Marco Pierre White can still put Gordon Ramsay in his place
Marco Pierre White can still put Gordon Ramsay in his place
Anita SinghFri, November 6, 2026 at 9:16 AM UTC
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Heston Blumenthal, Gordon Ramsay and Marco Pierre White assemble to reflect on their careers - BBC/Chris Raphael
“Like Jesus with a chef’s jacket on,” is how Gordon Ramsay describes his former mentor, Marco Pierre White. This was back in the day, when White was the brooding enfant terrible of the restaurant world. His volatility was the stuff of legend, albeit with a canny understanding of what would make the newspapers. Woe betide the diner who dared to ask for salt and pepper; they would be left with no meal at all as the waiters whipped away the food and cleared the table until the mortified customer took the hint and slunk out.
Ramsay was White’s protégé. He learnt not just how to cook to Michelin-star level, but how to become a media star. They were close, and then they had a series of epic bust-ups. The three-part Rise of the Rockstar Chef (BBC Two) builds to a meeting between the pair for the first time in 20 years, and is a fascinating study of two great talents and their competing egos.
It conjures the insane pressure of life in a top restaurant kitchen, when chefs would fall asleep while standing up, and the competition to win a Michelin star. We’re taken back to that point in the late 1980s and early 1990s when White almost single-handedly transformed Britain’s culinary reputation and ushered in a new generation of brilliant young chefs. Many of those chefs, including Angela Hartnett and Marcus Wareing, appear here.
The series is billed as “the story of three rebels”: Ramsay, White and Heston Blumenthal. But Blumenthal, though his career gets a decent airing and he is praised as a genius (“It’s almost like Heston has gone to the moon, got some recipes and come back down again,” says Wareing), is a minor player in this drama. He has been through the wringer with burnout and bipolar disorder, and is treated gently. This show isn’t really about him.
The rivalry between White and Ramsay is covered in detail, with both men giving their sides of the story on the various fall-outs and slights, including the highly entertaining tale of Ramsay staging a raid on his own restaurant, stealing the reservation book, making off with Wareing as his getaway driver then blaming White for the theft.
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We’ve seen enough of Ramsay on TV over the years. It’s far more interesting to listen to White, who retains a knack for stealing the show. You can’t help but compare the appearance of the two – global superstar Ramsay looks fit as a butcher’s dog, while time has not treated White so well.
White and Ramsay face off over a restaurant table - BBC/Chris Raphael
The documentary is made by Ramsay’s production company, so of course it goes out of its way to make the boss look good. His lines – “We were council house rebels with a f---ing cause” – often sound pat and pre-rehearsed, but his hurt over White’s behaviour seem genuine.
The first two episodes tee up the third, when White and Ramsay face off over a restaurant table (Blumenthal is there but a bit of a spare part). It doesn’t exactly fall flat, but there are no fireworks or fisticuffs, only a bit of passive-aggression and what Wareing laughingly described as “d--- swinging”. Ramsay’s attempts to win an apology from White go nowhere. “You put me against the wall,” he pleads at one point, recalling a physical altercation. “No, you put yourself against the wall,” White replies, keeping a straight face.
Ramsay, so used to running the show and hearing “Yes, chef” at every command, has planned this encounter in intricate detail. The courses at the reunion dinner are some of the trio’s signature dishes, and Ramsay has arranged for the chefs to go into the kitchen to oversee their creation. Yet White flatly refuses. After all these years, he’s still the one in charge.
All episodes are on BBC iPlayer now; Rise of the Rockstar Chef continues on BBC Two on Thursdays at 9pm
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
