The King has some very exacting rules when it comes to his bedroom routine, claims former royal butler Paul Burrell, with some surprisingly ‘excessive’ demands
The King insists on having his precise instructions followed to the letter(Image: Max Mumby/Indigo, Getty Images)
Royal insider Paul Burrell has lifted the lid on His Majesty the King‘s rigid routine, saying the 76-year-old monarch has always insisted on his servants conforming to very strict standards.
Burrell, who started working for the royals as a footman at Buckingham Palace when he was just 18, moved to Highgrove House in Gloucestershire to become part of the then Prince of Wales’s household in 1987.
For a decade, he was a servant and close confidante of Princess Diana – once claiming that he was “the only man she ever trusted.” His relationship with her husband was always a little more distant, though, he says.
In his new book, The Royal Insider: My Life with the Queen, the King and Princess Diana, he explains that while he’s only nine years younger than the King, he always felt as if he was “much older and from a different generation.”
Burrell goes on to detail the King’s paradoxical obsession with waste, which he says is at odds with some of his bizarre personal habits.
Paul Burrell has spilled more royal secrets(Image: HGL, GC Imagesvia Getty Images)
“His routines have never changed,” Burrell writes. “His toothpaste is squeezed onto his toothbrush every morning and he uses a silver key which winds down the tube to avoid any waste.”
But while Charles claims to “abhor” waste, Burrell says he’s also strangely excessive when it comes to his clothes: “His pyjamas are laundered or pressed every day, the drawstring tapes pressed flat like his shoelaces.
“He, again like his father, likes his dress shoes to be ‘spit-and-polished’ to a mirror finish.”
The late Queen had a rigid ‘no carbs’ rule(Image: WPA Pool, Getty Images)
The royals also stick to some peculiar food rules.
There’s no garlic on the menu for the King, for example. When she appeared on MasterChef Australia, Queen Camilla revealed that garlic “is a no-no” for the King.
Since 2008, he has also boycotted foie gras because of the animal cruelty involved in the delicacy’s production.
The King’s mother, the late Queen Elizabeth II, also had some strict rules around food. She wouldn’t, for example, eat any carbs at her evening meal.
Prince George is a huge carbonara fan(Image: Chris Jackson, Getty Images)
Former Buckingham Palace chef Darren O’Grady told The Telegraph: “When she dines on her own she’s very disciplined. No starch is the rule. No potatoes, rice or pasta for dinner. Just usually something like grilled sole with vegetables and salad.”
No pasta would be a dealbreaker for Prince George, though. The future king is hugely fond of spaghetti carbonara, according to top chef Aldo Zilli. The Italian-born cook revealed that he had been told of the young prince’s pasta predilection by no less than Prince William himself.
He said: “I’m waiting for the call because apparently his little boy’s favourite is spaghetti carbonara, so I’m waiting for the call to go and cook it for him.”
“If George has my carbonara, he will never have another one,” Aldo added, “so I need to go and make it. Let’s get the ball rolling, send me to the palace to cook!”