Gordon Ramsay gets a kicking

A string of setbacks - including losing both the top spot in leading restaurant guide Harden's and his concession at the Connaught - have left everyone asking: has the foul-mouthed chef lost his touch?

It hasn't been a great start to the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness for Britain's top chef-entrepreneur. A string of setbacks has led to whispers that Gordon Ramsay's "unbeatable formula" may be curdling, says The Guardian. After taking "a kicking" in both the Zagat and Harden's restaurant guides, he has lost his concession at The Connaught, while revelations that he hadn't actually caught the sea bass he was shown manfully spearing on his Channel 4 show The F-Word, made Ramsay the Action Man look like a plonker. Worst of all, perhaps, his renegade brother, Ronnie, has just been jailed in Indonesia for heroin possession.

"To use Ramsay's parlance, he's just had a nasty knee in the bollocks," says his publicist. Some cannot conceal their delight. Andrew Gilligan in the Evening Standard was "glad, glad, glad that the world seems to be ganging up on Gordon Ramsay". He "always thought it absurd" that "this foul-mouthed individual" was seen as a role model. But given how far Ramsay has travelled, you might argue there are worse. Ramsay, described by critic AA Gill as a "wonderful chef, just a really second-rate human being", has become an unlikely British institution, says The Sunday Telegraph. On top of his string of Michelin-starred restaurants, he has a lucrative line in consultancy and several cook-books under his belt, and the compulsory range of celebrity-chef china. If Ramsay pulls off his ambitious plan to conquer America, this £67m "mini-empire" will become huge. Yet rapid expansion lies at the heart of his troubles. "No one doubts Ramsay's talent. But the growing impression is that the maestro is spreading himself thinner than a white truffle shaving."

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