Andy Richardson: Chief's concern was cue to get off the mic

He'd christened me Bandit after an incident on a pool table in Turin, which is where all the best nicknames are conceived. We'd gone for a wild weekend, rooming together in the city centre. Sleep had been noticeable by its absence and The Chief had christened a local wine emporium 'the glue factory'. "Because when you're in it, you get stuck." Geddit.

The name Bandit came about after I'd told Chief I wasn't much cop at pool. He'd swallowed my dissembling hook, line and sinker. After three defeats, he raised two ringers in my direction and swore the next time we played he'd bring Mick Hill to be his partner. Bandit stuck. Like glue.

Oh yes, and before we go any further, Mick Hill's the World Pool Champion. He is to eight-ball what Ronnie is to snooker: a genius, in short. Come on, keep up.

Chief and I renewed our acquaintance when he agreed to be the star guest at a food festival which, in a moment of apparent madness, I'd conceived four-and-a-half-years ago. A best friend and I had risked more money than either of could afford, worked 90-hour weeks to set it up and, happily, made a go of it. Funny what hard work can do. Edison was right when he quantified success as being 99 per cent perspiration and one per cent inspiration.

Chief is more used to cooking for the hoi polloi. In the past 12 months, he's cooked food for Barack Obama, David 'I'm-Dave-Not-BoJo' Cameron, Angela Merkel and others. He's won Michelin stars, he was Gordon Ramsay's best man when the fiery one got married and he survived a tussle in a kitchen with Marco Pierre White. His stories are taller than The Shard and, even more remarkably, they're all true.

But I digress. Chief was due on our food festival stage at 1pm and by 12.45pm we were starting to get a little itchy. We were suffering from what Sir Alex Ferguson called Squeaky Bum Time. For Chief was nowhere to be seen. He'd called a couple of times to bemoan the satnav-one-way-system that had transported him through some mysterious rabbit hole into Latesville. By 12.57pm, and with a crowd mounting, we were assessing our options: Panic or look stupid?

And then Chief rocked up, looking cooler than a Norwegian cucumber. "Alright, Bandit?" he said, as I carried his monkfish to the demonstration stage. "Not bad, thanks, Chief." The safest place is at the eye of a storm. He took straight to the stage; seasoned pros can do that. No prep, no fuss, no nerves; just BOOM.

And a crowd of enthusiastic foodies watched him cut, sizzle, fry, stir and season while umming and ahhing about his brilliance. "Isn't he the bloke who's normally on Saturday Kitchen," said one fan. "Yes, said her partner. But today's Sunday." Great. Glad we've sorted that out.

While Chief was being brilliant, the man on the mic – who, incidentally, is the world's tallest town crier at a mighty 7ft 2ins – was busy taking a break. He'd been asked to attend a christening and so rather than make PA announcements about brass bands, celebrity chefs and cookery classes, he was watching water being poured on to baby's heads. "Stand in for me, fella," he'd said. The Man on the Mic never calls me Bandit. He will after I've challenged him to a game of pool.

I'd taken to the mic with the enthusiasm of a drunk in a distillery. I was a rat in a bag of corn, a Star Trek fan at a Leonard Nimoy memorial. "Laaaydeeess and gentleman," I'd begun, before offering exuberant oration about our star turn. I was the rap in rhapsody, the vigour in vigorous, the fan in fanatical.

My voice boomed across 49 acres of showground and a hoard of tantalised food festival goers flocked to watch one of the event's big guns.

Except when they got there, they couldn't hear him. Because the doofus – that's me – on the mic was talking so loudly and incessantly that he was drowning out Chief.

And so, when I caught up with our star turn afterwards for what I intended to be a jovial and ebullient round of back-slapping, he offered this: "Bandit, will you just shut up. . ."

And then he laughed. And he laughed. And he laughed. Phew.

My lesson is learned. And the next time the Man on the Mic goes to a christening while the man who cooks for Barack Obama is rustling up Monkfish risotto for a field full of fans, I'm going to do what any self-respecting Bandit should do. I'll ignore them both, head into town and ask anyone if they fancy a game of pool.