Daily Mail - Daily Mail Weekend Magazine
THREE FOR THE ROAD
They speed around like Clarkson and co, with just as much banter and machismo, but in their new series, Gordon Ramsay, Gino D’Acampo and Fred Sirieix are in hot pursuit of the perfect party feast
Gordon Ramsay, Gino D’Acampo and Fred Sirieix forge an unlikely partnership for a wild foodie trip to each of their home nations
Never mind the Englishman, the Irishman and the Scotsman. The Scot / Italian/ Frenchman combo is so much funnier, particularly when you put them all on a nudist beach during the course of filming a TV series and ask them to – how to put this? – run free.
Renfrewshire-born Gordon Ramsay might have moved to Stratfordupon-Avon when he was a boy, and may now split his time between Los Angeles, London and Cornwall, but he is, he insists, ‘100 per cent Scottish from the waist down.’
Meaning? ‘ That he’s a prude,’ pipes up the resident Frenchman, the celebrated maitre d’ (and star of First Dates) Fred Sirieix. ‘It was a nudist beach in St Tropez, and it was hilarious. Gino [ he points to the Italian, TV chef Gino D’Acampo] stripped off immediately. Gordon refused.’
Too right I did, insists Gordon. ‘I was in my pants and there was no way I was going further. Apart from being Scottish, it’s... well, it’s disgusting! There was a restaurant and Gino came out of it stark naked – in the nude! – when there were people eating their spaghetti!’
Gordon would like to reiterate that he did not, repeat, did not, get naked. ‘At my age? With the effects of gravity being what they are? Apart from anything else, the sunshine shouldn’t be shining on those parts.’
Gino rolls his eyes, happy to admit that he went absolutely starkers. ‘ With me everything is tight and going in the right direction. Why not? I just think that when you are on a nudist beach in St Tropez, you must respect the locals.’
So where does Fred himself stand on this nudity debate? It seems he’s comme ci, comme ca about the whole thing. ‘I didn’t do it, but only because Gordon didn’t want to. Otherwise, I don’t mind. I’m kind of in the middle of these two. Always in the middle.’
What on earth is going on? Well, last Christmas, this unlikely threesome – ‘the chef, the waiter and the poster boy’, as Gordon calls them – teamed up for a festive cooking programme. The show, intended to be a one- off, was a runaway success – so much so that earlier this year an entire new series was commissioned, one that would see the intrepid team travel to Italy, France and finally Scotland.
The resulting show, Gordon, Gino And Fred: Road Trip, which starts this week on ITV, is part food programme, part travel show, part pan-
Fred takes a selfie with his two companions on Vespas in Naples to. Who is playing Widow Twankey, though? Actually, the way Gordon tells it, he is playing all the parts. ‘I’m the oldest, the most mature, the most successful and the hardest worker,’ he says, that famous Gordon Ramsay modesty oozing from every pore. ‘And the most famous, obviously. The joke was that I was recognised in France, where no one knew who Fred was. They were saying, “Is he a doctor?”, and I was say- ing, “No he presents Blind Date in the UK.” I had to introduce him.’
‘It’ s called First Dates,’ says Fred, for what you suspect might be the 131st time. What’s perhaps most surprising about this new programme is that Gordon is willing to share the limelight with Fred and Gino, for it’s pretty clear today that he considers the show to be another Gordon Ramsay production. And his Continental lackies are clearly lacking.
Have they been dream travel companions? ‘Have they hell,’ he says. ‘ This one,’ ( he jabs a finger in Gino’s direction) ‘all he wants to do is sleep. He wants to sleep 119 hours a day. Everything is “later, later”. Every afternoon, he has a nap as if he’s 80, not 40. You look for him and he’s sleeping. And this one,’ (it’s Fred’s turn) ‘well, he’s French. All he wants to do is complain.’
So far, so stereotypical. Is Gordon the ego of the operation? The other two leap in to say ‘oui’ and ‘si’. ‘He’s the barking dog, the one who’s the best at everything, who says, “We should do this, we should do that, ta-ta-tata- ta- ta.” He’s like a runaway train,’ says Fred.
The show was first mooted as a sort of foodie version of Top Gear. A Top Gear With Tomatoes, let’s say. Except that instead of racing in Ferraris, the leading men all squish into a campervan. With Gordon driving, obviously. ‘I do all the driving,’ he confirms. Gino points out that actually, in France, Fred took the wheel. ‘And what happened?’ asks Gordon. ‘He drove into a wall.’ Fred objects. ‘You made me do it,’ he says.
I meet the tempestuous trio in a castle in Scotland, on the final leg of their great adventure. They have been on the road for three weeks, first driving to Italy where they sampled the finest mozzarella in Naples, and whizzed around for a while on Vespa s (‘ We nearly died in Naples,’ admits Fred, who seems the least navigationally savvy of the three). After that they hung out for a while in Sardinia, organising the menu and cooking the food for the wedding-vow renewal of Gino’s best friend Marco. Then they skipped to St Tropez, mostly to eat oysters.
Now, it’s up to Bonnie Scotland, where they’ve been swishing around in kilts and diving for scallops near Oban (not at the same time, necessarily). This experience sent Gordon’s blood pressure through the roof.
‘Gino asked for an espresso,’ says Gordon. ‘I’m not kidding. We’re diving in Oban and he’s asking for an espresso and a biscotti!’
Gino and Fred have also experienced their first- ever Highland Games. ‘And my last,’ Gino muses. It does rather sound as though they weren’t adequately prepared for their first foray into Scottish cul--
‘Gino came out of the restaurant stark naked’ GORDON RAMSAY
ture. Gordon says he tried to get them ready by making them watch Braveheart, but it was quite a challenge. ‘ They throw tree trunks,’ says Fred, bewildered. Gino adds, ‘ I got disqualified doing the shot putt.’ Thankfully, the entertainment moved on from sporting matters to more creative ones. Fred says they had to do a performance. ‘I recited a poem. Gino sang a song with his guitar. Gordon hid in the toilets.’
In the sort of sequence you’d really never get in Top Gear, Gordon makes Fred recite his poem, which has a punchline about oyster juice dribbling down his soft beard. ‘He thinks he’s Serge Gainsbourg,’ Gordon says, wiping the tears from his eyes. ‘I’m surprised he didn’t get lynched. Practise that rubbish in your own country. Don’t do it in ours.’
Gordon goes off to take a phone call from his wife Tana in the middle of our interview – ‘He does this all the time. Unbelievable,’ says the more polite Gino, as the Scotsman strides from the table – but it’s actu- ally a blessing as it gives the others the opportunity to talk about him without being interrupted. The expletive count drops by 98 per cent while he’s away too.
So ’fess up, lads. What’s it really like being stuck in a campervan with Gordon Ramsay for three weeks? ‘Exhausting,’ says Gino. ‘We were filming for 12, 13 hours a day which, with Gordon, feels like 36 hours every day.’ Did you want to kill him after a few weeks? ‘No, it’s funny, but you get used to his continuous barking. He’s particularly funny when he’s angry. The more he gets angry, the more we laugh. It’s a beautiful thing, realising how wrong and how strong he is.’
Fred, who is quite the sweetheart, reckons he has the measure of the man. ‘Gordon’s quite childish. Everything is a competition. He just wants to win. He thinks he is right. He thinks he is going in the right direction – and he knows the end before you get there.’
Gino gives one of his big Italian smiles – the ones Gordon says lit up the campervan, and made him ‘glow in the dark’ – as he says they make a dream team. ‘Gordon goes at everything at 120mph. I take life at 10mph. Fred is in the middle. We all accept our place.’
And what do the three of them actually have in common? ‘ More than you would think,’ says Gino. ‘We have the food, obviously. And we are all family men.’
It’s certainly a curious three-way bromance, then. Gino says he married his best friend (he and wife Jessica have three children). Fred has two children with his now ex-partner Alex. The Ramsay clan is the biggest, naturally, and includes four children. Gino says that they all call their partners and kids when they finish filming, which sounds positively cosy.
How timely, though, to have Gordon and his Continental cousins taking off in their campervan in peak Brexit season. The conversation inevitably turns serious (and mercifully, less sweary) when they chat about the implications. Gordon has flip-flopped a little with his views on Brexit – he previously suggested that it was a disaster in the making, then said that it could potentially be advantageous if it gave ‘lazy’ Britons ‘a kick up the a***’. Today, he says that speaking to those people running export businesses – particularly seafood and specialist food exporters dealing with mainland Europe – has made him fearful of the future.
He says he doesn’t like what sort of country we have become, and talks of his unease at what he sees as ‘the destruction and the humiliation of our Prime Minister’. ‘The way she is spoken to is shocking. She was dealt a card she didn’t want to play, yet the country wants to humiliate her. We can complain all we want but the train is moving. It has left the station.’
Gino injects some Italian passion into the debate. He says he knows who should be driving the train too. ‘I don’t think the politicians should be negotiating Brexit. I think business people should deal with it. We don’t need politicians.’
Who does he have in mind? ‘Gordon, for one. Then Alan Sugar. And
‘I recited a poem. Gino sang. Gordon hid in the toilet’ FRED SIRIEIX
‘Gordon’s particularly funny when he’s angry’ GINO D’ACAMPO
Richard Branson. Put all three of them in. They would sort it out.’
Clearly, Gordon would run a mile from any such thing. He reiterates that he likes to stay out of politics. When President Trump was visiting the UK this summer, he reveals that he was asked to cook a meal for him at Blenheim Palace. ‘Thank you, but no thank you,’ he says.
Doesn’t Gordon mostly live in the States these days? He says that’s not true. ‘ It looks like that because we have a house there, but we get in, work hard, and get out again,’ he says, referring to his filming schedule. ‘I love it when I’m there but I also love getting back.’ The family are very much based here in Britain, and he talks proudly of the fact that his twins Jack and Holly have just embarked on degrees. ‘They’ve finished their A-levels and are off to university. That grounding is crucial. I don’t want to break it up.’
Where is home for the others? There is, once again, an explosion of laughter. On their travels, it seems, they called into Gino’s Italian villa where he spends five months of the year. ‘I work for seven, and take five months off in the year.’
‘Lazy!’ screams workaholic Gordon. ‘He is 42 years of age. He has 30 restaurants in London. He needs to be in them!’
Peacemaker Fred interjects. ‘He obvi-
ously doesn’t, because he’s successful.’ Certainly, Gino has a nice house. ‘A house?’ scoffs Gordon. ‘It’s a mansion. Honestly, this man is the Hugh Hefner of Sardinia. There was this huge sign, four metres long, outside saying “Vi lla D’Acampo”, and CCTV everywhere, like you’re getting into the Pentagon.’
The other two stayed chez Gino, and one segment was filmed at his home. Gordon hasn’t recovered from the personal branding that goes on there. ‘And they say I have a big ego! It said “D’Acampo” on my dressing gown. They brought the wine – called Gino Vino. It tasted like paint stripper.’
The clincher, though, was when they meandered down to the local harbour in Sardinia and Gordon admired a yacht there. The name on the side was, yes, you guessed it. ‘It was the biggest boat in the harbour – and it was Gino’s.’
So you don’t have a yacht, Gordon? ‘Not yet, but I will have to get one.’
Gino winks. ‘And it will be bigger than mine, obviously.’
Gordon, Gino And Fred: Road Trip starts on Thursday at 9pm on ITV.