge and he opens the door, it's "like a little siren" calling to him. "But it's supermarket prawns and a mayonnaise tub, dirty old cheap prawn cocktail in a tub." He reserves that pleasure of for himself though, and it's not what he'd serve an unannounced guest for lunch at home: "There's normally not a lot in my fridge but there's a lot in my store cupboard. OK, I'd either do tuna salad or carbonara."

Heston's Easter Sunday lunch. Photo: Heston Instagram

Despite his reputation as a perfectionist, Blumenthal, who has three grown-up children, insists he's not scary. "I have a temper like everybody and it used to be quite bad," he says, "but I did cranial massage therapy many years ago and it really worked with my temper."

To relax, he also loves skiing and watching Family Guy but doesn't have trouble turning off his inventive brain to sleep at night. "I used to have to go to bed with a pencil and paper, just because if I woke up I'd need to get something down on paper. I don't sleep that much but I'm a lot better now. I might sleep five or six hours—it used to be two."

Is he a workaholic? "Although I work a lot, I'd never call myself that."

Last year Blumenthal moved his flagship UK restaurant The Fat Duck from Bray, Berkshire, to Melbourne for six months, and the experience is traced in SBS's four-part Inside Heston's World (premieres March 31, 8.30PM.)

Heston Blumenthal. Photo: Heston Instagram

He says his fast-paced lifestyle and need to keep challenging himself is motivated by "questioning everything—I love learning, I love invention, I love playfulness" and adds he's never, ever bored: "I used to be. I've changed a lot. I wasn't very good at my own company before, I always had to be doing something with someone. I always used to say I was driven by fear of failure. Now failure is fantastic. Failure is an opportunity for learning."