Ryan Riley, founder of the not-for-profit cookery school Life Kitchen, has spoken about receiving a British Empire Medal in the King’s new year honours list. The 32-year-old from Sunderland was recognised for his work helping cancer patients rediscover the joy of food through free classes at high-end venues.
Riley set up Life Kitchen in 2019 with his best friend Kimberley Duke, inspired by his mother Krista, who lost her sense of taste and appetite during chemotherapy for lung cancer and later died. Duke’s mother also died of cancer. “Life Kitchen was my idea, but Kimberley and I did it together,” said Riley. “Without her, I would be so screwed.”
The classes have attracted support from celebrities including Nigella Lawson, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Jamie Oliver and Sue Perkins, and have reached about 100,000 people worldwide through books and classes. Riley said the honour felt like “the highest honour that could be awarded to two disadvantaged kids like us who are from a council estate”.
However, Riley admitted that working with cancer patients has taken an emotional toll. By age 30, he had attended 50 funerals. “We didn’t realise that when you work around cancer patients, you are going to face a lot of death,” he said. He also struggles with the fact that Life Kitchen’s success is linked to his mother’s death. “The pain comes alongside success again and again and again,” he added.
Riley has never made money from Life Kitchen, despite its success. After his mother died, he won £20,000 in a casino and used it to move to London. “They say never make big life decisions after a bereavement, but I moved to London, which allowed us to change our lives, but it also meant that I never really had a chance to deal with my grief,” he said.
