Recipe for success

We interviewed Gregg Wallace for the spring edition of Southwark Life. Find out what he thinks of Southwark...

What made you open Wallace & Co?

I wanted a café, not a restaurant, with fruit and veg for sale in it. That was it.

And you sell the same veg you sell outside Wallace & Co on stalls in Borough Market don't you?

They are the Secrets stalls and all the veg comes out of our farms business Secrets Direct. I've basically been a greengrocer for 20 years and I started out supplying fruit and veg to restaurants. I still do. I'm Jamie's greengrocer, Marco's greengrocer and I supply to the Ivy and Caprice.

But I've had the stalls in Borough Market for about three years.

Southwark Council is working with schools to promote healthy eating and exercise. Do you have any advice?

I've always eaten lots of fruit and veg and my two kids do too. That and doing lots of exercise as a child always kept me fit. I think young people should get out there and use the parks in Southwark. They are great.

Wallace & Co is in south west London, where you live now, but you were born in Peckham weren't you?

Yes, on Kincaid Road, off Meeting House Lane. I was such a fortunate boy, even though we didn't have any money. We had no bathroom and we had an outside loo but my grandparents lived upstairs and that was a wonderful thing. They'd take me out to Rye Lane every Saturday morning. We used to play on the street when we were kids. And we used to go up to Peckham Rye and kick a ball about. I was really happy in Peckham.

How old were you when you left Peckham?

I was about 12 when we moved to Ivydale Road in Nunhead. Then, when I was 22, I bought a flat in Honor Oak. After that I bought a small house in Bermondsey, when I was 24. I stayed there for six years.

You left Bermondsey 15 years ago, what do you remember about it in the 1990s?

I loved it. Bermondsey is so central; you can get from Southwark Park Road to Parliament Square in about ten minutes. My local pub the Queen Vic was close to my house and I still firmly believe that you never get a sense of community unless you use your local pub.

How do you think Southwark has changed since you lived there?

It's become far more affluent than when I was a kid but it's still undoubtedly a blue-collar area of London. I do really want to see what happens with the Elephant and Castle because that's the last bit of central London that's undeveloped.

Futher information

Wallace & Co is at 146 Upper Richmond Rd, SW15, 020 8780 0052, http://www.wallaceandco.com/.

Gregg Wallace is this year's ambassador for the Ideal Food section of the Ideal Home Show, www.idealhomeshow.co.uk.

Read the full article in April's Southwark Life magazine.