I have lived in a restaurant atmosphere my whole life. When I was a child, my parents ran a local bistro – the Genas, in Lyon. We lived in the flat above it.

On school days, my mother would drop us off, then go shopping for the plat du jour – she was the cook, and my dad ran the front of house. My brother Cédric and I were lucky enough to be able to come home for lunch. We’d eat in the kitchen, then help our parents do the lunch service before going back to school for the afternoon.

The dishes my mother made were straightforward and seasonal, following what she’d find at the market in the morning. Simple snacks, steak, tripe ... in Lyon there is a lot of pork.

In the autumn, she’d often make a kind of savoury cake, and serve it with a green salad. I loved the cheesiness, and the salt from the smoked bacon. We serve something similar now, a salty loaf made with pigs ears, which we serve alongside a tripe gratin. Crunchy on the outside with a soft, moist crumb. Delicious.

Our flat was a fairly classic three-bed, with a kitchen we hardly ever used – my mother was always downstairs in the restaurant kitchen, and my brother and I were usually outside. From my parents I learned the importance of simplicity, respect for good produce, and a solid work ethic. My mother taught me that being a chef was hard work and that if you were going to do it, you had to do it right.

I left school at 15 and chose to go to catering school. I did my apprenticeship at Brasserie Leon de Lyon. After this, I spent the next few years working my way around many professional kitchens, and eventually worked in Paris for Alain Ducasse and Alain Passard. I moved to the UK in 1997.

My brother and I were really close when we were younger – still are. He’s younger than me. As kids, we’d spend our days on our bikes with our friends, leaving early in the morning and coming home late at night. We never watched TV.

We lived in a working-class neighbourhood, which we knew really well. I remember we found an abandoned house once that we liked to play in. We were very lucky – it was a good childhood.

Sundays we’d spend at home en famille, and that was wonderful. It was the only day of the week when our lounge got any use. Nowadays I still find it difficult to go out on a Sunday evening – being at home with my family is all I really want to do. A traditional roast dinner, coupled with a decent pint of bitter, always wins hands down at my house. It’s the English part of me – which is very much here to stay.

Pigs’ ears savoury cake

This is best made 24-48 hours before you want to eat it.

Serves 12
60g butter, at room temperature
60g parmesan
2 eggs, whisked
125g flour
1 tsp baking powder
25g flat-leaf parsley, chopped
2 tsp olive oil
1 tbsp dijon mustard
350g pigs ears (precooked and thinly sliced) or 250g lardons
Green salad leaves, to serve

1 Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/gas mark 4. Cream the softened butter together with the parmesan until white and fluffy. Slowly add the eggs, flour and baking powder, a little each at a time. Fold in the parsley, oil, mustard and pigs ears or lardons. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

2 Spoon the mixture into a lined bread tin and bake for 30 minutes, then drop the oven temperature to 160C/325F/gas mark 3 for 40-45 minutes, or until a knife inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.

Claude Bosi has two Michelin stars for his restaurant Hibiscus in London. He is collaborating with Terence Conran on a new restaurant in Chelsea’s Bibendum building, set to open in Spring 2017. He is also UK and Ireland mentor chef for S.Pellegrino Young Chef 2016.

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