Rick Stein has explained what he will be doing next after saying he won't ‘last that much longer’. The TV chef and Cornish restaurateur, aged 77, recently told The Times, he had been thinking about death ‘big time’. after suffering symptoms of breathlessness for five or six years.
Rick has undergone heart surgery after being told in 2022 that he would die without the operation. A cardiologist read his echocardiogram and told Stein that his aorta was failing. Drugs could delay surgery, but only for a while.
Rick said: “Having had the operation and recovered, the improvement in my health has left me tremendously optimistic. Even though at my age and with the normal realities of life I’m not going to last that much longer, I think as long as you’ve got your health and you’re optimistic generally and enjoying your life, you don’t tend to ponder too much about how little life you’ve got left.”
Now Rick has spoken about his next career move. During a chat on The One Show on BBC One with hosts Alex Jones and Jermaine Jenas, he said: "I'm doing a little theatre tour up and down the country. I'm quite good at holding an audience. I just tell stories about what it's like doing TV programmes and sometimes the crew appear in my shows and people like that. It's bringing people into what it's like working on a TV show."
An Evening with Rick Stein runs March 15-30, starting in Buxton, Derbyshire. For details, see rickstein.com/tour
