8 minute read
A CHAT WITH GORDON RAMSAY
WORDS & PHOTOGRAPHY FROM 24KILOS
The ease with which Gordon Ramsay was able to transport his own unique brand of culinary reality TV to American shores confirms a number of different thing. Firstly, that both the UK and the US love to see a job done properly. Next, that there’s a shared passion for food, the type that has offered our chefs all the adoration and acclaim of international film stars.
There’s also the point that both Atlantic bedfellows clearly love an angry man, as typified by Ramsay’s sometimes terrifying pursuit of chefs, kitchen hands, front of house staff, restaurateurs and, on occasions, even the diners themselves!
Of course, the 54-year-old Scot refutes the tag. “Angry? Me?” he questions, with a wry smile. “I think the big thing is wanting a job to get to the point where you sit back and savour it. And the fact is, if you have some idiot stood in your way, preventing that, then of course you’re going to get mad.”
“You must remember too that the kitchen is a pressured environment. It’s hot, it’s smelly, it’s unwelcoming and it’s the place where the demands on you are incessant, and where absolutely everything you produce will be scrutinised to the hilt.”
Does he miss that environment, now he can sit comfortably and let others endure the stress, burns and unsociable work shifts. “Fuck yes, I miss it like hell!”
Q: You’ve never been afraid of hard work, we know that much.
RAMSAY: To become one of the best you’ve got to work with the best, and that’s exactly what I did, so as my mates were progressing into the first-team [Ramsay was a promising footballer who was on the books with Scottish soccer giants Glasgow Rangers] and getting professional contracts there I was buzzing my arse off in France, taking shit from the French, being called ‘rosbif’, all sorts of names, and “what are you doing over here?”. The harder the time I got, the more focused it made me.
Q: Talking about the way you learned your trade, it seems we live in a food and entertainment culture that makes everything look accessible and, dare I say it, even entitled, yet still there is no easy fix when it comes to making an impact. Do you agree?
RAMSAY: I don’t think there’s a problem with effort, but I do believe we have produced a culture where young people, and adults, can see that others have had what appears a very easy path into a profession or to success.
Largely, they don’t see the hours, days, months and years that went into cultivating that craft – they don’t see everything that happened behind the scenes. If they did, there wouldn’t be this layer of expectation, or level of disrespect towards people who have made it.
Gordon's Quick & Simple Recipes, Gordon Ramsay
Unfortunately, what social media has given us is unparalleled access into the lives of rich and famous people, and typically what you see those people doing is whatever they’re up to in their leisure time. You are not witnessing the hard graft, so it becomes something of a distorted picture, and I do think that’s dangerous.
Is there a way out of that? I don’t think so – not unless Twitter and Instagram explodes. I think the next generation needs to manage, or have managed for it, its expectations though, because some of them are totally off the scale.
Q: Were you worried about your ability to crack America?
RAMSAY: Worried? No, because that’s not in my nature. I have always had extreme confidence in myself when it comes to work, largely because I’ve achieved everything I’ve set out to achieve, so did I worry it would be a success? No.
What’s more we had a few really good formats in the UK that we’d played about with, and had some real traction with, and I knew that whatever worked in the UK should work in the US, just with two or three times the scale.
What did concern me and the production team were some of the intricacies and certain colloquialisms that we’d have to overcome. It’s a basic communication thing, and communication is everything on TV and in the kitchen.
But did I believe it would work? Yes.
Q: Are our appetites so different?
RAMSAY: Well the one thing that unites the Brits and the Yanks is that we fucking love our food. What also unites us is the fact that, collectively, we get slagged off by so many other countries, and it is this unity we have that keeps us together, and that’s really fucking special.
But beneath all of that is the fact we, genuinely, have many of the best minds in cuisine in the whole world. The French, the Italians… yes they will always be right up there, but we have joined them at the top, and it is our diversity and ability to draw in, celebrate, style and reimagine traditional global cuisine that has taken us to the next level.
The French won’t do that – they’re not interested. The French want to be the French, and they’re bloody good at it. The Italians have probably the best food staples you could ever wish for, so there’s no need for them to branch out; whereas the UK and the US have always been a melting pot – if you’ll excuse the pun – for styles from around the world, and the fact now is we’re overtaking other nations because our dinner plates have a strength and a versatility that others just can’t get near. These are exciting times.
Q: Do you think people in America have come to terms with the level of swearing in your shows?
RAMSAY: My advice on this one has always been the same – if you don’t like it, turn over. To appreciate why the odd swear word might pop out of my mouth you have to acknowledge the pressures of the kitchen and the food environment. It always looks like a lovely serene, woolly, fluffy place front-of-house and that’s the whole point – you wouldn’t want to keep turning up for meals where the staff were ripping shreds off one another… in fact, perhaps you would… but still, the point is it’s all calm in the dining room, but to establish that calm it needs to be high pressure out the back. And only when you’ve seen that situation do you really appreciate what it is we go through. It’s stress – pure, unadulterated stress. It’s not pleasant for anyone, and someone being offended by an expletive is really going to be the least of my fucking worries!
Q: What keeps you motivated after all these years? RAMSAY: it’s not that many fucking years – Jesus [laughs]. What keeps me motivated is the next thing.
Q: What advice would you give for people looking to get to the top?
RAMSAY: Be disciplined, be bloody-minded, be organised, be clear in your goal, and perhaps even be selfish, put yourself first because you can bet your life if you give someone else a leg-up they’re going to take it, and then you’re playing catch-up.
As I said before, success doesn’t just fall into your lap, as seems to be the expectation of a new generation. You’re going to have to work fucking hard for it, but I will guarantee you that with the right amount of effort and a basic requirement that you’re not an idiot, you can get somewhere… anyone can. Q: How do you relax away from work?
RAMSAY: My family are obviously key for me. I have a lovely wife and beautiful children – I have lovely homes and I enjoy the people around me. I like to cook – in fact I like to cook more now than I did before because I’m not spending every waking moment in the kitchen as I was in my younger days.
Aside from that, the gym is important – it’s a big stress reliever and I know a lot of other chefs say the same thing. In a way it’s not that different to the kitchen because it’s hot, sticky and uncomfortable, but whereas over a hot stove you’re perspiring and becoming more stressed, at the gym you’re easing out all that intensity, all that shit. It’s an beautiful feeling and certainly something I need.
Q: Do you like pressure?
RAMSAY: Yes – love it. When [wife] Tana and I sold our first home to raise the money for my breakthrough restaurant, it was a nervy time. We were back in rented accommodation in London with no guarantee whatsoever that things would work out the way we hoped, but that fear was the absolute driver in terms of pushing forward and ensuring that every last ounce of effort was invested in the brand and the business.
As you get older and become wealthier, you have more to fall back on, but still it amounts to the same thing whether it’s a big investment or a small one – you don’t want to fail, and that fear of failure is the one fuck-off thing that will forever galvanise me more than anything else. I love the feeling.
Q: Who has been your biggest inspiration?
RAMSAY: Probably Marco Pierre White, who I worked under and learned so much from. Angry, brutal, exacting and hard as nails. I don’t think too much of him rubbed off on me… [laughs] e
