When you think of royals, a lavish lifestyle often comes to mind. Being followed by the paparazzi, travelling to exotic locales for "royal visits," eating exclusive meals in expensive china, those exquisite ensembles with elaborate hats and sometimes even riding chariots is what everyone thinks of.
While the royals are often known to be high-brow, a former Kensington Palace chef, who worked for the British Royals for 11 years, has said that the family's eating habits were in fact quite normal. Carolyn Robb cooked for Prince Charles, Princess Diana, and Prince William and Harry at the Royal household between 1989 and 2000.
In an interview with Racked, Robb said that exclusive meals were never really on the menu and the Royals "didn't really have that kind of diet at all." She explained that the royal family preferred simple and homemade meals like anyone else and often included produce, such as fresh mushrooms, from their estate in their meals.
"A lot of the products came from the garden. Lamb would come from the estate, milk would come from the cows on the estates. The pheasants and game were shot so that was no cost and the wild mushrooms, we'd pick and use them throughout the year," Robb added.
"It was quite economical, the way the kitchen was run. We would do more extravagant things if we were entertaining."
However, she did say that the dining affair was not always simple and the Royals did consume caviar and truffles at times.
Strangely, there was also one ingredient that the Royals religiously avoided and that was garlic. "The only thing that was forbidden was garlic. And the reason for that was that they obviously did a lot of public engagements and were in close proximity to people and never wanted to have garlic," Robb explained.
The chef also said that Prince Charles was very economical and did not like wasting food, due to which all the leftovers were saved and used for some purpose of the other. "He never wanted to have huge amounts of food on the plate. They were always very thrifty and economical. If we made roasted lamb and there was leftovers, we'd probably go and make Shepard's pie the next night."
Robb also said that Prince William and Prince Harry were "amazingly good" and it was their mother who decided what they would eat. "Like all children, they had their things they liked to eat, but they'd eat roast chicken, Shepard's pie, homemade fish fingers," Robb added.
