Can't cook, won't cook - Young British women "can't cook to save their lives"

He is infamous for his raging four-letter-word tirades but now Gordon Ramsay has managed to insult 50 per cent of the population without uttering a single expletive.

The television chef has provoked uproar by claiming that young British women "can't cook to save their lives". In a move likely to alienate his army of female fans, the 38-year-old Michelin-starred chef, who is currently filming a new series for Channel 4, says that Britain has produced a generation of women who can "mix a cocktail" but are incapable of doing anything else in the kitchen.

Celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay The former professional footballer said that while more and more men were making their mark in the kitchen, far too many women were surviving on a daily diet of expensive and unhealthy ready-made meals.

"I have been visiting ladies' houses up and down the country with our film crew and you'd be amazed how little cooking the girls are doing," he said. "When they eat, they cheat - it's ready meals and pre-prepared meals all the way.

"Seriously, there are huge numbers of young women out there who know how to mix cocktails but can't cook to save their lives, whereas men are finding their way into the kitchen in ever-growing numbers. Trust me: I am only telling you what I've discovered."

The comments might come as a shock to Ramsay's wife, Tana, who cooks for their four young children in a separate kitchen at home.

Ramsay, who has become an unlikely sex symbol through his regular television appearances, makes his scathing comments in an interview to promote his new series, The F Word, in which he cooks a three-course meal for each episode.

He tells the current edition of Radio Times that he has no time for "stick-thin models who never eat" and he says that he would refuse to serve anyone in his restaurants who asked to go off menu because they were "on a stupid diet like the Atkins or GI".

His damning verdict on the culinary skills of young women is causing controversy. Female cooks and writers accuse him of ignoring the inroads made by a new generation of women chefs into what was previously a male-dominated world.

The number of female chefs at work in Britain has been rising steadily for years. They include Ramsay's former protégée, Angela Hartnett, the 36-year-old chef-patron at the Connaught in Mayfair, central London, in addition to Ruth Rogers and Rose Gray at the River Café in Hammersmith, west London, who trained Jamie Oliver.

Clarissa Dickson Wright, who shot to fame as one half of television's Two Fat Ladies, said that Ramsay's remarks were "rubbish and about 10 years out of date".

Ms Dickson Wright, who was until recently the rector of Aberdeen University, said: "I think when I first joined the university there were young women students who didn't know how to cook. But I think the situation has completely changed over the past five or six years.

"Young women have read books by food experts and chefs and are now much better informed on what they should eat and how they should prepare it.

"I have noticed the sea change because unlike a lot of so called celebrity chefs I spend my time with real people rather than the glitterati."

Tamasin Day-Lewis, a food writer who contributes to The Daily Telegraph and Vanity Fair, described the Ramsay thesis as "complete b*****ks".

"I have a 20-year-old daughter at Bristol University who has already written a student cookbook and prides herself on cooking from scratch, buying good food and making sure her store cupboard of essentials never runs out," she said.

Skye Gyngell, a chef and the food editor of Vogue, agreed that cooking was a dying art but said it was "bull***t" to suggest that women were worse than men.

"We live in a world of convenience and life is so quick that a lot of us can no longer be bothered to learn cooking as a craft or skill," she said.

Ruth Watson, the proprietor of the Crown and Castle Inn at Orford in Suffolk, who presents Channel Five's The Hotel Inspector, said: "I don't disagree that a lot of people aren't bothering to cook real food during the week but as Gordon Ramsay seems to rate everyone on the size and efficacy of their balls, it's hardly surprising he gives women the thumbs down."

Nigella Lawson, the television chef and chat show host, has herself previously attacked British women for "vaunting their undomesticity".

Ramsay's pizza joke outrages vegetarians

By Roya Nikkhah
(Filed: 15/05/2005)

Gordon Ramsay, a chef almost as famous for his four-letter outbursts in the kitchen as for his food, has sparked outrage after feeding meat to a vegetarian in his new television show.

The programme was filmed for the second series of Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares, which will be broadcast later this month on Channel 4.


	Gordon Ramsay: 'Good luck with the Vegemite!'

In the first episode, which coincidentally will be shown during National Vegetarian Week, Ramsay invites passers-by to sample pizzas at La Lanterna, a struggling Italian -restaurant in Letchworth, Hertfordshire.

One of the volunteers who agrees to take part says that he has been a vegetarian for eight years. Ramsay replies that the restaurant's chefs have prepared a vegetarian pizza and gives him one to try. After the volunteer - identified only as "Bob" - has eaten the pizza, Ramsay tells him: "Unfortunately, that pizza has got a lot of mozzarella and tomatoes, but underneath all that there is parma ham."

The vegetarian complains to Ramsay that he has played a "mean" trick on him, but Ramsay jokes that he "hasn't come out in a big rash". He is then filmed laughing at the man and asking him if he would like some more, while telling the restaurant's chefs that they have "converted a vegetarian". As the volunteer hurries out of the restaurant, Ramsay calls out after him, "Good luck with the Vegemite!"

The incident has infuriated vegetarians, who have denounced Ramsay's actions as offensive and unethical. Tina Fox, the chief executive of the Vegetarian Society, said: "I am amazed that Gordon Ramsay can find the discomfort of a fellow human being so amusing.

"It can be deeply upsetting for vegetarians to find they have eaten any part of an animal in error. Would Gordon find it equally amusing if an anaphylactic customer died at the table due to eating nuts?"

Rose Elliot, the award-winning vegetarian food writer, called Ramsay's behaviour "outrageous" and said that she would no longer visit his restaurants.

Dave Spikey, the actor who stars in Channel 4's comedy series Phoenix Nights, who has been a vegetarian for more than 20 years, said: "I find it extraordinary that anyone could have so little respect and regard for other people's sincerely held moral beliefs and ethical choices."

Leading chefs were also critical. Tom Aikens, the chef-patron of the eponymous restaurant in Chelsea, said: "People often choose to be vegetarians for serious dietary or religious reasons. To feed them meat is unnecessary, unkind and certainly not funny."

Heston Blumenthal, the owner of the Fat Duck restaurant in Bray, said: "If someone decides not to eat meat they have made that decision for a reason and it should be respected."

Alex Scott, the owner and head chef at La Lanterna, said that the vegetarian in question appeared distressed after the incident: "I did feel a bit sorry for the guy as he ran out of the restaurant looking very sick and pale. Gordon fell about laughing and I think it made his night, as he's not known for his liking of -vegetarians. I think Gordon just forgot to tell him the pizza had parma ham in it, but he definitely knew because he oversaw us making it and discussed the ingredients with us."

A Channel 4 spokesman said: "We believe this was a genuine mistake and that Gordon Ramsay did not deliberately set out to give meat to a vegetarian."

In an interview to promote the BBC's Comic Relief programme in 2003, Ramsay was asked what had been his most recent lie, to which he replied: "To a table of vegetarians who had artichoke soup. I told them it was made with vegetable stock when it was chicken stock."

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