I don’t care if you are royal. Get out!
And don’t call me a ‘paddy’, says top chef Corrigan
AS Meghan Markle prepares to tell Oprah about her feelings of racism from the UK’s royal family, one of our top chefs in London reveals how he handles it.
Richard Corrigan kicked a senior royal out of his prestigious London restaurant – but first made her pay her bill.
The Co. Meath celebrity chef has told how he was forced to confront anti-Irish racism as he was preparing to feed the rich and famous, but he had no compunction about doing it.
Ever the gentleman, Richard refuses to name the royal – he would only confirm that it was a female – who derisively referred to him as a ‘paddy’.
However, he explained: ‘I have witnessed very little racism, or racist kind of remarks, to me in over 33 years of living and working in London.
‘I mean, there were the odd times that they did pass comments. There’s been a few times a minor member of the royal family called me “Paddy”.’
Referring to the incident in his up-market restaurant , he said: ‘I made her pay her bill and kicked her out on the street, so that word goes around very quickly.’ The 57-year-old chef added: ‘I’ve always associated racism and comments like that with the bullies, so if you give it straight back into their eyes, they tend to shut up and go away, and stay quiet around you.’
However, he also said that the prejudice he might face today would be nothing compared to that which Irish immigrants, travelling to Britain for work, had to deal with in the past.
‘It has happened in the previous generation going there [to London], the Irish people that went there in the Fifties and in
‘I associate racism with bullying’
the Sixties, they got it between their two eyes.’
Yesterday, Corrigan, pictured, said he would not name the royal in question or say any more on the matter. Friends say he does not want to do anything to damage his businesses, which include such successful restaurants as Corrigan’s Mayfair, Bentley’s Oyster Bar and Grill, and Bentley’s Sea Grill in Harrods.