Gerald Diffey has spent four decades immersed in the world of food, wine and hospitality, from early days waiting tables in old English hotels to establishing two of the best places in the world to drink and eat: the award-winning Gerald’s Bar in North Carlton– Heston Blumenthal described it as ‘a proper, proper old-fashioned sort of bar’– and Gerald’s Bar in San Sebastian.

Beggars Belief is a collection of funny, poignant, insightful and just plain ludicrous stories from Gerald’s life in kitchens and behind bars: his formative years in the UK, memories of food and family; tales and tips from forty years of service; journeys and meals, people and places, from lunch on the side of a volcano in Sicily to dinner on a beach in East Timor; stories and recipes and drinks suggestions from North Carlton and San Sebastian; vignettes, slices of life, observations.

‘Romance,’ writes Gerald in the introduction. ‘That’s what I sell. Sensual pleasures. Sights, sounds, smells, touch, taste. Cyrano de Bergerac said: “I have tried to live my whole life with panache.” If I said that, I’d sound like a twat. But you get the drift. I’m off to bone some quails.’