We meet the Bristol man who swapped a high paid job for cooking burgers in an old school bus

You don’t really expect some of the best food in Bristol to be served from the back of an old school bus. But that’s what Fat Dad’s Kitchen is managing to do when it pops up in various brewery tap car parks.

I recently ordered the dirty beef chilli fries from Fat Dad’s Kitchen when it had a residency in the windswept car park outside the Left Handed Giant brewery tap in St Philips and it was genuinely mind-blowing, as well as mouth-numbing.

It was some of the tastiest street food I’ve eaten in a city that serves some of the best in the UK.

And now Fat Dad’s Kitchen has moved on to another Bristol brewery tap - this weekend it pops up outside Lost and Grounded in Brislington, where it will be every Friday and Saturday.

As well as those incredible dirty beef chilli fries, the menu will include The Triple Beef (two beef patties with slow braised short rib), the Sloppy Joe (two beef patties topped with beef chilli) and, for vegetarians, The Spicy ‘Shroom (spiced oyster mushroom).

The man behind Fat Dad’s Kitchen is self-taught chef Paul Clifford, who says he got the idea after a health scare and subsequent mental breakdown. Cooking, he says, was what got him through the tough times.

“I left a 20-odd year career in pharmaceuticals and decided to follow a passion which was food,” says Paul, who runs the business with his partner, Maria.

And as a way of giving something back, the couple have also helped local charities dealing with food poverty and the vulnerable.

“Cooking has always been something I found myself gravitating towards when my head was spinning and found the process very cathartic and decided this was the direction I wanted to go. I’m not getting any younger so it was now or never.”

Once he came up with the idea, Paul contacted some of his favourite restaurants and chefs and asked for some work experience shifts.

These included Wilson’s, Souk Kitchen and Adelina Yard in Bristol and time spent with London chef Sami Tamimi, who is most famous for his work with celebrity chef Yotam Ottolenghi.

Paul says his time working in London was partially funded by selling his French Bulldog puppies to Sami Tamimi.

“I had followed Sami on Instagram for years and I always used to message him questions - he was always so lovely and took the time to reply.

“Then he messaged saying he wanted one of the French Bulldog puppies, then he decided to take the brother and sister from us. He then invited me to stay with him and his partner for a month and took me everywhere.”

Paul then sourced the American school bus, which came from Brooklyn and arrived after an eight-week trip across the pond. He named it Betty after his beloved grandmother.

“After some delays with paperwork, we were set to go about the transformation from bus to kitchen. However, COVID and lockdown hit so the bus sat in a field until the end of the pandemic.

“It basically rusted and many of the moving parts corroded - it took a lot of money to put her back together but we finally managed to open in July 2022, with a very well received Middle Eastern menu.

“After much deliberation in the cold winter months, we decided to try our hands at smash burgers and the feedback and responses we’ve had have been humbling to say the least.

“We have a very strong ethos: the best ingredients, minimal fuss, maximum love. I also have to thank great suppliers like Origin Butchers and Hugo’s Greengrocers, both in Southville, for always supplying the best raw materials to help us do what we do.

“I’m still learning, still developing, still broke ... but I’ve never been happier!”

Fat Dad’s Kitchen is at Lost & Grounded Taproom, Whitby Road, Brislington, BS4 4AR, every Friday (4pm-10pm) and Saturday (1pm-10pm).