Sid Owen's France

Tell me about your passion for cooking
I’ve always loved cooking and I grew up with good food. My uncle was a keen chef and my brothers enjoyed cooking as well. It was always drummed into us to eat healthily. We grew up in Islington close to Chapel Market and we ate a staple diet of meat and veg. My mum died young so my brother and I had to cook for ourselves.

How did you come to own a restaurant in Aubeterre-sur-Dronne?
I was actually thinking of buying a holiday home and the restaurant came up. I’d always fancied the idea of having a restaurant and just jumped in at the deep end.

How easy was it to open the restaurant?
It was difficult dealing with French bureaucracy. Local officials can be quite laid back so their hours took some getting used to.

How easy was it to fit into French rural life?
It suited me straightaway. I quite like just kicking back and chilling out really, doing nothing, having long lunches and soaking up the Charente sunshine.

What food did you serve in the restaurant?
It was a bit of everything really. A good mixture of dishes I’ve learned to cook – a bit of French, Italian, Thai and English.

Where did your clients come from?
All over actually. In that part of the world everywhere is a drive but I had good regular customers who would travel 40 minutes to eat there. There were a lot of English as well as Dutch and French, the odd American and Japanese. It was a good mixture really.

Where did you source your ingredients?
It was all local and I did all the buying. The meat was from the local abattoir, the duck was from the local duck farm and we had a local guy who grew organic salads, tomatoes and herbs so it was all sourced locally. That was the beauty of it because there is so much farmland, a lot of people grow their own so even local people who came into the restaurant would hand us their overgrown produce.

Why did you sell the restaurant?
The restaurant was a great experience – really hard work – but things got busy back in England so I decided to sell it.

What's your favourite French dish or ingredient?
I really got into the duck over there – the magret. I also like the confit de canard. It was on every menu. You don’t really get it in the supermarkets over here. I really liked the Périgordian salads with foie gras.

How well do you know other parts of France?
I’ve been so many times. When I first got down there I tended to go to the coast, Bordeaux. I used to go to Brittany years ago. It’s such a big place that you take it for granted.

Is there a particular part of France that you really like?
I love Saint-Émilion and Arcachon is lovely as well. All of it really – it’s so picturesque. It’s beautiful in Charente. You can drive for an hour and not even hit a traffic light. When all the sunflowers are out, it looks lovely.

What aspects of French life do you enjoy the most?
Just the laziness. It’s funny but when you do nothing in France the day still goes quite quickly really. When I was busy at the restaurant I’d go home, entertain and cook – it was nice not having to leave the house sometimes as well.

How good is your French now?
It’s not bad. It could be better but I get by. As long as you try with the French that’s what’s important. They pick up on that and you get accepted a lot more easily.