Jamie Oliver and Gordon Ramsay, two titans of TV cooking, were locked in an infamous feud that lasted more than a decade.
The mud-slinging became increasingly vicious over the years, with Gordon making stinging remarks that visibly rattled Oliver on multiple occasions. But the long and bitter dispute finally ended when one of the chefs was hit by personal tragedy.
Oliver has now returned to our screens with a new Channel 4 series called Fast and Simple. The show sees the star whip up quick and simple meals, offering expert tips to cut down on complications and maximise flavour.
The rivalry between the chefs begun in 2009 when Oliver objected to Ramsay comparing Australian journalist Tracey Grimshaw to a pig.
In response to the remarks, Oliver told The Sun: “Aussies aren’t forgiving. Once you’re gone, you’re gone… It’s never good to criticise a woman, especially when they’re loved by their country and you do it on national television.”
Although Ramsay eventually apologised to Ms Grimshaw, he was far less courteous towards Oliver, dismissing him as a “‘one pot wonder”.
Ramsay explained: “Everything kind of gets mixed in – hands in. It’s a very different style to me. He sticks it in the oven, comes back three hours later and it’s done. We cook differently. I use basic ingredients taken up with a lot more excitement. But competition is healthy. It’s good to have that kind of rivalry”, according to OK!.
The chef then rubbed salt in the wound by revealing that the last time he complained about a meal was at Oliver’s joint, declaring: “Last time I had dinner at Jamie Oliver’s restaurant.” Ramsay even insisted on calling Oliver a cook rather than a chef in 2010, to imply that the star did not deserve professional status.
Oliver in turn made his views of his rival’s cooking clear by praising Ramsay’s wife Tana’s cookbook instead of any of the ones authored by the celebrity chef.
Ramsay also poked fun at the healthy eating campaigns that helped Oliver to cement his reputation as a national treasure. During an interview with Radio Times in 2017, Ramsay said: “It’s all very well to spout off now about sugar tax and supermarkets,” adding, “None of that was spoken about when he was label-slapping with Sainsbury’s for ten years.”
He didn’t stop there, going on to mock Oliver’s weight and cooking abilities whilst hosting The Nightly Show in the same year. Ramsay even acknowledged that that his comments were close to the bone in an ironic apology letter to Oliver, which he shared publicly.
In the letter, he wrote: “I just want to say that I’m sorry. I have been hard on you this week, Jamie. I’ve called you fat, I’ve criticised your restaurants, called you fat, said you enjoyed prison sex, and called you fat. What I said was hurtful, Jamie. I don’t want to make you cry. The last thing I want to do is look at your cute face and think: blubber, blubber, blubber.”
Oliver appeared to take the high ground in his response to Ramsay, telling The Sun: “I was doing TV years before him, so maybe five years ago it would have bothered me and I may have responded.”
He added: “But he’s got four kids and I’ve got five kids, and I don’t want to be slagging off some kids’ dad on telly. It’s not nice.”
However, while the comments may have appeared forgiving to some, they struck a nerve with Ramsay’s family. Oliver’s words came just months after Ramsay’s wife had suffered a tragic miscarriage five months into pregnancy with their son Rocky.
Tana was left “mortified” by Oliver’s comparison between the two families, which she interpreted as a very personal slight. Her incensed husband swore to end all communication with Oliver unless he apologised, marking a turning point in their ongoing war of words.
Discussing the issue with Radio Times, Ramsay shared: “Jamie turned round and said, ‘I’ve got five kids, he’s got four kids.’ To judge someone else’s family on the amount of kids you have…boys will always fight and butt heads but Tana was mortified, I mean really mortified.”
Oliver was quick to set the record straight and offer his condolences to Gordon and Tana after their loss. The chef claimed that his offending comments were supposed to be “fairly grown-up and reasonable”.
In a candid interview with Radio Times, he admitted: “I don’t want personal spats in public with someone that, to be honest, I don’t even really know any more… I don’t think he liked me taking the high ground.”
Oliver added: “I think that’s basically it. So, I’m going to take the high ground now and say I wish him all the best, and all success. Good luck to him. But we have both got kids, and I don’t know what sort of example we’re setting if we’re arguing like we’re in the playground.”
In 2019 Ramsay confirmed that relations had steadily improved between the two chefs. Speaking on The Jonathan Ross Show, he outlined how their friendship had grown around the time that Oliver’s restaurant chain faced collapse.
Ramsay said: “Listen, that was devastating,” Ramsay confided to Ross, insisting, “I don’t think anyone likes to revel in that kind of failure. And also yeah, the bottom line is, he’s a great guy, great chef, and it was sad to see, you know, him disappear overnight.”
As the budding friendship continued to grow, the chefs’ families shared a barbecue together in Cornwall in 2018. In a sign that the feud is fully resolved, Ramsay revealed in an August TikTok post that his wife often follows Oliver’s guidance when preparing meals like lasagne and shepherd’s pie for guests, and even shared a video featuring one of Jamie’s cookbooks.
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