Hell's Kitchen Marco's early days
With his tousled hair and cheeky grin, this lad looks like butter wouldn't melt in his mouth.
Fast forward a few years and, while the hair is roughly the same, from the mouth come withering putdowns in language that would make a docker blush.
Hard as it is to believe, this angelic schoolboy would grow up to be Hell's Kitchen chef Marco Pierre White, famed as much for his volcanic temper and short fuse as his cooking.
Nearly four million tuned in on Monday night to see Leeds-born Marco call one diner a "pompous f****r" and bawl out the teams of celebrities in his kitchen, including WAG Abbey Clancy, Anneka Rice, Emmerdale star Adele Silva and comic Jim Davidson. But his big brother Clive, opening his family album to the Daily Mirror for the first time, reveals that the three-times married serial womaniser has a much softer side.
And he tells how his 45-year-old famous brother has healed a family rift and now pays his two older brothers an allowance to help them get by.
"We are close and speak regularly," says Clive, 53. "He looks after me with money and Graham gets an allowance as well. I was a chef but I'm a carer now." But family relations weren't always so good. Clive admits that he has been on the end of the odd Marco tongue-lashing.
The brothers fell out following the death of their father 10 years ago and the bitter clash prompted Marco to all but leave them out of his recent autobiography, White Slave.
"They mostly did not want to spend a lot of time with me," he explained. Marco, who gained three coveted Michelin stars by the age of just 33, grew up on a tough estate, where he enjoyed hunting, fishing and, quite often, poaching.
His Italian mother Maria Rosa died of a brain haemorrhage when he was six - weeks after she had given birth to Marco's younger brother, Craig. Dad Frank, also a chef, was a drinker and would often beat his sons.
When widowed Frank married his girlfriend, Hazel, in 1978, Marco, then 16, felt it was a betrayal of his mother's memory.
He said later: "I could not forgive him. It seemed that he was making a mockery of the feelings my parents had for one another by marrying again."
After not speaking for 13 years, Marco was reconciled with his father in 1994, three years before Frank's death at the age of 70.
Rows with his siblings then led Marco to sever all contact with them. But with one exception the surly chef has now healed the rift.
Clive, who still lives in Leeds, says: "I go down to London quite often to see him and his family and he comes up here sometimes.
"Yes, there were problems before, - family stuff and things with our dad - but things are fine now."
Clive confirms that, as kids, he and Marco used to hunt together but "drifted apart", with things not going too well between them. "But that is all in the past," he adds, "and we get on well now."
His brother Graham, 52, lives in the Yorkshire village of East Keswick, where locals describe him as a "bit of a character". His tatty cottage is covered in upturned horseshoes and, when the celebrity chef visits, they like to drink in the nearby Duke of Wellington pub.
"Graham brought Marco here a few months ago," confirms landlady Mary O'Boyle, 58. "He likes to show off his famous brother.
"At the moment, Marco comes to see him every couple of months. But it's a recent thing - they seem to have patched things up.
"They like to have a few pints of lager and speak to the locals. They always like to drink out of tankards. Graham has told us that his brother pays him an allowance every month.
"He doesn't work, so wanders round like the lord of the manor - he's a real character. He is also a great cook like Marco but also a bit of a poacher who likes hunting."
Marco is a regular visitor to the estate where he grew up and his stepmum Hazel still lives in the modest family terrace. But when asked about the family rift, she says: "I don't really want to say anything."
Family friend Gloria Johns, 72, reveals: "I saw Marco about a year ago, when he came back here. He popped in for a cup of tea and a chat. He and my son used to play together in the park and collect golf balls for the golfers."
Marco did a milk round as a youngster, hunted in the woods and even got paid £1.50 by former England and Leeds United manager Don Revie for collecting golf balls. Another family friend, Terry Kershaw, 71, recalls: "Marco and his brothers were always arguing. Most of the time it was about their dad and family problems. He was also a bit of a tearaway."
The chef still refuses to speak to brother Craig, after Marco claimed his youngest sibling insulted his dad at his funeral.
Marco is being divorced by his wife of 14 years, Spanish-born Mati Conejero. She is his third wife, after Lisa Butcher - who was effectively dumped 24 hours after tying the knot - and first wife Alex McArthur.
The couple lived with their three children in West London but their marriage was dogged by rumours of his infidelities.
At boiling point..
When a chef complained of the heat in the kitchen, Marco grabbed a knife and slashed the back of his shirt and trousers. He said: "I was good enough to help him calm down."
A diner refused to pay because his souffle had taken too long. White grabbed a mink coat which belonged to the man's wife, saying: "No payment, no coat."
Another customer was ejected for daring to ask to choose his own cheese.
The interior decorator of one restaurant turned up soon after it opened, wanting free drinks and a meal. White threw him out, ripping off the sleeve of his designer jacket.
Mirror
