Prince William skips royal appointment to enjoy curry and beer with 'That Peter Crouch Podcast' team

Prince William, the Duke of Cambridge, is believed to be a thorough professional. However, the British royal reportedly decided to skip an appointment as he was enjoying curry and beer with ex-footballer Peter Crouch and a BBC podcast team.

The incident happened during a recording session for "That Peter Crouch Podcast" at Kensington Palace in March last year. Radio 1 DJ Chris Stark, who was also present at the impromptu lunch party with Prince William and Peter Crouch, recently recalled that the Duke of Cambridge "binned off" a royal appointment for beer pints with them.

Speaking on the Andy Jaye podcast yesterday, Stark said: "At one point, this lady stood up to say that he's got to go on to his next appointment - God knows what that was - and he just binned it off." Stark hosts "That Peter Crouch Podcast" with Crouch and BBC sports journalist Tom Fordyce.

The 33-year-old revealed that their meeting was only meant to last 45 minutes, but the royal was having such a good time that it lasted three hours with booze and curry ordered from Crouch's local Indian takeaway.

"I think he was having a good time and I'm sure he's got his own way of relaxing but in those two or three hours that we were in the Palace, I do think I saw a real side to him," Stark said.

Stark, who first met William at a radio station, noted that the royal seemed like a different person during that lunch. He told Jaye: "I've met him at Radio 1 and it was a very different experience. [At Kensington Palace] I felt like you could have a pint with him and genuinely see what he was about, and I really like him."

"I genuinely saw a side to him where it was like 'you are a young lad as well,'" added Stark. The episode shot with Prince William was in support of the Heads Up campaign, whose aim is to change the conversation on mental health through football.

Kensington Palace, the official residence of Prince William and his wife Kate Middleton, had shared pictures from the lunch on its official Instagram in August last year. One of the photographs showed the group of four enjoying pints of beer and curry and chatting, while another showed them laughing together.

Stark added about his meeting with the heir to the British throne: "I was really aware that we were there to kind of talk about his campaign, but then we were all a couple of pints into this conversation and then I found we were having a genuine chat with him. You could see him drop having to think too much around the party line or whatever it was he was trying to focus on and just talk. It was so nice to see."

"I'm not encouraging everyone to go and get pi***d to have these types of conversations... but seriously, being a couple of pints in with Prince William, you realise there are similarities to what he was experiencing and what I've felt and what other people feel," Stark added.

He also noted that he felt like the royal also had a lot going on and it was "interesting" to see him relax and have a laugh with them. He revealed that William even sent a letter to them after a couple of weeks thanking them for the time. "What he said in it was so lovely," Stark said.