‘I want to be known for my food, not my screaming’

Famed British chef Gordon Ramsay on why he’s willing to eat raw sea urchins, which chefs don’t get his sympathy, and why trying to disconnect his reel-life persona from his off-screen one is a lost cause — but an undeniably profitable one

Gordon Ramsay's reputation precedes him. Not the apoplectic one, where he's flying off the handle at one of his chefs or lobbing terribly cooked salmon across the room (although that is the disposition he's most famous for). No, it's his other persona - the ultra-courteous, ever-charming side - that I was alerted to prior to my interview with him, courtesy numerous forum discussions between folks who'd interacted with the famed British chef themselves. And he was every bit the gentleman when we met at the newly-opened Hell's Kitchen restaurant at Caesars Palace Bluewaters earlier this week.
Inspired by the eponymous TV show, the restaurant is only the second in the world after its flagship in Las Vegas - so, it's a definite doffing of the cap to Dubai's very vibrant fine dining scene. It's worth noting though that, for Gordon, the much-anticipated venue is but one more to add to his existing empire of 34 restaurants across the world. Which is just as well, because there's no divorcing the man from his first love. In a relatively (but not entirely) cuss-free, sit-down interview with WKND, the restaurateur managed to address everything from sustainability to fitness, and entrepreneurship to social media blowbacks - but all of it was within the larger framework of what he is best known for: food.
The celebrity chef is not unaware of the massive respect he garners in the industry but he manages to lay down the facts - and stats - without sounding pompous about it. "Everyone asks, how do you do it, how do you manage? I'm working smarter, not harder," he reveals. "It's finding that juxtaposition of balance in terms of quality of life, developing, and not becoming stale. That's quite exciting, because you can't slow down but you do need to pace yourself."
Well, he has been pacing himself. It's going to be 21 years since Gordon opened his first solo restaurant in Chelsea, London, in 1998. It's also their 18th year maintaining three Michelin stars there - so, if anything, there's tons of experience that's keeping this chef on top of his game. As he quips, "I'm not the new kid on the block, I'm the grandad on the rock!"
Despite his fiery temperament that detractors often peg as 'borderline (or outright) abuse', the numbers don't lie. Gordon attests to the incredible "draw of staff" at his restaurants across the world - and it's not difficult to see why they continue to receive an influx of "requests from talented individuals who want to be part of" the GR team. "We're the Manchester United of kitchens!" cracks the self-assured chef, in the first of several sporting references the former footballer would drop during the interview.
No apologies
He is far better known for dropping truth bombs though - unapologetic and, at times, hilariously brutal ones. The conversation turns, inevitably, to his reputation for being a 'screamer' in the kitchen. Is his off-screen persona anything like his reel-life one? Gordon chooses to illustrate his response. "When you train and go to play in front of 80,000 people every week at [football stadium] Old Trafford, you get serious; you're in that zone. That's exactly what I'm like when it's curtains up [on the TV shows]: it's serious. We just finished shooting the new Kitchen Nightmares series [in which he cracks the whip with floundering restaurants in a bid to help them turn their fortunes around]. We filmed about 174 hours for five days, which will be edited down to 42 minutes of footage. If I had to sit down and show myself shaking hands with everybody, embracing, high-fiving. You do the math.
"I have a real life outside the kitchen," he continues. "It's just inside, when I've got my jacket on, I want perfection. I'm not going to sit there, pretending to be their friend, when they're sending out substandard food. So, whether I'm saving a business or in my own kitchen, I'll be blunt and I'll be straight. I think the persona is amplified because of what you see in a condensed version so. I must send you the rough cuts," he laughs.
While it may be difficult for most to disconnect him from his television personality, Gordon is keen to make the distinction clear. "If I was never again on television after today, at heart, I'm still a real chef," he says. "It's just that your reputation grows bigger on the screen than it does in a restaurant. I can't be blamed for that! Unfortunately, the ratio of 200 people I cook for every night is never going to catch up with the 22 million people that watch the shows every week. I just use the exposure to generate interest - and I haven't got a single restaurant to fill now."
It's quite some exposure, with the programmes running successfully across 150 countries and 172 different territories. It's taken 15 years to get there - and yet. "There's now this funny equation where I consider myself a real chef, but people insist I'm just a TV chef, because they've never eaten my food. Well, come and eat my food - then you'll understand why I get so mad on TV," he exclaims, part-amused, part unable to keep an F-bomb from slipping through the net. "I want to be known for my food - not my screaming."
You are what you eat?
Fixing up flailing restaurants and whipping chefs into shape is not the only thing Ramsay's shows are about. He's just finished what he's calling "an extraordinary unchartered series" for National Geographic, that sees the team start off in Peru, then make their way through Morocco, Laos, New Zealand, Hawaii and Alaska. And he's been as unafraid to test his taste buds as he is to give someone a tongue-lashing. From maggot-covered cheese to live snake hearts and deep-fried tarantulas, what most barely have the stomach to read without forcing back the bile, Gordon's had the guts to eat. Perhaps being in the business of (literally) spitting out 'terrible' restaurant food is what gives him the pluck to eat what many might not touch with a pole, let alone a fork.
"I think every chef has to put their palate through the ups and downs. You can't just cherry-pick the favourites," he explains. "I recently went deep sea diving for the most amazing sea urchins. We came up and the diver I was with opened up this sea urchin right there, while we were floating in the sea and literally seconds after plucking it from a depth of 15-18 metres. The flavour of that sea urchin was extraordinary - it just tasted so different from what it's like, four days later, packed on a shelf. It's so hard to describe because we're cleaning it in salt water and eating it, but the creaminess was mind-blowing - and way, way better than it is when we get it on land."
If anything, his travels give him a really deep appreciation for how communities survive. He tells of how his daughter was recently aghast to find out he'd eaten seal meat in Alaska, innards and all. "I had to tell her, no, that's how people there live," he says. "They don't have supermarkets, or cars to drop ingredients around to them. They've got three hours of sunlight a day. So yes, seal. Is it the kind of protein I want to eat every day? Of course not. But if I was in the outback of Alaska and that's what was available to survive, then, of course, I'd eat it."
When the critic is critiqued
As far as food choices go, Gordon has been exceptionally vocal about some trends more than others. Just last week, he sent Twitter fans into a mini-meltdown by introducing a vegan option onto the menu. Why? Because anyone who's been following the outspoken chef is more than well-acquainted with his 'committed carnivore' stance, and how he has, in the past, declared himself "allergic" to vegans. So, when he announced the introduction of a Beet Wellington, people practically fell over themselves to call out what they saw as blatant hypocrisy, flooding his page with 'Where's the lamb sauce??' GIFs (a line he's famous for yelling on a show back in 2006). But what his fans don't seem to get is that the master chef's business sense trumps his impenitent rhetoric any day.
"We had 2.5 million impressions on that Instagram post - it was insane," he acknowledges, shaking his head. "Look, I've had fun and laughed at veganism, but I love it. What I find really hard as a chef is the cult, angry, fighting stance that some protesters adopt - that's the bit I get anxious about, because we don't need that aggression. I've got a bigger issue with Evian and the plastic bottles they produce on a daily basis that's hitting the ocean, as opposed to the sustainability of eating meat. So, introducing plant-based ingredients cleverly was an integration that, if I didn't do, would have been one of the biggest mistakes I ever made in my career."
Gordon credits his three "amazing" daughters with keeping him in tune with the younger generation "that is far more conscious" about social and environmental issues than he ever was when he was their age. "I've been silly and funny with flippant remarks about being allergic to vegans. But we're talking about [stuff I said] 20 years ago, not two months ago, so I just have to grin and bear it. Am I turning vegan? No. Will I eat vegan food? Of course, I will - and it's gone down exceptionally well!"
Despite lashing back at certain other plain-spoken British celebrities [hello, Piers Morgan] who've been working themselves into a fine lather over the matter, Gordon makes it clear he is not allergic to criticism as long as it is fair and pertaining to his food.
Nailing the balance
If there's one thing that almost every chef WKND has ever spoken to is unanimous about, it's about how they have absolutely no time for anything else outside the kitchen, let alone staying fit. Gordon, however, cannot sympathise. "Yeah, that's laziness," he states, not bothering to mince words as usual. "You could say the same about doctors, lawyers and airplane pilots - they're all under pressure. We're not saving lives, we're cooking food."
But everyone in F&B agrees the hours can be nightmarishly long, I contend. "Well, here's the thing, there's no fast track to success," says Gordon, who, at 52, is enviably fit for his age. "You can't work less and earn more. It's an industry that, like medicine, you need to study. If you're not prepared to go on that path and become disciplined to study and to become somewhat selfish, you're never going to make it to the top."
Perhaps, the thing that helps, in part, to drive Gordon to the top is knowing what he doesn't want in life. "I don't want to get to the age of 50 and be working split shifts, and eating processed, reheated food," he says. "That would destroy me. But you can't get to the top if you want to work seven hours a day and be at home seven nights a week. It's like sport: if you want to get into the Premier League, you need to put that work in. So, I think what chefs need to understand is you need to have that passion, but also look after yourself. You need to find that balance." Personally, Gordon says he trains 3-4 days a week. "That allows me to eat whatever the hell I want to eat - and I've a very happy life because of it!"
karen@khaleejtimes.com

• Food and Dining