Alasdair Gill, a chef and son of the late restaurant critic AA Gill and former Conservative MP Amber Rudd, has spoken about losing a decade of his life to drug and alcohol addiction while working in top London kitchens, including one with a Michelin star. He frequented a notorious Kensington property nicknamed the "Misty River Hotel", a dilapidated Georgian house used as a drug den by a family of dealers, even as he maintained a career cooking at venues such as Spuntino and The Delaunay. Now six years sober, he has written a memoir about his experiences, offering a candid account of addiction that contrasts with his privileged background and family connections.

Gill, 33, describes freebasing crack cocaine, taking Xanax laced with fentanyl and using a wide range of other drugs, at times snorting substances from the edge of his chef's knives to start his day, all while concealing the extent of his addiction from loved ones. His memoir, "Knives And Spoons: A Chef's Story Of Kitchens, Addictions And Mayhem", details this period, including nights spent sleeping rough on strangers' floors and in doorways. He is now in a relationship with Danish actress and model Maja Simonsen, with whom he has a six-month-old son named Arlo.