In 2005, as he launched his new series, Gordon Ramsay, commenting on the phenomenon of ‘Celebrity Chefs’ said, “I don’t really think I’m a celebrity chef. There’s a TV bracket and a serious chef bracket.”
Ramsey went on to snidely dub chefs Ainsley Harriot, Brian Turner and Anthony Worrall Thompson as the Teletubbies.
I think he’s great, he brought cooking to the masses. He has given it sex appeal. He’s great at reinventing the wheel.
Last month, Turner and Thompson were in Dubai, acting as spokespersons for Steelite tableware and Mark Wilkinson Furniture, respectively. So Caterer decided to go along and ask these celebrity chefs what the difference is between a celebrity chef and a chef.
One of the criticisms often leveled at celebrity chefs is that they spend more time behind the cameras than behind the stove. While admitting that he doesn’t cook as often as he would like, Turner points out that he is 60 years old, and so would not be cooking every day anyway. “I do cook more than people expect,” he says.
“When you cook on TV you need to get a lot of practice, but if you’re going to do a load of [cooking] and then break off for an interview, and then restart [cooking the dish] the job doesn’t get done. It’s a not often enough applied law of common sense.”
Turner feels that, in addition to having an outgoing personality well suited to TV, he has put in his time behind the stove, and has proven himself enough to merit the status of celebrity chef. But he admitted that there is a big difference between being a chef and being a celebrity chef. “It’s a dichotomy. I get letters from mothers saying, ‘My son wants to be a celebrity chef, how does he do it?’ Certain people have created an animal which is not totally controllable.”
As for who has been instrumental in creating the celebrity chef animal, Turner was not naming names, but the initials JO came up more than once. “I call it the JO syndrome. He wears scruffy jeans and goes further away from cheffing.” Turner also points out that while he has been cooking for more than 40 years, Jamie Oliver was just 22 when he first appeared on TV.
Thompson, in contrast, has no problem with Oliver, perhaps because he appreciates Oliver’s showmanship more than Turner.
“I think he’s great, he brought cooking to the masses. He has given it sex appeal. He’s great at reinventing the wheel.”
But Gordon Ramsey is another matter altogether. Thompson was quick to praise Ramsey’s skills as a chef, but just as quick to denigrate his skills as a celebrity.
Thompson and Ramsey have had a long-running dispute, which is as much about showmanship and rivalry as about animosity.
“Gordon-he’s a complete t****r,” laughs Thompson, adding, “He’s a brilliant chef, but he made a rod for his own back by saying he hates TV chefs. Now he’s a TV chef himself. I have heard from mums who have stopped their sons going into the industry because of Ramsey.”
Thompson acknowledges that he also spends less time behind the stove than in front of the cameras, but feels that is not a compromise.
“I’m a quality controller really, I buy meat, breed my own pigs, grow my own veg. A lot of chefs want everything to look its best but don’t care where it comes from.”
In fact, it is showmanship and style that really separates Turner and Thompson’s different approach to the role of television, and celebrity, in their careers.
Turner describs how he got his start as a TV chef very much by accident. “I didn’t go into TV, I was invited. Anthony Worrall Thompson is a very clever guy, he has a great thinking mind and in the early days he thought chefs could make their mark on TV, so he got the job of making a little film on food for the BBC.”
Thompson brought his friend and fellow-chef Turner into the film and the two cooked together for the BBC shorts.
Says Turner, “We cooked on a battleship, it was very funny. We did two, eight-minute films.Richard and Judy then had us on their show, and I was on every Friday for nine years.”
Turner explains that his entrée into celebrity chefdom was more accidental than deliberate. “[My restaurant] was struggling at the time and it saved me. Anthony Worrall Thompson has an agent, but I don’t go looking for TV, I don’t have an agent.”
Thompson also claims to be an accidental celebrity. “For me, a celebrity is Johnny Depp. I’m just a lucky guy who was around when they needed more chefs on the telly,” he says.
You can’t get that many people on telly, you’ve got to have the personality.
“I’ve always had the knack of being there when a fashion starts -slow food, bistro food, Moroccan food, Mediterranean, retro.” Yet, Thompson also acknowledges that acting is in his blood (both parents were actors, and his godfather was Richard Burton).
Thompson says he has always tried to make people happy along the way, although he is well aware that many people have a problem with him and his celebrity status. “The beauty of telly is that you have lots of people who love you and lots of people who hate you. I’m not a precious person. I muck in and do what I have to make people happy, but you open yourself up to being knocked.”
Another criticism of celebrity chefs is that they often use their status as a platform for advertising and selling all manner of products, many only tangentially related to cooking.
After all, does the world really need celebrity chef branded oatmeal (Turner) or kitchen cleaning cloths (Thompson)? Turner laughs, “Probably not, but when an opportunity comes along I don’t see a problem. Some people get on any bandwagon coming down the street, they will put their name on anything.”
Again, Turner points out that he doesn’t go looking for branding opportunities. He works with Steelite because its makes all its products in the UK. “Steelite is one of the few companies that make it all in the UK, not in China. I like that because I’m very British in my cooking, so there is a synergy there. I do branding when there is a synergy.”
Thompson claims to take a similar approach. “I don’t endorse anything I don’t believe in. Gordon Ramsey endorses Threshers, but I guarentee you he’s never been in one in his life. If someone likes you why not give them an opportunity to use a product [you endorse]? I don’t just sign off on products. They go back and forth until I’m happy with them-I won’t endorse crap,” he said.
Although this slow food enthusiast also endorses artificial sweetener Splenda, the Mark Wilkinson kitchen promotion in Dubai is certainly a question of synergy-Thompson uses the kitchens at home.
One thing Turner is very passionate about is the lack of training for chefs coming up today, compared to when he began cooking.
“I left home at 17 in 1960 and went to London to train in the big end-of-transport hotels. These were the only places in England in those days to really train. I cried my eyes out but I left home because I had to. When I was young it was an employers market. Now it’s different, the acceleration has happened through a shortage of chefs.”
“We just don’t have the workforce today the way we once did. If we had a banquet and needed 420 servings of fish, we used to get in 210 whole fish and bone them ourselves. Now, you get in 420 pre-packaged filets.”
Thompson agrees that the shortage of people means that promotion through the kitchen ranks is very rapid now.
“There are so few staff they can be head chefs at 22, 23,” he says.
But he was quick to point out that celebrity chefdom does not usually work like this.
“You can’t get that many people on telly, you’ve got to be right for it-its harder than it looks.”
Thompson is also happy to praise fellow celebrity chef Turner. “Brian Turner is a good old mate, he’s the old sage of the industry, a great leveler.”
But he can’t resist one last jab at Ramsey. As he poses for a photo shoot, the photographer asks Thompson to add a bit of personality to his pose, and Thompson obliges by making a ruse gesture and saying, “F*** you Gordon Ramsey.” A showman through and through.
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