If I’ve had a bad day, which sometimes happens, I go for a late-evening walk down to the river. I live and work in Bermondsey, in south-east London, by the Thames. I go to the Millennium bridge and stand there, with no one around me. On one side is St Paul’s cathedral and on the other is Tate Modern, and I think: “How lucky am I?” It’s true: to see the city in all its beauty, with no one around, is just amazing. If you get there in the morning or afternoon or early evening, it’s full of thousands and thousands of people. But when there’s no one there, it’s just amazing. This is one of the things that makes me very happy.
I think I’m naturally quite a jolly person, but doing something for a living that I love helps. If you see me smiling and laughing in one of my restaurants, it’s because that’s my job and it makes me happy. I get to bring everyone together to have a good time, eating and drinking and enjoying – that is my life. And my work has allowed me to meet so many different kinds of people, from politicians to artists.
Being among people is the most important thing. I’ve always been sociable – people bring you happiness. Sometimes you meet someone with bad karma, but they don’t tend to stay in your life for long. My family is in Spain, but in the UK I have many friends who are like family to me now. And of course, I have my partner here and he makes me happy.
Going home to visit my family is a highlight for me, and I try to do it at least five times a year. I just go there and spend time with my mum in the kitchen, recuperate and enjoy cooking, eating, drinking and sleeping. It is wonderful to go to the countryside where I’m from in Extremadura, in western Spain. It’s stunning. Being in my dad’s vegetable garden brings me to life. When I visit in spring, whether I’m in the garden or wandering around town, the smell of orange blossom is something truly special.
I run two restaurants, with another on the way, and I fit in book-writing around that. But I want to be busy. I’m ambitious. I run on adrenaline and my partner sometimes says that if I’m not stressed about something, I’m stressed because I’m not stressed.
I always need something new to be working on. When I open a new restaurant or write a new book, seeing something coming into the world, something that wasn’t there before, is the best feeling. I say, “Wow, I did that, and people are enjoying it.”
Life is to enjoy. That’s the key – to have a good time with your friends and family and keep going. It’s easy to do that in London, a city where there are so many things to do.
José Pizarro was talking to Amy Fleming
