Top chefs offer up revelations, resistance

KEVIN Rudd is guided by his family and Tony Abbott is a deep thinker overcome by a sense of calm, says the ABC's Annabel Crabb.

Kevin Rudd shares the chocolate slice he made with host Annabel Crabb.

KEVIN Rudd is a man inextricably linked to and guided by his family and Tony Abbott is a deep thinker overcome by a sense of calm, according to political commentator and host of the ABC's Kitchen Cabinet Annabel Crabb.

Crabb told The Australian the format of her cooking show had helped to penetrate the exoskeletons of the nation's leaders, contributing to a greater understanding of them. But their guard had not been dropped completely.

"Look, Kevin Rudd is a very clever person and he has an extremely nimble brain," she said. "He does think very carefully about the answers he chooses to give and . . . wasn't entirely taken unawares at any point in the filming. But he was very convivial."

The filming schedule was much shorter for these special guests than for most politicians, she added, but the format allowed "slightly different" questions.

One of the most interesting responses was when the Opposition Leader shared an anecdote about some blunt advice he'd received from then opposition leader Malcolm Turnbull about being in a "funk" after the 2007 election loss.

"The program doesn't pretend to be the be-all-and-end-all of political interviewing but it does help you understand these politicians as people and it's the things they choose to offer up when they're not told to offer up anything at all that open your eyes," Crabb said.

"I thought his decision to reveal that was very interesting, very interesting, and it reflected well on both of them. Abbott was in a good frame of mind when we met.

"It helps that we get along -- as I do with the Prime Minister -- and he's a pretty interesting person. He thinks pretty deeply."

But it was Mr Rudd who remained an enigma. "I asked him about regret -- I really enjoy asking politicians about the nature of regret because you can be affected by such random circumstances, small things balloon into catastrophes," she said. "And he told me he didn't regret anything because all the big decisions he talked through with his family and it was impossible to regret anything in which they were involved.

"That's the one thing that really comes across with Kevin, his closeness and reliance on his family. That is really part of his being."

Crabb added: "One of the biggest questions about Kevin Rudd is just why . . . why, when you've just lost your job on national television, would you continue?"