Gordon Ramsay is an interesting character; now globally famous for his television shows
Gordon Ramsay
and tirades of abuse against those featured in them. In fact he is perhaps more famous for the abuse than for anything else but it should not be forgotten that this is a man whose various restaurants have been awarded an astonishing 13 Michelin stars.
Gordon Ramsey was born in 1966 in Scotland and by the time he left home at 16, his parents had moved around the U.K. several times looking for work. By this time his much talked about fledgling football career had begun and ended after series of injuries. He puts much of his later success down to recovering from the disappointment of this period of his life.
Following the footballing disappointment he started to take an interest in cooking and enrolled in an Hotel Management course at a college in Oxfordshire. This eventually led to a position as commis chef at the Roxburgh House Hotel and he worked his way up until he was running the catering side. A dalliance with the owners wife led to his leaving for London where he eventually began to work under Marco Pierre White at Harveys.
Le Gavroche, Mayfair
White was an extraordinarily erratic employer and eventually Ramsay got fed up with the “rages and the bullying and the violence” and, with White’s blessing, left to work under Albert Roux at the influential French restaurant, La Gavroche, in Mayfair. From here he followed Roux to a hotel in the Swiss Alps and then, citing burnout, spent a year as a chef on a private yacht called Idlewild.
By 1993 he was refreshed enough to return to London where White offered him a head chef’s job and a 10% share in the Rossmore. In a little over a year, Ramsay had earned the Rossmore a Michelin star and then a second in 1997. By this time though, the relationship between Ramsay and the other owners had deteriorated and in the same year he left to start his own establishment. A new chapter was beginning.
Part Two follow….