Queen Camilla’s son Tom Parker Bowles has recalled the embarrassing blunder he made when he first met Queen Elizabeth II in a new interview.
The 49-year-old food critic discussed his new book, Cooking & the Crown, which traces the history of royal culinary cuisine through the tastes and preferences of Britain’s king and queens.
Speak with The independentTom said the book was originally only going to contain royal recipes and anecdotes between the reigns of Queen Victoria and Queen Elizabeth II, giving him a “degree of separation” having only met the late monarch twice.
The first time was when he was eight, Tom recalled, adding, “I was so scared I was more likely to curtsy than take a bow.”
When greeting the monarch or a member of the royal family, men traditionally bow their heads (a neck bow), while women make a small bow.
Queen Camilla’s son Tom Parker Bowles recalls the embarrassing blunder he made when he met Queen Elizabeth II for the first time
The next time he would meet the late queen would be on the occasion of Camilla’s wedding to King Charles, when he and his sister Laura Lopes “sneaked out for a fag or something” and got lost in Windsor Castle.
When the brother-sister duo was discovered by the “magnetic and lovely” queen, who was accompanied by her beloved corgis, Tom said they “followed [her] like two rather terrified but impressed puppies.”
Since the Queen’s death two years ago, his book has become something ‘closer to home’, with Tom including his mother Camilla’s recipes, as well as the secret to preparing his stepfather’s favorite green omelette.
Tom recently appeared in an episode of the ITV1 program Love Your Weekend with Alan Titchmarsh to promote Cooking & the Crown, which was released last month.
During his part of the show, Tom said food was always an important part of family life growing up in Wiltshire with his mother and his father, Andrew Parker Bowles, Camilla’s first husband.
He described Camilla as a ‘good cook, a very simple English cook’ who hates following recipes and doesn’t like baking.
Tom said to Titchmarsh, “MrMy father was and still is, I would almost say, a great gardener, a good gardener in your company. He is a good gardener. He was very obsessed with his vegetable garden, so we could… follow the seasons through the garden.
‘And my mother was a good cook. He is still a good cook, a very simple English cook. I didn’t like baking, didn’t like measuring… no scales, and no recipes either.
“You know, her fried chicken, I just keep going on and on… ‘Well, just do it.’ So you have to pay a little attention.’
Queen Camilla’s son explained that he was so intimidated by the late monarch that he ended up curtsying instead of bowing
Queen Camilla acknowledged that her culinary skills are ‘limited’ in an interview with Tom Tom in Mail On Sunday’s You magazine in 2022.
Describing her culinary style as “nothing too much, fussy or clumsy,” Camilla said she learned to cook by watching her mother, Rosalind Shand, who made food the “heart” of family life.
“One of my earliest memories is shelling peas and beans with my mother, an accomplished chef,” she said. ‘I learned it from my mother. I’ve never followed a recipe in my life.
“On Friday evening we got to choose our dinner,” she remembers. ‘I always went for frozen chicken pot pie, much to my mother’s dismay.’
Tom also recently revealed that his mother Camilla is not part of their family WhatsApp group as she still uses an old Nokia phone ‘for security reasons’.
He also confessed that he has had a hard time getting hold of his mother since she became Britain’s Queen Consort, adding that he only finds out her whereabouts when Tom sees her on TV.
He told Woman & Home magazine: ‘She works much harder, she has always worked very hard [so] it’s still like this: I call my mother, she doesn’t answer, I watch television [and think] ‘Ah! She’s in Jersey.”
The 49-year-old previously described his mother, Queen Consort Camilla, as a “good cook, a very simple English cook” who hates following recipes and isn’t fond of baking.
Royal fans won’t be surprised to hear about the Queen’s phone choice as she previously revealed she betrays her grandchildren for using their phones at the dinner table.
Speaking to the Mail in 2022, ahead of her 75th birthday, Camilla expressed her concerns about social media, which she described as a ‘double-edged sword’, and admitted that she often tells her grandchildren to stop their ‘flipping’ – have to put away phones.
“Families no longer sit down at the table and eat,” she said. ‘Because I’m old, we all used to sit down [to eat]. Now everyone is on their device. It just makes me quite angry!’
Tom shares two children, 17-year-old daughter Lola and 14-year-old son Freddy, with his ex-wife Sara Buys.