Gordon Ramsay Caught Lying About His Three Michelin Stars

Gordon Ramsay has been caught telling pork pies again after announcing he is to close his flagship restaurant for a revamp in a bid to keep his three Michelin stars.

The celebrity chef told American food magazine Bon Appétit he’d had a conference call with bosses of the French tyre guide on Friday to tell them that Restaurant Gordon Ramsay in Chelsea, London, would be shut for two months for “an amazing new refurb”.

He said: “I think every five years at that level, to reposition yourself is important. We’ve got three Michelin stars, the longest time a British restaurant has had three Michelin stars. So every five years, it needs to be moved up.

“Because you get criticised easily. ‘Well, it’s not worth three stars anymore, he’s cashing in, he’s never there’ - all those kinds of things. So you gotta silence those critics by constantly reinventing.”

Reinventing? Perhaps it’s the truth the notoriously slippery chef is talking about in the taped interview. Because his restaurant in Royal Hospital Road has not held three stars the longest in Britain. Far from it. That honour is held by The Waterside Inn, in Bray, Berkshire, which has had three gongs since 1985 - a piffling 16 years before Ramsay got his.

Ramsay, 45, is right about one thing. He has had a lot of criticism for not being behind the stoves of his restaurants and for spreading himself too thin in his pursuit for world domination. Not least from some of his former lieutenants who emerged blinking from the shadow of his large posterior to open restaurants in their own name, without having the constant gall of Ramsay taking credit for their hard work while lounging around in the California sunshine.

But what has that got to do with a new paintjob and a bit of interior design? Is he so sick of the decor in his 45-seater eatery, if he can still remember where it is, that he can’t stand being there? Will the wonderful revamp mean he will spend more time sweating in his flagship kitchen, run by head chef Clare Smyth for the past six years, rather than parading himself in front of American TV audiences like a painted horse and playing MonkeyTennis? Unlikely if his past performances are anything to go by.

And how does a splash of sage green “silence critics” who accuse him of cashing in? Ramsay - who has just opened two new eateries in Las Vegas, Gordon Ramsay Pub & Grill and Gordon Ramsay BurGR (GR, geddit?) and is to launch a London restaurant with David Beckham - has been cashing in and embellishing the past ever since he was in short trousers.

First, with his lie about having played first-team football for Glasgow Rangers, before his career was cut short by an injury, creating the myth of the tragically injured football star who re-invented himself as a chef. And secondly with his TV fame and the dark PR arts he uses to keep his name in (and out) of the newspapers.

As he goes on to say in the interview: “It (cooking) is a tough business. A very tough, demanding business. And it’s slightly Machiavellian in that you need to be strong, especially at this level.”

Slightly Machiavellian? I think Niccolo would have been proud. Perhaps he should say longest in the world in the next US interview, and say he was soccer captain for Manchester United. After all, it’s important to keep constantly reinventing.

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:: What's Next For Gordon Ramsay? Monkey Tennis?