Jean-Christophe Novelli launches world-first at GP Masters

Further to the announcement last week that Britain’s biggest selling female artist Katie Melua will headline the close down party, GP Masters today announces the ‘world’s first edible paddock’ - an amazing 15ft oasis which will be providing fresh produce to be used by Jean-Christophe Novelli and his team of chefs as they cater for paddock guests at the Grand Prix Maters of Great Britain (12th – 13th August, Silverstone). Novelli is four-time Michelin star winner, top chef, TV star, and the man voted the ‘sexiest chef in the world’ by no less an organ as ‘The New York Times’!

"It is a ground-breaking concept," explains Novelli. "It enables me to have at my immediate disposal the most important commodity a chef requires, namely fresh, seasonal produce. To pick and then use what the garden offers, be it herbs, vegetables or fruit is so important to the way I cook. To be able to do so in an environment that is so pleasing to the eye simply adds to the experience and fuels my creative passion. This is why I have built an edible garden even at my home, where my Academy is. What I particularly like about creating ‘The Edible Paddock’ is that it provides a fantastic contrast between the heat, the noise, the smoke, and the tarmac of the circuit at Silverstone, and the green, pleasant and natural oasis found just a few metres away in the paddock."

The 45-year-old from Arras, in Northern France, is one of the most recognisable chefs in the world. At the moment his diary is incredibly full. A regular guest on various TV shows, he also co-presents ITV1's Saturday morning show, ‘Saturday Cooks Live’, and hosts ‘Food Uncut’ on UKTV. He was, of course, one of the two resident cooks in series two of ITV's hugely successful ‘Hell's Kitchen’, and even spent two weeks high in the snow-capped Andes earlier in the year to record Channel 5's "Alive", a recreation of the horrific plane crash involving a Chilean rugby team back in the 1970s. His range of kitchen ware with Arthur Price is readily available, he has launched his chain of gastropubs, and runs his hugely successful Novelli Academy from his beautiful farmhouse situated just outside Luton in the Hertfordshire countryside. His next likely venture, a series of books, is currently in the pipeline.

Apart from his love of food, one of Novelli's other passions happens to be motor racing: "I think all the drivers are heroes," Novelli admits. "I used to love watching the great French drivers, especially Alain Prost. I gather Rene Arnoux will be at the

GP Masters of Great Britain and I will make sure we get to meet each other. Niki Lauda was another exceptional person. And then there was Nigel Mansell. I'll never forget watching his tyre blow at 200 mph during the Australian Grand Prix in 1996. How he managed to control his car down that straight with his tyres exploding, and knowing that it had just cost him the world title, I'll never know."

Perhaps Novelli can ask the man himself at 200 mph! The two are planning a fast lap of Silverstone in the 600 bhp GP Masters two-seater race car. Mansell is taking to the wheel, of course, with the Frenchman sitting right behind him, although if Novelli had it his way, it would be the other way round. "Oh, I'd much rather be the one doing the driving," he explains. "I am a much better driver than passenger, and I would feel a lot more comfortable being in control of the car, rather than having someone else driving. Mind you, if you're going to have someone else driving you around Silverstone at those speeds, you could do worse than have Nigel Mansell in charge!”

Indeed you could. The only other problem Novelli faces is being able to tear himself away from the garages, the pits, and the grid, in order to serve up his sumptuous cuisine. "I intend to see as much as I possibly can," he tells you. "I will be everywhere. I will see the mechanics working in the garages, I will be inspecting the cars as they line up on the grid, and I will be watching the start with great excitement. "And then? ”Oh, well then I will be serving a thousand or so guests from my ‘Edible Paddock’.

Like all great practitioners, he makes it sound so easy.