Raymond Blanc is a busy man. Aside from running his small empire of restaurants, working with aspiring chefs at his cookery school, and juggling press interviews, he has been promoting a new recipe book following the BBC2 series Kew on a Plate.

And as if that wasn’t enough, the 65-year-old French chef has also overseen the refurbishment of Brasserie Blanc in St Albans, which reopened in March.

The dad-of-two says: “Things sometimes need to be refreshed because before St Albans was formatted onto the old Brasserie Blanc, it was dark burgundy, it was a little bit old French, no? 

“It didn’t quite fit any more with what the modern customer wants and the environment you are in is important,“ continues Raymond, who is responsible for training world-class cooks Marco Pierre White and Heston Blumenthal.

“We first needed a bit more modernity – keep the traditional side underneath but there would be modernity on the top.“

The updated Verulam Road eatery now features long tables, atmospheric lighting, stylish décor and an open kitchen, which Raymond hopes will coax in a younger set.

“Food is about celebration and the refurb creates an environment for some younger guests – of course we want our older guests to stay with us,“ says Raymond, who enjoys relaxing with his family on his days off.

“What I love the most is really creating wonderful food with my team and, of course, giving it to your guests because that at the end of the day is what it’s all about.“

And it is not only the restaurant which has been transformed, as the Brasserie Blanc menu is undergoing its quarterly redesign too for the summer season.

“I work with my chef Clive and we spent three to four days working at it together,“ explains Raymond.

“We bring in the ideas together and we form them up to a level where it’s ready to be cooked. Then he cooks it and we taste it together. It’s quite a long process.“

Fresh and home-grown produce is a focal point for Raymond who, growing up in Besançon close to the Swiss border, learned to grow food from the garden at a young age.

“I had to become a gardener from the age of six or seven because we were growing food for the house,“ says the chef, who moved to England to work as a waiter at the Rose Revived restaurant in Oxfordshire in 1972.

Under the guidance of his mother and father, the now Michelin-starred chef was taught to understand the seasons, climate and soil to produce the best vegetables to feed their family.

He says: “My father was a great gardener and had two acres around the house where he would grow vegetables and food. All would be harvested and grown there, special varieties.“

Now a successful chef, businessman, author and TV personality, Raymond has held on to the values he learned as a boy, transferring them to the menus he compiles for his restaurants.

“I have tried to keep those values of seasonality and I think that’s the most important thing that the consumer must learn, and if we learn that, my god, that will be a great step forward,“ says Raymond.

It is an interest he investigated during filming Kew on a Plate in which he spent a year at Kew Gardens growing fresh produce and cooking seasonal recipes with presenter Kate Humble.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, given the length of time he spent growing food at the Royal Botanical Garden, his current favourite recipes – pea risotto and grilled asparagus with smoked paprika – were discovered during filming the show.

But for now, the AA Chefs’ Chef of the Year winner wants a break from television work in order to get back to his businesses.

“I love every part of the restaurant scene, I couldn’t just live for the food – I would find it too belly-centric,“ he laughs.

He continues: “I’m going to rest a little while and think what I’m going to do next. Brasserie Blanc is growing and we have a brilliant team.”