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Canwest News Service
Welcome, reader, to Gordon Ramsay’s fabulously appointed family home, overlooking one of southwest London’s most beautiful parks. The house is all so manicured, so perfect, that we may as well be in a hotel. No doubt for Ramsay, who runs scores of restaurants worldwide, and who at the end of this interview will fly to Canada for some filming of the new season of The F Word, it must sometimes feel that way.
But I think it’s more than that. For even Ramsay’s face, which once bore the craggy marks that told of his years slaving at a hot stove in the kitchen, is now oddly smooth. The lines are still there, but the skin between them is — well, it’s very Hollywood. This, he revealed last month, is thanks to a touch of plastic surgery. "What happened was that we were having dinner with Simon Cowell at Cecconi’s, and he said ‘Do you not think that your face is a little creased?’ Cheeky! Anyway, he [Cowell] recommended a doctor who would sort out the creases here." Ramsay strokes his chin. "He gave me some sort of filler. Simon says it looks quite unique." It is clear that Ramsay, whose reputation was built as much on his penchant for cussing as it was for his many Michelin stars, is now trying to present a very different image. Given the events of the past year, that should perhaps not be so surprising.
Ramsay has had a pretty rough time of it over the past 12 months. This began last November when a woman called Sarah Symonds claimed to the News of the World that she had been having a seven-year affair with the chef. Ramsay denied the relationship, but the damage was already done.
From there, it snowballed. There were the revelations that one of Ramsay’s restaurants, Foxtrot Oscar, and some of his gastropubs, were using food preprepared off-site and then sold with markups of up to 586%. There was the unfortunate moment, in Melbourne, where he is said to have called an Australian television presenter a "lesbian pig" — a charge he apologized for at the time, but now tells me was wrongly attributed to him.
Worse was to come. In June of this year, it was reported that Gordon Ramsay Holdings had fallen into financial difficulty. Things only improved when £5-million was pumped into the company by Ramsay and his father-in-law, who is his business partner.
All of this made me vaguely nervous about our interview. Ramsay, 42, is not backwards in coming forwards about his feelings, and yet the man I meet is calm, controlled and charming, even.
While he won’t comment on rumours of his infidelity, the same cannot be said for accusations about him being a bad chef, or his restaurants being on the slide. I make the mistake of asking him about his recent appearance on BBC Breakfast, during which he took offence to host Bill Turnbull when he asked him if he still cooked in his restaurants. Ramsay’s breathless response is repeated here only in part.
"What an old fart," he says. "I’ve been at the coalface for 20 years, which you can probably tell by the depth of the lines on my face. I cook, I create, I’m incredibly excited by what I do, I’ve still got a lot to achieve. Do I want to be at the coalface 16 or 17 hours a day, cooking everybody’s bit of lamb? No. I have done though. We are the Manchester United of kitchens now. Am I playing full-time in the kitchen? I am a player-coach."
I ask him if the criticism ever gets to him. "I made a conscious decision last year just to cut it out. But I have to thank the British media for this: They build you strong." He compares the past year to taking off on a plane. "You think, ’s–t, we can’t turn back now.’ And you go through the cloud, and it’s bumpy, but then there is a glimmer, and then BAM, and you’re through. You think, down there it’s so grim and grey, and up here it’s amazing bright sunshine." – The F Word airs Tuesdays at 9 p.m. on Food Network.
