Nov. 23, 2025

Fat F**k vs. Five Kids: How Gordon Ramsay and Jamie Oliver's 16-Year Feud Finally Went Too Far

Show Notes
Transcript

For sixteen years, Gordon Ramsay and Jamie Oliver—two of Britain's most beloved chefs, both fathers, both wildly successful—spent an extraordinary amount of energy tearing each other apart in public. Ramsay called Oliver fat, untalented, a "one-pot wonder." Oliver fired back about cookbook sales and deep jealousy. It was petty, it was tiresome, and it was great for business.Then in 2017, Jamie Oliver said something that crossed a line neither man knew existed.

Trying to de-escalate their feud, he mentioned that they were both fathers—Gordon had four kids, Jamie had five—and maybe they should stop "slagging off some kids' dad on telly."There was just one problem: Jamie didn't know that months earlier, Gordon and his wife Tana had lost their fifth child in a devastating miscarriage. The comment, meant to bring perspective, instead became the most painful moment in their entire rivalry.

This Thanksgiving, we're exploring how two grown men needed their wives and children to finally tell them what should have been obvious all along: some things matter more than winning. It's a story about pride, grief, reconciliation, and what happens when you forget the person you're insulting has a family watching.

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Calaruga Shark Media. Thanksgiving twenty twenty five. Across America, families

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are gathering around tables laden with turkey, stuffing and all

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the trimmings. They're sharing what they're grateful for, catching up

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on each other's lives, navigating the careful dance of family

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dynamics that makes the holidays both magical and maddening. Some

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will argue about politics, Some will resurrect old grievances, Some

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will say things they don't mean in the heat of

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the moment, and some, like what happened in twenty seventeen

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between two of the world's most famous chefs, will say

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something that cuts so deep, so unexpectedly, that it transforms

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a year's long professional rivalry into something unforgivable. This is

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episode thirty eight, Fat Fuck Versus Five Kids, Gordon Ramsey

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versus Jamie Oliver. The date was sometime in early twenty seventeen.

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British celebrity chef Jamie Oliver was giving an interview talking

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about his ongoing feud with fellow chef Gordon Ramsey. The

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two had been trading insults for nearly a decade. The

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usual celebrity chef nonsense about restaurants cookbooks and television ratings.

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Jamie was trying to take the high road. He was

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trying to de escalate. He said, I don't think he

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can be jealous of me, because no British chef has

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cracked American TV like Gordon has. He's killing it. But

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we're different. But he's got four kids and I've got

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five kids, and I don't want to be slagging off

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some kid's dad on Telly. It's not nice. It seemed

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like a reasonable thing to say, an attempt at perspective,

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a reminder that they were both fathers with families who

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didn't need to see their dad's behaving like children on television.

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There was just one problem, one thing Jamie Oliver didn't

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know when he gave that interview. Gordon Ramsay and his

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wife Tana had four children, but just months earlier, Tana

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had been five months pregnant with what would have been

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their fifth child, a boy they planned to name Rocky,

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and then she had a miscarriage. Gordon Ramsay, the man

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who screams at people for a living, the chef who

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has made a career out of being unbreakable, the guy

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who yells its fucking rawed terrified contestants was devastated. He

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and Tana were mourning privately, trying to heal as a family,

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dealing with a loss that no parent should have to endure.

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And then Jamie Oliver went on television and talked about

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how many kids they each had. Jamie turned round and said,

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I've got five kids. He's got four kids, Gordon said later,

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his voice tight with emotion. To judge someone else's family

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on the amount of kids you have, that's mortifying. Jamie

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claims he had no idea about the miscarriage, that the

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comment was innocent, that he was trying to be conciliatory,

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not cruel. But intention doesn't always matter when words land

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like that. And this Thanksgiving, as families gather and navigate

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the complicated terrain of what to say and what to

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keep to yourself, it's worth remembering what happened next. What

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happened when two successful grown men, fathers, husbands, pillars of

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their industry spent sixteen years in a feud so bitter

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that it took their wives and children to finally end it.

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This is the story of Gordon Ramsay and Jamie Oliver,

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two British chefs who started as friends became enemies, said

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things about each other for over a decade, and ultimately

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learned what actually matters when you lose everything. Some feuds

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are about business, some are about ego. This one became

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about family and about what happens when you forget that

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the person you're insulting has one act one Brothers in Arms.

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To understand how two of Britain's most beloved chefs ended

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up in a sixteen year war that required spousal intervention

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to resolve, you have to understand where they started as

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friends in the nineteen nineties. Gordon Ramsay and Jamie Oliver

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were both young British chefs trying to make names for

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themselves in an industry that was brutal competitive and dominated

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by old school French technique and toxic kitchen culture. Gordon

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Ramsey was the older of the t Born in nineteen

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sixty six in Scotland, his path to culinary greatness was

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forged in fire. He'd originally trained to be a footballer,

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but a career ending injury sent him to catering college. Instead,

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he apprenticed under the legendary Marco Pierre White at Harvey's

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in London, an experience he later described as traumatic but transformative.

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White was a genius and a tyrant, and he taught

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Ramsey that excellence in the kitchen came at the cost

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of everything else, your sleep, your relationships, your sanity. Ramsey

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absorbed those lessons and added his own volcanic temperament to

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the mix. By the early nineteen nineties, he was working

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in France under masters like Guy Savoy and Joel roe Beauchamp,

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earning Michelin stars and a reputation as both brilliant and terrifying.

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Jamie Oliver was younger, born in nineteen seventy five, and

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came from a completely different culinary tradition. He grew up

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in his parents' pub restaurant in Essex, learning to cook

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in a warm, family oriented environment. Where Ramsey had been

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shaped by the high pressure world of Michelin starred French cuisine,

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Oliver learned rustic Italian cooking and developed a philosophy centered

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on simple, accessible food that anyone could make at home.

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In nineteen ninety seven, Oliver got his big break. A

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documentary about the River Cafe featured a young, energetic Sioux

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chef named Jamie Oliver cooking with infectious enthusiasm. The BBC

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immediately gave him his own show, The Naked Chef, which

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premiered in nineteen ninety nine. The title referred to stripped

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down simple cooking, not actual nudity, but it didn't matter.

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Jamie Oliver became an overnight sensation. By two thousand, Oliver

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was Britain's most famous young chef, with best selling cookbooks

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and a television empire. He was the anti Gordon, approachable, optimistic,

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using phrases like puca and lovely jubbly, cooking meals you

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could actually make on a Tuesday night. Gordon Ramsey, meanwhile,

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was building his empire the hard way. He opened his

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flagship restaurant, restaurant Gordon Ramsey in nineteen ninety eight, and

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within three years it had earned three Michelin Stars, the

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highest honor in fine dining. He started appearing on British television,

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but his brand was completely different from Jamie's. Where Jamie

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was warm and accessible, Gordon was fierce and uncompromising. Where

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Jamie cooked comfort food, Gordon served oat cuisine. Where Jamie

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encouraged home cooks, Gordon terrorized professional chefts. In those early years,

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the two men respected each other. They were both products

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of more Arco Pierre White's sphere of influence. Marco had

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been Ramsey's mentor and had given Oliver advice early in

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his career. They were both British chefs making it on

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the world stage, each in their own way. I was

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always a big admirer of his. Jamie would later recall

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he was doing great things at Royal Hospital Road. He

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was the protege of Marco and was killing it. We

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got on very well in the beginning. They attended the

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same industry events. Their families knew each other. Gordon Ramsay

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had his wife Tana and their growing family Meghan born

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in nineteen ninety eight, twins Jack and Holly in two thousand,

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Matilda in two thousand one. Jamie Oliver married his childhood

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sweetheart Jewels in two thousand and they started their own family,

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Poppy born in two thousand two, Daisy in two thousand three,

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Pedal in two thousand and nine, Buddy in two thousand ten,

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and River in twenty sixteen. The kids were close in age,

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the families moved in the same circles. There was no

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reason to think these two successful chefs couldn't peacefully coexist.

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And then Gordon Ramsey's American television career exploded. In two

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thousand and four, Ramsey launched Hell's Kitchen in the United States,

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bringing his signature screaming and swearing style to American audiences

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who had never seen anything like It was a massive hit.

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Then came Kitchen Nightmares in two thousand and seven and

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Master Chef in twenty ten. Gordon Ramsey became one of

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the most recognizable faces on television, building a media empire

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that would eventually span restaurants, TV shows, books, and endorsements

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worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Jamie Oliver also expanded

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to America with shows like Jamie's Food Revolution, but he

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never retched achieved the same level of American fame that

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Ramsey did, and somewhere in there. As Ramsey's star rose

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higher and higher, as the competitive dynamics shifted, the friendship

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began to curdle. Gordon Ramsey started making little comments in interviews,

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nothing too serious at first, just the occasional jab about

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Jamie's cooking style being too simple, his restaurants being inconsistent,

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his celebrity chef persona being more about personality than skill.

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Jamie mostly ignored it. He had his own empire to

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run restaurants around the world, a successful TV career in Britain,

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best selling cookbooks that outsold Ramseys by a considerable margin,

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he didn't need to engage in petty feuding. But Gordon

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Ramsey wasn't done because for all his success, for all

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his Michelin stars and television fame, Gordon Ramsey had a problem.

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He couldn't let anything go, and in two thousand and

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nine he gave Jamie Oliver a reason to finally bite back.

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Act two, the First Blood. The feud officially ignited in

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the summer of two thousand and nine when Gordon Ramsey

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made a mistake that would cost him dearly. He insulted

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an Australian journalist on Australian television, and Jamie Oliver decided

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he'd had enough of staying silent. Ramsey was in Melbourne

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for the Good Food and Wine Show when he was

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interviewed by Tracy Grimshaw, a popular television presenter in Australia.

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The interview didn't go well. Ramsey was dismissive and rude,

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and then later that week he performed a comedy sketch

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at the show that included a crude sexual joke comparing

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Grimshaw to a pig. The Australian media exploded. The Australian

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Prime Minister Van Rudd publicly condemned Ramsey's comments. The backlash

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was swift and brutal, and Jamie Oliver, watching from Britain,

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decided to weigh in. Ozzie's aren't forgiving. Oliver told the son,

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once you're gone, you're gone. It's never good to criticize

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a woman, especially when they're loved by their country, and

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you do it on national television. It was a measured criticism,

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reasonable even, but to Gordon Ramsey, who was still dealing

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with the fallout from the Grimshaw incident, it felt like

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a betrayal. Here was Jamie Oliver, who had benefited from

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Ramsey helping to legitimize British chefs on the world stage,

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publicly criticizing him. Ramsey's response was immediate and vicious. He

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called Jamie Oliver a one pot wonder, a devastating insult

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in chef culture, suggesting that Oliver could only cook one

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type of food, one type of dish, that he act

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the technical skill and range of a real chef. But

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Ramsey wasn't done. Over the next several years, he would

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use every interview, every television appearance, every opportunity to take

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shots at Jamie Oliver. He mocked Oliver's weight, calling him

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a fat fuck. In private conversations that would eventually become public,

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he criticized Oliver's restaurants, his television shows, his cooking philosophy.

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When both chefs opened restaurants in Hong Kong, Ramsey couldn't

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resist taking a shot. Two British chefs Jamie Oliver and

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Gordon Ramsey rubbing shoulders together in Hong Kong, Ramsey said

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at his restaurant opening, at least I'm here. I came

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to my opening right. If you're going to open a

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restaurant in Hong Kong, at least turn up. The implication

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was clear. Jamie Oliver didn't care enough about his restaurants

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to show up to his own openings. He was a

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celebrity chef who slapped his name on things without doing

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the real work. Jamie Oliver, for his part, tried to

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stay above it for a while, but Ramsey's attacks were relentless,

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and by twenty fifteen, Oliver decided it was time to

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fight back. In an interview with The Mirror, Oliver unleashed,

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Gordon will do anything to try and take the piss

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out of me because he is deeply jealous. He's too

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busy shouting and screaming and making our industry look like

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a bunch of shouters and screamers. Oliver then went for

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Ramsey where it hurt most the cookbook sales. My book

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sell more than his, Oliver pointed out correctly, while Ramsey's

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cookbooks were well regarded, Oliver's accessible home cooking focused books

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consistently outsold Ramses by millions of copies. And then Oliver

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twisted the knife by praising Ramsey's wife. Tana. Ramsey had

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written several cookbooks of her own, and Oliver suggested she

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was a far superior writer than her celebrity husband. If

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I was to choose between Gordon Ramsey's cookbook or Tana Ramsey's,

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it would be Tana's every time, Oliver said. For Gordon Ramsey,

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whose ego was legendary, whose entire brand was built on

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being the best, these comments stung. He responded by doubling

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down on his attacks. I generally used to bite once

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a year, and that used to set him off for

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another year. Jamie later recalled on the Louis Thereau podcast.

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I didn't have anything against him, but it was serving

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its purpose for him. The feuding became a regular feature

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of British food media. Whenever one of them had a

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new show or restaurant opening, reporters would ask about the

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other one, and both chefs would dutifully provide a quotable insult.

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It was petty, it was tiresome, but it was also

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good for business. The feud kept both of their names,

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and the headlines reinforced their brands, Ramsey as the fierce competitor,

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Oliver as the more reasonable one, and gave fans something

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to argue about. For years, it seemed like they had

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reached a stable equilibrium of mutual disdain. They would trade

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barbs in interviews, occasionally make fun of each other on television,

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but ultimately stay in their separate lanes, Ramsey with his

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fine dining and American TV empire, Oliver with his accessible

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cooking and British television success. And then, in twenty seventeen,

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Gordon Ramsey decided to escalate in a way that shocked

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even people who were used to his volcanic temperament. Act three,

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the unforgivable. In January twenty seventeen, Gordon Ramsey was given

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the opportunity to host The Nightly sh Show, a short

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lived British late night talk show that gave different celebrities

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a week long stint as host. Ramsey's week was memorable

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for all the wrong reasons. He swore excessively, even by

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his standards, drawing thousands of complaints from viewers. But what

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really made headlines was his extended, vicious attack on Jamie Oliver.

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According to reports from The Sun, Ramsey spent several minutes

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of his show targeting Oliver with a string of obscenities

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that specifically focused on his weight. He called Oliver fat,

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repeatedly made jokes about Oliver single handedly trying to solve

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Britain's obesity epidemic by eating so much himself, and then

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turned his attention to Oliver's restaurants, suggesting they were failing

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because Oliver wasn't a real chef. The attack was so brutal,

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so personal, so sustained, that it went beyond typical celebrity

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chef rivalry into something darker. This wasn't professional competition. This

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was Gordon Ramsey using his television platform to try to

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humiliate someone who had once been his friend. Jamie Oliver

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watched the show and was hurt, but he'd learned over

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the years not to respond immediately to Ramsey's provocations. Instead,

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he gave it time, waited for the right moment, and

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then gave an interview where he tried to contextualize the feud.

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It was in that interview, sometime in early twenty seventeen,

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in the aftermath of Ramsey's TV attack, that Jamie Oliver

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said the words that would transform their feud into something

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neither of them could have anticipated. He was asked about

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Ramsey's continued obsession with insulting him. Jamie responded, thoughtfully, trying

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to rise above it. I was doing TV years before him,

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so maybe five years ago it would have bothered me,

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and I may have responded, Oliver said, but he's got

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four kids and I've got five kids, and I don't

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want to be slagging off some kid's dad on Telly.

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It's not nice. It seemed like a mature response, a

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reminder that they were both fathers, both had families, both

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should be modeling better behavior for their children. But Jamie

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Oliver didn't know something crucial Just months earlier, in June

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twenty sixteen, Tana Ramsey had been five months pregnant with

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what would have been their fifth child when she suffered

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a miscarriage. Gordon and Tana had been devastated. They had

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already named the baby Rocky. They had told their four

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children they were going to have a new sibling, and

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then suddenly that future disappeared. The Ramses dealt with their

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grief privately, as many families do. They didn't make a

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public announcement. They focused on healing as a family. Gordon

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threw himself into work the way he always did when

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things got hard. And then Jamie Oliver went on television

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and talked about how he had five kids and Gordon

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only had four. Gordon Ramsey heard those comments and felt

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like he'd been punched in the stomach. Jamie turned round

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and said, I've got five kids. He's got four kids.

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Ramsey later told Radio Times his voice tight with barely

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controlled emotion. To judge someone else's family on the amount

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of kids you have, that's mortifying. Ramsey made it clear

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he was done with Jamie Oliver. He wouldn't speak to

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him again. The line had been crossed. Some things couldn't

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be forgiven. Jamie Oliver, for his part, was horrified when

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he learned about the miscarriage. He insisted he'd had no

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idea that his comment had been innocuous, that he'd been

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trying to de escalate the feud, not make it worse.

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But the damage was done, and for the first time

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in their years of feuding, the insults weren't funny any more.

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The rivalry wasn't entertaining, It was just painful. I don't

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think he can be jealous of me, Jamie had said

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in that same interview, continuing his thought about Ramsey. No

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British chef has cracked American TV like Gordon has. He's

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killing it, but we're different. Those words, intended to be

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complimentary to acknowledge Ramsey's success, now rang hollow in the

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aftermath of what had become the most hurtful exchange in

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their entire feud. For the next two years, Gordon Ramsey

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and Jamie Oliver didn't speak. Their families, who had once

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been friendly, had no contact. The feud had gone from

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professional rivalry to something deeply irreparably personal. But their children,

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who had grown up together, who were friends on social media,

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who didn't understand why their fathers couldn't act like adults

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were watching, and so were their wives, Tana and Jules,

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who had had enough of this nonsense. Something had to give,

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and in twenty nineteen, when everything fell apart for Jamie Oliver,

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it finally did Act four. When Everything Falls apart. May

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twenty nineteen, Jamie Oliver's restaurant empire collapsed. Jamie's Italian, the

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chain of Italian restaurants that bore his name and had

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locations across the UK, went into administration. Over one thousand

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employees lost their jobs. Twenty two restaurants closed overnight. It

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was a devastating financial and personal failure for Oliver, who

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had built the chain on the promise of accessible, quality

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Italian food at reasonable prices. The collapse was the result

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of multiple factors over expansion, increasing competition in the casual

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dining sector, rising rents and business rates, changing consumer habits.

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But for Jamie Oliver it was a gut wrenching moment.

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These were restaurants with his name on them. People had

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lost their jobs because of decisions he'd made. The British media,

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which had spent years covering the Ramsey Oliver feud, with

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glee now turned their attention to Oliver's failure. Would Gordon Ramsey,

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who had been insulting Oliver for a decade, take the

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opportunity to gloat. Would he make some smug comment about

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how real chefs build sustainable businesses. Gordon Ramsey did something

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else entirely. He called Jamie Oliver. That was devastating. Ramsey

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said later on the Jonathan Ross Show. I don't think

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anyone likes to revel in that kind of failure. Bottom

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line is, he's a great guy and a great chef,

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and it was sad to see him disappear overnight. Ramsey

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revealed that he'd reached out to Oliver immediately after hearing

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the news. I called straight away, he said. For Jamie Oliver,

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who was dealing with one of the worst professional moments

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of his life, that phone call meant something. It meant

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that underneath all the insults and the television feuding and

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the years of petty warfare, there was still some vestige

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of their original friendship. The two men met for a

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drink and they had a conversation that was long overdue.

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But it wasn't just Gordon and Jamie who decided it

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was time to end the feud. Their wives Tana Ramsey

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and Jules Oliver had reached their limit in the end.

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Actually it was Jules and his wife Tana that sorted

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it out, Jamie revealed on the Louis Thereaux podcast in

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twenty twenty five. Because they've got growing kids. Gordon's got

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a gorgeous w and amazing kids, and we've seen them

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all grow up. Our kids have got so much in

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common and they all talk on socials anyway. The message

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from both wives was clear, come on, dad's grow up.

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Both of us got a telling off, Jamie said. Then

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we went to have a drink and put it all

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to rest. We let bygones be bygones. For Jamie Oliver,

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the reconciliation was a relief. Looking back on the sixteen

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00:25:30.079 --> 00:25:33.480
year feud, he struggled to even remember what had started it.

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I generally used to bite once a year, and that

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used to set him off for another year, he recalled.

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I didn't have anything against him, but it was serving

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its purpose for him. I mean, I'd have to ask

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Gordon what it was all about. Because we never fell out.

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We got on for the first couple of years, and

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as he did more TV, it just went on and

359
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on and on, and it was painful. Conducting the interview

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reminded Jamie of how it had allegedly started with Gordon

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calling him a fat fuck. Yeah. I was always a

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big admirer of his, Jamie said, brushing past the insult

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with the perspective that time and age had given him.

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We got on very well in the beginning, and then

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as we got into the kind of TV careers, I

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think probably he just bit the reconciliation held. By late

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twenty nineteen, Gordon Ramsay was publicly saying they were absolutely

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friends again. In twenty twenty four, they were even friendly

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at industry events, speaking warmly about each other in interviews.

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We are currently friends, Jamie confirmed in twenty twenty five.

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We all get into ruts and trouble and say things

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we shouldn't do, And I think the energy of the

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drink me and Gordon had was like, look, this is silly.

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Let's just put it behind us, Let's just crack on.

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And I think I'd much prefer that place, He continued,

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with the wisdom that comes from getting older, and I

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also think just getting a bit older and wiser. I

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guess I'm experienced now I've sort of seen it, smelt it,

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felt it. Hopefully I can make better decisions going forward

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based on learnings, for better or worse. Gordon Ramsey, for

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his part, showed his support for Oliver in tangible ways.

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When Oliver was going through the restaurant closures, Ramsey sent

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supportive messages. He spoke kindly about Oliver in interviews. He

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made it clear that whatever had happened between them, he

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didn't wish failure or suffering on his former rival. Gordon

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was very supportive, very kind. When the restaurants went bust,

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Jamie said, he sent me messages, and our relationship has

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been back on track and in a good place some

389
00:28:00.400 --> 00:28:05.359
time now. The feud was over not because someone won

390
00:28:05.480 --> 00:28:10.079
or someone lost, but because two grown men, fathers, husbands,

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successful chefs finally realized what their wives and children had

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been trying to tell them all along. Life is too

393
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short for this shit. Epilogue What the Table teaches. As

394
00:28:30.440 --> 00:28:33.799
we record this episode during Thanksgiving Week twenty twenty five,

395
00:28:34.359 --> 00:28:38.079
Gordon Ramsey is fifty nine years old and Jamie Oliver

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00:28:38.319 --> 00:28:42.839