Early life:
Gordon Ramsay was born in Johnstone, Renfrewshire, Scotland, and raised in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England from the age of 5. Ramsay is the second of four children; he has an older sister, Diane, a younger brother, Ronnie and a younger sister, Yvonne. Ramsay's father Gordon (died 1997) was, at various times, a swimming pool manager, a welder, and a shopkeeper; his mother, Helen Cosgrove, and Yvonne have been nurses.
Ramsay has described his early life as "hopelessly itinerant", as his family moved constantly due to the aspirations and failures of his father, who was violent.In 1976, they finally settled in Stratford-upon-Avon where he grew up in the Bishopton area of the town. Ramsay has described his father as an alcoholic. In his autobiography, Humble Pie, he describes his early life as being marked by abuse and neglect from this "hard-drinking womaniser". At the age of 16, Ramsay moved out of the family house into a flat in Banbury.
Football career:
Ramsay played football and was first chosen to play under-14 football at age 12. He was chosen to play for Warwickshire. His football career was marked by injuries, causing him to remark later in life, "Perhaps I was doomed when it came to football". In mid-1984, Ramsay had a trial with Rangers, the club he supported as a boy. He seriously injured his knee, smashing the cartilage during training. Ramsay continued to train and play on the injured knee, tearing a cruciate ligament during a squash game.
Ramsay has claimed to have played two first team games for Rangers.[According to his autobiography Ramsay played "a couple of non-league matches as a trialist" for Rangers and was signed by the club at the age of 15.
Allan Cairns, the photographer who took the picture in September 1985, said the photo was not one of Rangers first team but a side picked to play a testimonial match. A Rangers spokesman said: "Ramsay was a trialist in that testimonial game. He trained with us for a few months after that but then got injured."
Rangers revisited
In series 4, episode 12 of The F Word (originally aired on 29 July 2008), Ramsay visited Ibrox, the home ground of his favourite childhood team, Rangers, and exclaimed, "Home, Sweet Home" and said, "My dream came true when I was spotted in the mid-80s and I joined the youth team here in Ibrox." He related that one of his fondest memories is playing alongside one of Scotland's football legends, Ally McCoist, who said about Ramsay, "I remember him well and the one thing that never ever will change is that he's a competitive so-and-so and wants to do and be the best that he can." Ramsay recalled that, "the pain of being released on the back of an injury" was only assuaged many years later, "after receiving [his] third Michelin Star", and concluded that, "without the upset at Ibrox, I would not be the chef I am today."Early cooking career:
By this time, Ramsay's interest in cooking had already begun, and rather than be known as "the football player with the gammy knee", at age 19, Ramsay paid more serious attention to his culinary education. After weighing his options, Ramsay enrolled at North Oxfordshire Technical College, sponsored by the Rotarians, to study Hotel Management. He describes his decision to enter catering college as "an accident, a complete accident".
In the early 1980s, he worked as a commis chef at the Wroxton House Hotel then ran the kitchen and 60-seat dining room at the Wickham Arms, until his sexual relationship with the owner's wife made the situation difficult. Ramsay then moved to London, where he worked in a series of restaurants until being inspired to work for the temperamental Marco Pierre White at Harvey's.
After working at Harveys for two years and ten months, Ramsay, tired of "the rages and the bullying and violence", decided that the way to further advance his career was to study French cuisine. White discouraged Ramsay from taking a job in Paris, instead encouraging him to work for Albert Roux at Le Gavroche in Mayfair. (While at Le Gavroche, he met Jean-Claude Breton, now his maître d' at Royal Hospital Road.) After working at Le Gavroche for a year, Albert Roux invited Ramsay to work with him at Hotel Diva, a ski resort in the French Alps, as his number two. From there, Ramsay moved to Paris to work with Guy Savoy and Joël Robuchon, both Michelin-starred chefs. In Master Chef Season 3, Episode 18, Gordon Ramsey states that Guy Savoy was his mentor. He continued his training in France for three years, before giving in to the physical and mental stress of the kitchens and taking a year to work as a personal chef on the private yacht Idlewild, based in Bermuda.
Head chef:
Upon his return to London in 1993, Ramsay was offered the position of head chef at La Tante Claire in Chelsea. Shortly thereafter, Marco Pierre White re-entered his life, offering to set him up with a head chef position and 10% share in the Rossmore, owned by White's business partners. The restaurant was renamed Aubergine and went on to win its first Michelin star fourteen months later. In 1997, Aubergine won its second Michelin star. Despite the restaurant's success, a dispute with Ramsay's business owners and Ramsay's dream of running his own restaurant led to his leaving the partnership in 1997. In 1998, Ramsay opened his own restaurant in Chelsea, Restaurant Gordon Ramsay, with the help of his father-in-law, Chris Hutcheson. The restaurant gained its third Michelin star in 2001, making Ramsay the first Scot to achieve that feat.
From his first restaurant, Ramsay's empire has expanded rapidly, next opening Petrus, where six bankers spent over £44,000 on wine during a single meal in 2001, then Amaryllis in Glasgow (which he was later forced to close) and later Gordon Ramsay at Claridge's. Restaurants at the Dubai Creek and Connaught hotels followed, the latter branded with his protégé Angela Hartnett's name. Ramsay has opened restaurants outside the UK, beginning with Verre in Dubai. Gordon Ramsay at Conrad Tokyo and Cerise by Gordon Ramsay both opened in Tokyo in 2005, and in November 2006, Gordon Ramsay at the London opened in New York City, winning top newcomer in the city’s coveted Zagat guide, despite mixed reviews from professional critics.
In 2007, Ramsay opened his first restaurant in Ireland, Gordon Ramsay at Powerscourt, at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Powerscourt, County Wicklow. In May 2008 he opened his first restaurant on the US west coast – Boxwood, in The London West Hollywood hotel, formerly the Bel-Age hotel on the Sunset Strip in Los Angeles.
On 9 August 2011, Ramsay opened his first Canadian restaurant in Montreal – Laurier Gordon Ramsay, formerly Rotisserie Laurier BBQ. However, in February 2012 Danny Lavy — the owner of the restaurant — announced the restaurant was disassociating itself from Ramsay, citing a lack of involvement and understanding on Ramsay's part. In 2013, the restaurant closed.
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