AFTER completing a catering course, 17-year-old Steve McCabe left Liverpool hoping to find a job.

Twenty-three years later and back in his home city, McCabe – now head chef at the Echo Arena Liverpool – has worked at some of the country’s top restaurants, mixed with celebrity chefs and catered for the world’s rich and famous.

On his travels, he has cooked for Princess Diana, Tony Blair, Bill Clinton, Michael Caine and the Liverpool FC squad.

And his next challenge is to cater for hundreds of guests and sports stars at the BBC Sports Personality of the Year event on Sunday, including Formula One champion Lewis Hamilton and several Olympic gold medal winners, including swimmer Rebecca Adlington and 400m star Christine Ohuruogu.

McCabe, 40, lives in Mossley Hill with his Australian wife, Samantha, and their three children Conor, 11, Aidan, 10, and Sian, nine.

In the mid-80s, after passing his catering course at Colquitt Street Catering College, where hundreds of ships’ cooks from all over the world once trained, McCabe decided to look elsewhere for work due to high unemployment in the city.

He said: “I ended up in London, firstly living on the outskirts and eventually living in the middle of the city. I suppose that reflects the way my career progressed.”

He found work at Harold’s Piscatarium – a fish restaurant frequented by a range of TV celebrities, including Benny Hill and the cast of Only Fools and Horses.

“After that, I ended up working with Terence Conran at Le Pont de la Tour, which overlooks the Thames.”

Eventually, he ended up launching Bank restaurant with Tony Allen, of TV’s “Tony and Giorgio” fame.

And it was also in London that McCabe met his wife, a soloist ballerina with the English National Ballet.

McCabe worked alongside Marco Pierre White, Gordon Ramsay and Jamie Oliver.