Out of office – Bhavin Patel on watching TV and EVs

Bhavin Patel tells us about his enjoyment of TV, from following Manchester United to cooking programmes, and how he’s converted to electric cars.

Please introduce yourself

Hi my name is Bhavin and I’m a general dental practitioner. I work in both NHS and private dental practices piloting the new contract and own my own practice in London’s west end.

More recently I have also taken on a clinical contact tracing role for Test and Trace.

What do you get up to in your spare time away from dentistry?

I’m from quite a sad family. Both my sisters are dentists. A brother in law is a dentist. I’m also married to a dentist.

I have a young family with a three-year-old boy and a one-year-old girl. They take up most of my spare time.

Any time I do get to myself I like watching football and enjoy (most of the time) following my team Manchester United.

After putting the kids to bed we love to wind down from a stressful day of dentistry and parenting with a glass of red and watching TV.

Many say we’d be great on Gogglebox as our reactions and conversations are somewhat entertaining.

What type of television/movies do you like – any guilty pleasures?

My wife Heena loves cookery programmes. I’ve compromised with watching the Great British Bake Off with her as it gives me a great excuse to eat different cakes whilst watching the show.

We also love gameshows and my favourite is Catchphrase where we can get quite competitive shouting out the answers.

My guilty pleasure at the moment is Good Girls on Netflix. And my all time favourite series is 24, which I still see as the ‘gold standard’ that I compare any new series to.

Are you a foodie?

Heena is a great cook and loves to experiment in the kitchen. So I am really lucky in that I get well fed and I’m her designated food taster and critique!

She’d love to one day own her own café on our local high street!

Are you into any sport?

I like my cars and I did my bit this year and went ‘green’. I traded in my Range Rover for a fully electric vehicle.

Now I can’t recommend the new Tesla Model 3 highly enough! It’s such a great car for the whole family. Especially if you like gadgets.

My son loves it because it has video games, Netflix, ‘Careoke’ (yes Careoke) and even virtual whoopie cushions! And, most importantly, it is (very) fast!

Do you like to travel and do your hobbies take you anywhere in particular?

Obviously like everyone this year we’ve been grounded but I do love to travel.

I enjoy seeing animals and would love to visit Africa and go on a safari at some point when the kids are a little older.

I think travelling opens your mind and broadens your horizons. It also puts life into perspective; seeing and experiencing other cultures reminds us of how fortunate we are to live in the UK and do what we do.