Marco Pierre White makes bombshell family confession after taking DNA test

Celebrity chief Marco Pierre White, who was born in Leeds and spent much of his childhood in the area, has made an astonishing discovery about his family after a DNA test

Marco Pierre White was just six when his beloved mother died — and he has now revealed for the first time the shocking truth about her love life that was exposed through an unexpected letter and DNA tests both he and his daughter had done.

Maria-Rose Gallina was an Italian immigrant who came to Yorkshire in 1953 with her sister and Marco has “extraordinary memories” of her despite being just six when a hammerage killed her.

In an emotional interview, the 64-year-old, who was born in Leeds, said: “In a strange and peculiar way, when my mother died, I ran to nature, and mother nature became my surrogate mother. It was like when I retired from cooking, I couldn’t face the outside world, I turned to nature.”

Being motherless, it was up to his dad, Yorkshireman Frank White, to raise him, and he described being “suppressed” by him from the age of six until the age of 16. He told The Bookshelf with Ryan Turbidy podcast: “He pushed me. At 13 I had to get up at 4.30 every morning.

“At five-o-clock I would start work on the milk for six days a week. And so my father pushed me and pushed me to work hard. The truth is, had he not done that to me, I would never have achieved what I achieved professionally.”

Irish broadcaster Ryan then asked him about the Italian side of his family, and he answered: “I will confess something to you today actually. I’ve never confessed it but I will. I don’t mind. They are all dead now so I can.”

Maria-Rosa came to England with her sister and she met Frank White in the Griffin Hotel in Leeds where he worked as a chef. She then married him while pregnant — but Marco later learned that she was in love with another man and came to England to “assist with the pain”.

Marco, the youngest person to ever win three Michelin stars at the age of 33, continued: “But what’s interesting, about 13 years ago, my mother’s sister wrote to me. And she sends me a letter. I open the letter and inside the letter is a photograph. And my auntie tells me that this was the love of my mother’s life. His name was Marco. So what that automatically told me is that my mother never told my father otherwise I would never have been called Marco.”

The celebrity chef said he realised “what my aunty was saying to me” but he felt it would be “pointless” to “turn that stone”.

However, he said his “clever little girl” Mirabelle then decided to get her DNA checked and it revealed that she was 89% Italian-Spanish and 9% Portuguese-French. Marco said: “So I said to Mirabelle,’ You know what this tells you? It tells you your grandfather on your father’s side is not your real grandfather.”

Given what he knew about the letter, Marco then decided to check his lineage too, and he learned that he was 89% Italian and 9% German-French, meaning he had no English blood in him either. He told Ryan: “And you are the first person in the world that I have ever confessed that too.”

Ryan replied “what a confession” before asking the celebrity chef how he coped with the news. He replied: "Because I had the letter I knew. “Mum is dead. Father is dead. It is fine. Not that important. But when my daughter gets her DNA done, then I have to then share with her. She has no English in her.”

The host then said that “neither have you” and Marco said: “No that’s true. It doesn’t change anything though does it?”