After Sex, Drugs & Sausage Rolls

Imagine Dave Grohl turning up for his first shift as a commis chef tomorrow, aged 31, in a pub in the East End.

Graham Garrett would no doubt tell us to get over ourselves. This is a man who, when asked whether a lifetime of writing songs, drumming, singing, cooking, writing recipes and producing a book makes him a creative, replies: “I suppose you could say there’s something creative going on, but I would never refer to myself as ‘a Creative’.”

Absolutely not, then.

So, no, Graham Garrett is not claiming to be Dave Grohl. But you get the idea

Garrett had spent more than a decade in the music business, playing drums with Dumb Blondes, Panache and YaYa and touring internationally through the 1980s. Think big hair, leather trousers, hard rock and bands driving around in Bedford vans with egos considerably larger than their wallets. Britpop and Madchester were still to come; this was the era of Freddie Mercury, Adam and the Ants and the New Romantic invasion. The music scene was loud, flamboyant and awash with characters.

Naturally, we couldn’t resist fishing for a little celeb goss from those years. There are rather too many stories to tell, although recognising celebrities back then wasn’t always his strong suit. He once mistook Bruce Springsteen for a pool attendant and asked him to fetch some towels, and helped himself to Stevie Nicks’ coffee and sandwiches, assuming she worked at the rehearsal studio. And for those he knew, he wasn’t necessarily better behaved: he recalls repeatedly ringing Phil Collins’ hotel room through the night to ask whether Bill was there. Ah, the innocence of the Eighties.

And then, at 31, he started again at the bottom of a professional kitchen.

“Being a commis chef on bugger all money, whilst trying to pay a mortgage and bring up two kids, probably wasn’t the best life plan.”

It was quite a gear change. Years of touring and recording followed by long shifts in somebody else’s kitchen, on commis-chef wages, while supporting a young family. Crazy.

Yet Garrett threw himself at it. He worked six and seven-day weeks, spent time in the kitchens of Nico Ladenis and Richard Corrigan and eventually ran restaurants for them. He has since cooked at 10 Downing Street and for the late Queen.

Cooking, though, hadn’t just arrived from nowhere.

“I always had a love of food and cooking from an early age. I guess I’ve been lucky to do the two things I’m most passionate about for a job as well as a hobby.”

We tried to find some grand connection between drumming and cooking. Timing. Precision. Performance, perhaps? Garrett isn’t interested.

“I don’t think being a drummer really taught me anything about cooking.”

He does concede that both require stamina. Touring can be physically and mentally exhausting and makes maintaining anything resembling normality difficult. Kitchen life requires “a different kind of stamina”.

“Both have their extremes with mad highs and lows but can both be very rewarding.”

The West House

By 2002, Garrett and his wife Jackie were ready to open somewhere of their own. They bought The West House, a small restaurant in a 16th-century weaver’s cottage on Biddenden High Street in Kent.

He never thought he would still be there 24 years later.

“The place just took on a life of its own. The key to not getting bored is to keep things moving, keep things exciting for yourself, your staff and your customers.”

Small really does mean small. The West House has ten tables and Garrett rarely does more than 30 covers at once.

“That’s enough for how we run things.”

A Michelin star arrived early and remained for 16 years. Garrett’s view of having it – and then not having it – is strikingly straightforward.

“I was happy with the Michelin star for the sixteen years that we held it and am now equally happy without it. It was a period of my life and career of which I’m very proud but no more important than now.”

Back behind the drums

For all the rock & roll history, Garrett then did a Greta Garbo on music. For around 25 years he barely touched it.

“I didn’t touch a drum kit or have anything to do with music.”

That changed when his friend Jerry Meehan, a major session player who has worked with Robbie Williams, Bryan Ferry and Roxy Music, persuaded him back into the studio during Covid.

“We produced an album together where I ended up playing on pretty much every song. We also recorded a few songs for a YaYa reissue.”

There is music at The West House too. Garrett has what he describes as a “ridiculously long playlist”, ranging from Sam Cooke and Marvin Gaye through Todd Rundgren, John Mayer and Paolo Nutini to The xx and Jamie Woon.

“I can’t really go too rocky for our customers but do sneak in the odd YaYa track.”

People from the old days still find their way to Biddenden too.

“We have lots of faces from my past and present eat here regularly.”

We asked him to assemble a Rolling Stones from the chef world. This did not go particularly well.

“I don’t think a Rolling Stones of chefs is a band I’d want to see or a kitchen I’d want to be anywhere near. It sounds like someone’s weird nightmare.”

Fair enough. Guilty as charged.

After the sausage rolls

In 2015 Garrett finally brought the two careers together in an autobiographical cookbook, written with food writer Cat Black.

The title was Sex & Drugs & Sausage Rolls.

It covered the rock years, his route into restaurants and the food that had travelled with him through both. Eleven years later, there still hasn’t been a follow-up.

Not that he hasn’t thought about one.

“I’ve got a couple of ideas for a second book but don’t want to give too much away in case I decide to do it.”

He will give us one clue.

“All I’ll say is that it will be the complete opposite of Sex & Drugs & Sausage Rolls.”

Garrett is now 24 years into The West House. The Michelin chapter has come and gone, the drums have unexpectedly returned and he isn’t terribly concerned with constructing a grand plan for what happens next.

“It’s difficult to think about ambition when you’ve been doing this as long as I have. There’s not much in life that I can think of that I haven’t done or would want to do.”

What does ambition look like now?

“To keep breathing is probably my most ambitious project currently.”

And five years from now?

“Ask me in five years’ time, if I’m still around.”

24 hours in Biddenden

For anyone contemplating getting out of London and making a night of The West House, Garrett has his own itinerary.

“Check in to one of the rooms, have a little mosey around the village and the local attractions. Chill in the hot tub with a bottle of bubbles.”

The hot tub belongs to the Rock ’n’ Roll room, naturally. One of four rooms at The West House, it has its own private garden, black four-poster bed, original music artwork and more than a nod to Garrett’s former life.

Then it’s downstairs for the reason most people have come: dinner at The West House.

Garrett offers two menus: a short menu at £75 and a full menu at £100, with optional wine pairings at £40 and £55 respectively. Both begin with snacks, homemade bread and hand-churned butter, followed by seasonal cooking drawing on the produce of Kent and beyond.

Graham’s plans for the rest of the evening are decidedly un-rock ’n’ roll.

“Dinner with a few good wines. Bed, breakfast, then maybe a bit of a walk.”

And after that?

“Pop down the road to the Three Chimneys for a few beers and a spot of lunch.”

Sounds good to us.

The West House
28 High Street, Biddenden, Kent TN27 8AH

Dining
Short menu: £75 per person; wine pairing £40
Long menu: £100 per person; wine pairing £55

Stay
Four individually designed bedrooms. Dine & Stay packages include the full menu and a continental breakfast hamper for two.
Telephone: 01580 291341

www.thewesthouserestaurant.co.uk
www.luxuryrestaurantguide.co.uk

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