Gordon Ramsay's After a year in which his global restaurant empire almost went bankrupt, the bad boy of British cuisine is serving cheaper cuts of meat and focusing on the richer rewards of TV stardom. By WILLIAM GREEN Photograph by PHIL RISK n a gray morning in October, Gordon Ramsay bursts into the kitchen of his south London house, pop music blaring from the radio. At the heart of the room stands a 67,000 pound (Sill,000) French cooking range that weighs 2.5 tons and had to be lowered by crane into the celebrity chef's home. Ramsay, who is 6 feet 2 inches (1.88 meters) tall and weighs 215 pounds (98 kilograms), is wearing jeans, a tight black T-shirt that accentuates his muscles and a Bell & Ross watch—a Swiss brand marketed to soldiers, bomb-disposal experts and other "men facing extreme situations." The 43-year-old Scot pours himself a juice, sits at the Idtchen table and looks back on his own extreme situation: a year in which his global restaurant empire al most went banlmupt. In the fall of2008, his London-based father-in-law, Chris Hutcheson. In late Gordon Ramsay Holdings Ltd. breached December, Ramsay says, KPMG recom the covenants on a £10.5 million loan mended that the company declare bank and overdraft facility from Royal Bank of ruptcy, fire hundreds of people and close Scotland Group Pic. The bank hired all but its best-performing restaurants. talking with Hutcheson about how to save KPMG to perform an independent re "Everything was on the line," he says. their business. The stress was so intense, view of the firm, 69 percent of which is "December, January, February and March he says, that he'd go for runs in Malibu at owned by Ramsay and 31 percent by his were the most highly pressurized, s—tiest, 4:30 in the morning, wearing a black vest most awful four loaded with 20 kilograms of weights. "I months I've ever just ran and ran and ran," he says. had in business." For Ramsay, bankruptcy was unthink Ramsay was in able even if it made financial sense. Hollywood for "There was no f—ing way that was ever most of the first 12 going to happen," he says. "That was w e e k s o f 2 0 0 9 never even an option." shooting the U.S. Ramsay's fame would have made it the version of Hell's most public of failures. "He's one of the Kitchen, the reality great chefs," says Jean-Luc Naret, Paris- show he fronts for based director of the Michelin Guide se t h e F o x n e t w o r k . ries, which awards the stars that are the After a day of film Oscars of the food world. Restaurant ing, he'd often be Gordon Ramsay at Royal Hospital Road on the phone for is London's only dining spot with three hours at night. Michelin stars. 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"He took classic French cook don, as a wife-beating alcoholic and thief, ing and modernized it," Hartnett says. whose favorite punishment was to thrash Friends say Ramsay is hard-wired for the back of his son's legs with a belt. Ram perfection. "If he were in a line of washer say's mother, Helen, raised their four uppers in a prison, he'd want to do it the children, baking bread when she couldn't best and fastest," Llewellyn says. afford to buy it and cooking them dishes Aubergine won two stars in 1997, and such as ham hock soup or sausages and Ramsay decided he deserved more than beans. His father'sview, Ramsay writes, the 25 percent stake its owners had given was that "only poofs cook." him. Ramsay quit, triggering a lawsuit for A knee injury wrecked Ramsay's breach of contract that the parties set dreams of a soccer career. So he stumbled tled out of court. into a hotel management course before Ramsay had just married a school taking a series of junior cooking jobs. teacher, Tana Hutcheson, with whom he now has three daughters and a son be N 1989, HIS fascination with tween the ages of 7 and 11. Tana's father, haute cuisine was awakened at Chris, who owned a printing company, Harvey's, a London restaurant risked £1 million in cash and loan guar run by Marco Pierre White, the antees to bankroll the Royal Hospital first British chef with three Mi- Road restaurant in 1998. He and Ramsay chelin stars. Ramsay then moved to have been partners ever since, and their London's top French restaurant, Le bond goes beyond business. "He's my Gavroche, as an apprentice chef. Mi son-in-law but, actually, he's my son," chel Roux Jr., now its head chef, says Hutcheson says. Ramsay was arrested in his first week The Royal Hospital Road restaurant, after jumping over a London under with signature dishes like lobster ravioli ground turnstile to avoid the fare. in a lemon grass and chervil sauce, won While Roux says Ramsay was un its third star in 2001. By then, Ramsay ruly, he made up for it in the kitchen. was as famous for his temper as his cook "He was beautiful to watch," Roux ing. A British TV documentary called Boil says. "He's a very naturally gifted ing Point showed him spitting out food chef. He has the taste, the eye of an and firing a waiter for serving the wrong artist, the efficiency, and he's ruth appetizer. Ramsay even ejected restau lessly hardworking." rant reviewer A. A. Gill—along with his Ramsay spent three years in guest, actress Joan Collins—for criticiz France, including a stint with ing him in print. "I've become more ma Robuchon, where he mastered the ture," Ramsay says now. "I wouldn't say essentials of French cuisine. Then, mellow. I still get incredibly frustrated." in 1993, he became head chef at Many employees defend him, saying Aubergine in London. "He was an he's generous and loyal. "He's definitely animal, a monster; he was horrible," says not malicious," says Josh Emett, head Angela Hartnett, who worked with him chef at Gordon Ramsay at The London in there.