Matt Tebbutt has issued a candid health confession (Image: ITV)
TV chef Matt Tebbutt made a startling admission about his health as shared his struggle to fight back the signs of ageing.
The Saturday Kitchen presenter normally cuts a sharp and energetic figure entertaining guests on his One show while serving up culinary treats for viewers to try out.
However, he admitted in an interview with Gabby Logan that despite his on-screen appearance, he was “losing the battle” to stay young and energetic.
Speaking on her podcast The Mid-Point, Matt explained that he had to give his lifestyle and diet a complete overhaul in order to prolong his life, especially after a “relentless” period of running a pub restaurant with his wife Lisa.
“I fight getting old. Let’s just put that out there,” he stated bluntly.
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Matt shared his love of exercise and cooking fresh food (Image: Getty)
After Gabby asked: “How are you fighting it?”, the chef gave a light-hearted response: “Well, I’m fighting it. I mean, I’m slowly losing that battle.
“But I’m fighting it like, ‘Yeah, I want to do this. Yeah, let’s do that. Let’s go to this party and then go out afterwards and then do three days on the trot at a festival’ and things like that. And I’m realising it’s quite draining at 51!”
Matt later revealed that he has cut back on the amount of meat he consumes, adding: “I’ve noticed I’m a carnivore. I eat quite a lot of meat, but I’ve lessened the amount I eat. I eat a lot more vegetables these days. I eat a lot earlier than I ever have done.
“In terms of other stuff, I’m eating more pulses. If I want to go healthy as it were, I’ll reach for an Ottolenghi book [referring to chef Yotam Ottolenghi] and go into that.”
Other tweaks to his diet included cutting back on his alcohol intake, cooking fresh food, snacking on nuts and not eating too much bread. In addition, he also confesses to being a fan of exercise – and he is trying to get better at it.
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Matt used to run a pub with his wife until 2015 (Image: Ricochet/Channel 4)
“I try and be pretty consistent with the exercise routine,” he said. “I’ve always loved exercise. I used to play as a kid. I used to play a lot of rugby. I now go to the gym for a couple of days a week and do free weights.”
Matt has been the lead presenter of Saturday Kitchen since 2016, taking over from James Martin who launched the rival ITV show Saturday Morning with James Martin.
Before taking on the show full time, he and his wife Lisa ran and lived in The Foxhunter Inn in Nantyderry, south Wales, between 2001 and 2015. He admitted in the podcast that balancing work life and family life in such close quarters proved challenging.
“Those little family-run restaurants are relentless,” he confessed. “You know, you’ve got a day off on a Monday – that’s when you do your orders and you’re washing. And if you’ve got any time, you go and have lunch.
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Matt has no regrets leaving his restaurateur life behind (Image: Cactus TV/Livia Hughes/Channel 5)
“And then at the end of the day, you get back in and you get ready for, you know, getting back in on Tuesday. And that’s it. We used to have two weeks off a year.”
After years of hard work, Matt revealed the moment he and his wife decided to leave the pub behind – and it happened to coincide with his Saturday Kitchen commitments.
“Then I reached the age of 40 and I thought, ‘You know what, I got offered something else. I’m going to take this’. And we took that leap into, I said, ‘Let’s walk away from this now’.
“Fortunately, it’s turned out well, but that was quite a leap of faith right then. But I think that’s what makes life interesting, doing those things.”
Saturday Kitchen is at 9.30am today on One