Picture it: you're a classically-trained, Savoy Hotel chef who's climbed his way from a chef-de-partie saucier to a chef inside Buckingham Palace. All your hard work has paid off, and you get to cook for the elitist of the elite.
You get there, and an eight-year-old boy is telling you how to make bacon properly. Oh, and that boy is none other than Prince Harry. That's exactly the situation Darren McGrady found himself in some two decades ago.
"It was after [the Royal Family] came back from Walt Disney World, and I had cooked bacon for breakfast," McGrady tells Food & Wine. "We serve the same bacon you can get in the states, and I broil it just the same."
He continues: "But Prince Harry said to me, 'We had it in America at Disney World, and it's so crispy you can snap it. You have to broil it first, and then you have to put it in some paper towels and place it in the microwave for a minute.' And I thought 'Yeah, OK, thank you, you little brat, teaching me how to cook'. But as soon as he was gone, I tried it, and I got this amazingly crispy bacon."
It turns out bacon-cooking advice wasn't the only thing Prince Harry gave McGrady, who says he was inspired by Prince Harry's favorite foods when he developed the recipes in his newest cookbook, The Royal Chef at Home: Easy Seasonal Entertaining.
Once McGrady learned the "correct" way to make bacon, he says he never deviated from Prince Harry's recipe, whether he cooked the crisps alongside eggs and toast or used them to top peanut butter and jelly muffins that Prince Harry and his older brother, Prince William, adored. Now, you also know the right way to cook bacon—thank you, Prince Harry.
While his childhood sounds like it was filled with glorious treats, there were a few things Harry missed out on. On a trip to a British nature reserve recently, he revealed that he'd never "toasted marshmallows over a campfire". "They're too sweet for me," he said.
He added: "[I have] made campfires and slept under the stars more than I've slept in a bed, but never made toasted marshmallows." With this, it must mean he's never made s'mores! I think Harry's jumping the gun here.
The internet was horrified to hear that Harry has missed out on this childhood favorite, but it's why he may not potentially like s'mores. The charred coating undercuts a lot of the sweetness literally from the first bite, but I guess the sweetness is still a little intense at times.
The blood sugar rush from the first bite just brings back so many memories, if you don't have that association, it's understandable why you would want to eschew this sweet treat in your adult life. Maybe Meghan will change his mind on the matter.
