The knives are out for Gordon Ramsay in New York City, and he knows it. Or
does he? Sitting across from me at the bar of a 55th Street yakitori joint,
he seems curiously untroubled. It’s not that he’s unconcerned, or
overconfident, or not taking his newest and boldest venture seriously; he
is. To the tune of millions of dollars of his own money. It’s just that he
doesn’t seem fully aware of the situation on the ground. He’s sipping his
beer awfully slowly, and eating his charcoal-grilled chicken with
disconcertingly obvious pleasure considering the circumstances. If I were a
man in his position, I’d be halfway down a bottle of vodka right now, my
stomach doing flips at the very thought of food.
On November 16, Ramsay is opening in New York. He insists – and I believe him
– that “Gordon Ramsay at the London” will offer food and service every bit
as good as at his mothership, “Gordon Ramsay at Royal Hospital Road”. He
hopes and expects to get three Michelin stars. He hopes and expects to make
money. What he seems not to know is that in New York City, one does not
necessarily lead to the other. I point out that Alain Ducasse – whose
restaurant empire Ramsay has mentioned frequently as a template for his own
– got three Michelin stars for his outpost here, and closed his doors
shortly after.
“Worst launch EVER,” I tell him. “The press here – even some of the old guard
French chefs – they hated that place before it even opened! Ducasse landed
in New York like a turd in the punchbowl. A f****** mausoleum.”
Ramsay seems genuinely unsettled by this. And I’m worried, too. I like Ramsay.
I admire his food, his career and, however ignorant much of the twaddle
written about it, his management style. I want him to succeed in New York.
But he seems surprised to hear of the cool, even hostile, reception that one
of France’s greatest chefs received here.
From a logistical standpoint alone, Gordon Ramsay at the London in the London
NYC Hotel appears a mammoth under- taking: formal dining for 45, a bar
offering more casual small plate fare for 70 (inspired by Ramsay’s Maze in
London), three private dining rooms that will soon offer special event
function space for 20, 50 and 80 seats. Guests of the hotel will be able to
call down for en-suite dining, and then there’s the Spa menu.
Having seen him on his wildly successful American version of Hell’s Kitchen,
where it is repeatedly invoked that he is the embodiment of the chef ideal
of rigorous perfectionism, all will expect Ramsay-standard food. How Ramsay
and his chef, Neil Ferguson, are going to pull off this multi-level,
high-standard food service all at the same time, mostly out of the same
hangar-sized kitchen with a union crew, while satisfying the capricious and
ever-escalating expectations of the New York foodie elite in the 45-seat
fine dining room is anybody’s guess. And people are guessing.
Told that Ramsay, rather than simply accept a fat paycheck for a “consultancy”
deal with the hotel, has invested his own money ($6.5 million by his
account), one veteran Uptown restaurateur with a similarly high-end
clientele was stunned. “If he did that, he’s a total idiot,” he blurted. “He
has the talent,” he went on to say, but, “he does not know what he’s getting
involved with when it comes to the union.”
Among the city’s top chefs, a union presence (not a feature in most
stand-alone fine-dining restaurants, but a fact of life in hotel operations)
is widely believed to be a crippling factor when it comes to multi-starred
aspirations. Overheads, including vacation packages, health plans, “sick
days” and holiday pay, can be an impediment to what is already, at best, a
narrow profit margin. More importantly, one can’t summarily fire a lazy or
mediocre cook or any union member who might not share your drive for three
Michelin stars. Speak too harshly to a union employee and you’ve got labour
problems. Bad labour problems. Expensive labour problems.
Which leads to another matter. In New York, few even care about the Michelin
Guide. While three stars in the fabled red guide are a major lure for
visitors from abroad, New Yorkers rely on The New York Times (and to a
lesser extent on the more “democratic” numerical gradings of the Zagat
guide). It is hard to overstate the importance of the weekly New York
Times review, currently written by Frank Bruni, who, like previous New
York Times critics, eats anonymously, using aliases and disguises when
necessary. The New York Times critic will make multiple visits (so
one can scarcely complain that he “came on a bad night”), awarding between
zero to four stars as judgment. The New York Times can, and has, it
is widely accepted, “make” or close a restaurant with a single review.
What will The New York Times think of Ramsay’s food, assuming he does
manage to match Royal Hospital Road in quality and creativity? Does he have
a chance at the all-important four stars?
“This is food we’ve seen already,” says the veteran restaurateur, who has
eaten at Royal Hospital Road. “Some guys here have been doing this for 20
years.”
His chances are “small”, says one current four-star champion. Food at his
London flagship is, “OK, but for New York it’s not that exciting.” He
suggests as well that, “the union is going to love him. He’s going to
generate a lot of money for them for verbal abuse.” Another, more favourably
inclined, New York Times four-star recipient suggests that
initially Ramsay can look forward to “probably three. Start with three and
be happy,” he says. “Work for the next.”
The notoriously competitive Ramsay clearly does want to play with the big
boys. Just a few blocks away are Thomas Keller’s Per Se, Masa Takayama’s
Masa, Eric Ripert’s Le Bernardin, Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s Jean Georges,
and Daniel Boulud’s Daniel – all much admired four-star New York
institutions. Keller, Vongerichten and Ripert have three stars each from
Michelin as well. Not that they need them. With all those heavy hitters so
close by, I ask Ramsay what he’s bringing to New York that we don’t already
have? Why hang his balls out that far, with a 45-seat fine dining room and
all that implies, in such company?
“We don’t have to be stiff and ornate,” he says. “I’m not coming with the
frills of Per Se. Three or four courses, and they’ll leave on a high. Pure
concentration of flavour. And I really mean identification of flavour.
Clear. You could eat blind and identify what you’re eating. No water
sommelier.” A reference to the departed Ducasse’s practice of offering a
variety of bottled waters from a tableside cart.
And there will, he insists, be a uniquely British dimension. There will be:
“Sea bass, cooked in the skin, with thyme flowers on a bed of crushed
potatoes, the most amazing sauce vierge, tomato consommé. Light. Easy.
Uncomplicated, unfussy food. Ravioli of lobster, red mullet, poached beef
with a root-vegetable consommé. Pigeon. There will be balance; a really nice
balance.”
Given his frequent trips to Asia, I ask if the menu will reflect those
influences. “There’s a lightness in the vinaigrettes and the sauces. A lot
more marinades. Braising, slow-roasting. Twice-cooked pork, and a little
more spice involved.”
But fusion? “I can’t deliver that. Maze is my first. If things work well over
here, then I’ll bring Maze.” Right now, he says, he’ll continue to play to
his established strengths. Asked about practitioners of molecular gastronomy
such as Ferrán Adría and Heston Blumenthal and their acolytes, he says, “I’m
a flavours man. The Fat Duck and Heston are extraordinary, [but] don’t go to
eat. Go to have fun. It’s uncharted territory. They’re discovering new
antics, so whatever they present with a three-star heavyweight bell
underneath, everyone’s confirmed that it’s great. They’re lucky. They’re a
lot safer. We’ve got a foundation. They’re setting a foundation.” He pauses
for a second, “we’re evolving, but consolidating at the same time.”
“So, you respect the old school?” I inquire.
“Big time.”
What does he know about The New York Times? Has he been reading up, I
ask him?
“Religiously. For the past 12 months. This guy comes in incognito. What I do
know is I won’t be kicking the f***** out, that’s for sure. I won’t make the
same mistake I made with A.A. Gill.”
A little later, he puts down an empty skewer and asks, “No one knows Frank
Bruni, do they?”
I tell him where he might get a picture.
“And would he come four or five times?”
Yes, I say. This seems to be news to Ramsay.
What about the constraints of running a union shop, I ask?
Ramsay explains the business model of an eventual American hotel/restaurant
operation, spanning New York, LA and Miami, with his partners, LXR Resorts
(Blackstone). Between the three he anticipates, “a billion dollars in
turnover. We’re running the whole food and beverage. A lot of chefs would
shit themselves in terms of handling room service, but the rooms are going
to pay my rent. When the NFL is on, or the baseball, whatever it might be,
and someone wants to have the most amazing home-made burger, then I’ll have
that done.” The majority of those preparing food in the 45-seat fine dining
room will initially, at least, “be the Brit Pack. Definitely. Definitely.
Definitely.”
Heading up the “Brit Pack” of seasoned Ramsay loyalists will be chef de
cuisine Neil Ferguson. “He was at Aubergine from the hard-arse days,” says
Ramsay proudly. “He was at Passard, Claridge’s, set up Angela Hartnett at
the Connaught. Been here for the last year. His wife’s from Boston. Kid’s
just been born. He’s almost American.”
Is Ferguson nervous?
“Oh, he’s shitting himself,” Ramsay laughs.
Ramsay’s shrewdest strategy for conquering New York might not make him money,
but it will very likely make him friends. The three-course lunch at Gordon
Ramsay at the London will cost, he says, “between $35 to $40” for food. And
for the evening dinner service an astonishingly low $60-$80 check average.
“My motives are to go 20 per cent cheaper than Jean Georges, Per Se and
Daniel. And deliver just as good,” he insists. “No three-course $300
bullshit. None of that. We’re stripping everything down.” At a time when
single menu items have crossed the $40 mark in many Manhattan restaurants,
this will surely gather some favourable attention.
His greatest asset? The enormous recognition he receives from his successful
TV series might, I point out, also have a downside. He might be famous, but
he’s famous here for being a TV star. Mostly liberal, moneyed New Yorkers, I
suggest, who like to think of themselves as world-weary, cynical and
sophisticated, might not take a shine to a chef known mostly for appearing
on a reality show.
He tells me that the one led directly to the other. He could have come to New
York earlier; he’d been offered consultancy deals with no personal outlay.
“Rock off every few months: you know, wade in, wade out. I want to do better
than that.” Instead, he chose to use the money from Hell’s Kitchen to
finance his personal stake in the New York restaurant. “I was quite curious
about Hell’s Kitchen and Kitchen Nightmares taking
off. Finding a way to use the money I earned over here, without setting the
wrong impression.”
The people who watch Hell’s Kitchen, I tell him, are not likely
to be the same people who will be eating in his restaurant, or staying in
the hotel. That, I offer, is probably a very different demographic.
“I can’t decide right now if it was a good thing or a bad thing,” he says,
ponderously, “in terms of the restaurant.”
But, he says, “Every chef in the world is going to Vegas for a payday, and I
haven’t. When all the criticism comes in for taking the TV road, I haven’t
sold my arse to Vegas without trying to make it in New York. New York first!
I’m here to cook my arse off!
“I’m used to pressure,” he says. “I’m useless without it.”
Having just read his memoir, Humble Pie, I was well aware that he was
used to not just pressure, but worse, far worse. Physical abuse by his
father, hazing and bollocking and sometimes even physical intimidation from
a gauntlet of brutally demanding chefs: Marco Pierre White (“each time he
would cut a slice, he would throw it at me”); Albert Roux (“he went
ballistic. He got hold of the bucket and he just threw it”); Joël Robuchon
(threw “a langoustine in my f****** ear. I couldn’t hear for weeks after).”
The procession of arse-kickings he’s survived to get to the top is something
that has been largely ignored in articles, which describe him as a bully or
as “Britain’s worst boss”. To me, the most significant testimony about the
kind of loyalty he engenders is that when he left Aubergine to open his own
place on a wing and a prayer, every employee left with him. Many of the
faces you see in old episodes of Boiling Point being spoken to with
something less than sensitivity are still with him. Those skills are
something he’s going to need when looking to inspire a mostly union crew to
greatness.
Now that he’s on top of the heap, and poised to tackle New York, what does he
think of his former mentors/tormentors? I quote my friend Eric Ripert on the
subject of Joël Robuchon: “When I think of Robuchon, I see a dark, dark
street.”
“Robuchon. Now he’s a Pope. I never want to turn into some dimwit
philosopher.”
Which of his former chefs appears in Gordon Ramsay’s real kitchen nightmares?
“Albert Roux. Because that was the first three-star I ever worked in.”
Does he have scary dreams?
“I do. Yeah.”
I mention the Versailles sequence in the original Boiling Point series, where
he cooked a banquet for hundreds of VIPs with a staff of rented knuckleheads
and sub-standard institutional equipment.
“When you’ve been bent over backwards, up, sideways, and you stand there,
naked with your knob in front of the Prime Minister of France… I’ve never
attempted that again.”
“But they loved it,” I point out.
“Yeah,” he says. “But I know what’s right. You know [when] you’ve
short-changed them. That’s why New York is 45 seats.”
Ramsay currently has nine restaurants in his empire. There’s his newspaper
column. He’s working with Royal Doulton on a line of housewares. He’s a
consultant to Singapore Airlines. Presumably, he’s rich. When, I ask, will
enough be enough? He’s been the “good son” all his life, looking after his
family when his father and his brother couldn’t or wouldn’t. The transience
and insecurity of his childhood is long past, surely never to return. Yet
he’s still running, literally and figuratively, a week away from turning 40
years old. “At 30, I was like a dog with nine dicks. At 40, I feel like a
dog with 12 dicks. Nothing’s slowed down. I’m a control freak,” he says
proudly.
Has he ever considered taking time off, gathering up his wife and four kids
and running off to Bali, then not getting out of a sarong for six months? He
looks stunned by the question. As if he’s been slapped, as if it never
occurred to him.
“What would I do without my kitchen?”
I ask him what it is that REALLY scares him. “Right now? The New
York Times.”
It’s easy to squeeze metaphors out of Ramsay’s aborted football career. It’s
harder today to avoid them. But I’ll use baseball as it is, somehow, more
appropriate. Where Ramsay finds himself now is the stuff of old classic
movies, where the ageing player finds himself once again the rookie
underdog, facing the biggest game of his life. It’s the most intimidating
field in the sport; the competition are long-time champions. All eyes are on
our outsider hero as he steps into the batter’s box. At least half the crowd
want desperately for him to fail. The pitcher fixes him in a dead-eyed yet
penetrating stare and readies himself to throw. Here comes the ball, Ramsay
swings, and…
Gordon Ramsay at the London, 151 West 54th Street (00 1 212 468 8888); the
London Bar (00 1 212 468 8889)
