How We Met: Floella Benjamin and Anton Edelmann

Writer, TV presenter and businesswoman Floella Benjamin was born in Trinidad, and emigrated to Britain as a child. Although best known for `Playschool' in the 1970s, she also writes children's books and runs a production company with her husband, Keith Taylor. She lives in south-east London and has two children. Anton Edelmann, the award-winning chef and director of the Savoy, was born in Germany in 1952. Since moving to this country in 1976, he has written six cookery books, including `The Savoy Food and Drink Book', made frequent appearances as a judge on `Masterchef', and is currently filming a Carribbean cookery series for cable television with Floella Benjamin. He lives in Potter's Bar with his wife and three children

Floella Benjamin: I remember first meeting Anton as if it happened yesterday: he's such a wonderful character, you can't forget him.

In 1996 I was made chair of the Woman of the Year awards lunch; I wanted something that had my stamp on it for the menu. So I phoned the Savoy, where we were having the lunch, and said: "Can your chef present me with a Caribbean menu?", and they said of course. And Anton came back, very excited, and said he'd love to do it. On the menu was ackee and codfish with avocado, and Caribbean chicken with basmati rice and peas; pudding was exotic fruit sorbet. Wonderful. So I went for a tasting.

The ackee and codfish was out of this world - I've cooked it many times, but it surprised me. Then we had the chicken, which was - um - all right. Caribbean food has to be seasoned and left, you can't just season it and cook it straightaway - that's its secret. I said: "This isn't quite right - there's something missing. Can I see the chef?" So the banqueting manager went in to see the chef and came back to say he was terribly busy, he couldn't see me, and I said: "All right, I'll wait." An hour later I said: "Is the chef coming?" The manager went through again and came back looking battered, with a: "I'm terribly sorry, the chef is busy." I said: "I'll wait. I've got all day."

Eventually Anton came out, bustling along - he's got this funny walk. He didn't know me and he was probably expecting an older woman with a blue rinse, so I think there was an element of surprise involved. He approached me; I went: "Darling!"; he went: "Oh, darling!"; and we hit it off after that.

I told him what I wanted - that's what I love about Anton, he's so open to new suggestions and ideas, he's not one of these temperamental chefs who says: "That's the way I cook it and that's it." He said: "Tell me what's wrong. I won't cook something and say it's Caribbean, if you, the expert, know the difference." I wrote him a note to give to his children which said: "Please tell your daddy to cook well for me", with a big kiss! You can always win through with the kids. So he did it, and it was a hit at the lunch last October - everybody licked their plates.

A month or two after the lunch I suddenly thought: "Anton was really great, how would it be if I did a Caribbean cookery programme and a book with him?" and the phone rang and it was "Hello, Floella, it's Anton here". Isn't that spooky? So we got together and chatted and had lunch - it's such a privilege to sit in Anton's kitchen and have lunch. You taste his food and think "How could this be done?" It's like someone moulding a piece of putty - if you mould a piece of putty it might be ordinary, but someone else can make a beautiful sculpture out of it. You just think: "How can they do that?"

I find him very easy to get on with, but I think that's because I told him off the first time we met! Well, it wasn't really a telling-off situation but I think he probably thought: "This woman has got a strong character, she knows what she wants." Anton knows what he's after too, what he wants to achieve, so there's a mutual respect. He knows I don't suffer fools gladly. I love to give compliments, but if something isn't right I believe in telling the person. If the person wants to learn, we'll get on well together. I'm the same - I love people to tell me if I've done something wrong. That's one of the reasons why Anton and I get on, because we can tell each other - I'll say something and he'll say: "Oh, no, Floella, that was stupid", or whatever. We're quite open that way - we're not temperamental with each other.

You can never be fed up with Anton. He has a great sense of humour and he's a very deep person; there's much more to him than you see on the surface, and when you get to talk to him you realise he's a man who cares. He might seem frivolous sometimes and jovial, but when you get to talk to him he's very deep, and I'm the same.

When you see him with children, he's got such a gift of communication. He loves his family, he's always talking about his children, and I always love people who talk about their kids and how important they are all the time. When you get to know Anton like I know him, you see a really gifted, caring, understanding person, but I think he won't allow most people to see that, because he's very careful who sees what part of him. I've only seen little snippets of him, he tries to cover up. I might say something and he'll say something else and we'll have a really deep conversation, then he'll make a joke and it's gone. But if you spend a month or so with Anton you see a totally different person. I can see through all the veneer and the flamboyance that he has - the way he walks and struts around and things. I see a lot of myself in Anton, because people don't really know me either - they just think they know me.

We'll still be in touch in 20 years time. Anton is special, there is something deep and special and caring about this man that I feel other people need to know about. He's got a lot to offer, if only people would allow him to go beyond being "Anton, the chef at the Savoy". There is a lot more to him than that.

ANTON EDELMANN: It was a very, very busy lunchtime last summer, and Floella came in to taste her food for the Woman of the Year lunch. She arrived quite early, and finished at about a quarter past one. I was so busy I forgot about her. At two, a waiter came back in and said she was still waiting - and was looking very impatient now. So I went down there thinking: "What am I going to do? Look embarrassed and apologise, or try and get round this one way or another?" So I went round the corner, and she was sitting there, very colourful with her hair up, and I went up and said: "How nice to see you, my dear", and gave her a kiss and a cuddle which was obviously the right thing to do. She was very nice and responded the same way, so we got off to quite a good start, I felt - because waiting such a long time is not always fun, though I couldn't really do anything about it.

She was very worried about feeding 500 middle-aged conservative ladies, who wouldn't necessarily be tuned into Caribbean food, all the spices and so on. At the time I wasn't exactly an expert in Caribbean food myself, though I'd been to Jamaica and I'd had some of it. But pigs tails and salt codfish didn't excite me too much. Although we loved our holiday over there, there's only so much you can do with pigs tails. Floella and I had a very good discussion about it, and she told me about her childhood and how she's so Caribbean, but what I'd seen in the Caribbean wasn't exactly visual food. It was very tasty and very different, but it wasn't very visual. I said it wouldn't be that great if it looked too Caribbean - some of those ladies might not eat much lunch and might complain afterwards. So we had the idea that we would make Caribbean food look snazzy, dolled- up: give it a bit of make-up. It was all very nice in the end - we toned down the spices a little.

A little later we had the idea that we could do something together for television about Caribbean food. Well, all Floella's peers, all these other 499 ladies, were saying: "Floella, how nice, what a marvellous job you've done with your idea about Caribbean food", and she was basking in the glory of that, and she came back to me and said: "Could you do the same for the rest of Caribbean food?" - the whole lot - and I thought "Crikey!"

After that our friendship carried on without much planning, really. I said to her: "Why don't you come along to lunch?", and she was easy to get on with, a good laugh. My life is very serious - in working terms, anyway - so it's nice to have somebody around to have a laugh with, that you don't have to take too seriously. We meet up quite often: we often lunch together with her husband, who pretends to be very English, this English gentleman sort of idea, which of course is completely alien to me, so I take the mickey out of him quite a lot - but she seems to enjoy it, which is very nice.

Floella is a very unpretentious person, very down to earth. She's very uncomplicated to be with, actually, a lovely lady. She has a very sunny sort of temperament, very positive. She does have a big personality, which needs space, but I quite like a bit of space myself.

What I like about Floella and what I think we have in common is that we are very disciplined, we both do lots of different things, go in many different directions - we are both very active. We both like old cars. And we both have lots of children - well, I've got lots, she hasn't got so many.

Floella is still chair of Woman of the Year and she's coming back to the Savoy this year - but she's going to get a Thai menu this time. This puts me at a slight advantage because I don't think she knows much about Thai food and I know an awful lot about it, which is much nicer than the other way round, because last time I was starting from cold. This time I've got a little head start.

We'll still know each other in years to come - we'll stay in contact. Even if we drift in different directions, I think we'll always meet up, even if it's only once or twice a year for lunch - but sometimes that's enough, isn't it?

! Floella Benjamin and Anton Edelmann's cookery show, `Caribbean Light', will be shown on Carlton Food Network in the spring.