Dan Ottaway, who worked as a chef for the royal family, has revealed the Prince Andrew was “more demanding” than the rest of the Firm, and “no one would tell him off” for his inconsiderate behaviour
12:00, 25 Oct 2025Updated 14:59, 25 Oct 2025
A former royal chef had spoken out on his experiences working in the kitchen of Buckingham Palace, revealing which member of the royal family was more difficult than others.
Dan Ottaway, who worked as a chef in Buckingham Palace and often cooked meals for the late Queen Elizabeth, has spoken candidly of his whirlwind experience working for the Firm as he started a new role as the executive head chef at a high-end hotel in Ireland.
Ottaway said that among all the members of the royal family that he served, Prince Andrew was “quite difficult” and “much more demanding” than others, while also heaping praise on a sweet act by Princess Kate.
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Prince Andrew with his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson (Image: Getty Images)
Ottaway told the Irish Independent that Prince Andrew would bombard the Palace kitchen with extravagant last-minute requests that were difficult to fulfil and put the kitchen staff under immense pressure.
He said: “We used to say that he was quite difficult, he would have been more demanding than the rest of them for sure. There would have been last-minute requests for lunches, guests, and stuff like that. Other family members would have told us weeks in advance because they understand we needed to prep for them.”
A former royal chef called out Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson(Image: Getty)
Ottaway added that Andrew’s unreasonable requests kept coming, saying: “But knowing, sort of, that he could get away with anything really, because who’s going to tell him off really, nobody. And he was probably the queen’s favourite child, he was definitely different to the rest of the family in his meal requirements.”
Dan Ottaway said Andrew was “more demanding” than the rest of the royal family (Image: Getty Images)
While the former chef admitted it was difficult to work with Andrew, he said the opposite about the Princess of Wales, revealing that Kate would always bring the children into the kitchen to thank the chefs after a meal. He said: “She didn’t want them to be ungrateful or whatever but it meant a lot to us in the kitchen to see the kids really bubbly.
The former royal chef’s claims echo what a former palace staffer told biographer Andrew Lownie about Andrew and Fergie’s lavish feasts , and how their demands for expensive and luxurious meals may have contributed to Sarah’s financial struggles.
The sacked staff member reveals to Lownie that “greed and wastefulness that contributed to the duchess’s financial downfall.”
The former courtier claimed, as reported in Lownie’s explosive book Entitled: “Every night she [Sarah Ferguson] demands a whole side of beef, a leg of lamb and a chicken, which are laid out on the dining room table like a medieval banquet. It’s a feast that would make Henry VIII proud.”
The source continued: “But often there is just her and her girls, Bea and Eugenie, and most of it is wasted. There is no attempt to keep it to have cold the next day. It just sits there all night, and the next day it’s thrown away.” The book also alleges that “her butler had to get in at 4.30am to put watercress on ice”.
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