Marcus Waering Leaves Gordon Ramsay
Gordon’s right hand man goes it alone….
Marcus Waering, former sous chef to Gordon Ramsay during his earliest days at Aubergine in London has left Gordon Ramsay Holdings to be his own man, so cutting a long and lucrative umbilical cord which saw him run the two michelin starred Petrus at the Berkley hotel and the one michelin starred Marcus Waering at the Savoy Grill at the Savoy hotel, both in London.
For many this will come as no suprise, Waering had been very much his own man in many respects in recent years and following the closure of the Savoy Grill and the refurbishments at the Berkley hotel it was only a matter of time before he broke away.
This must be a blow for Ramsay, Waering was his trusted deputy for many years, he also helped Ramsay keep up with Alain Duccasse in the ‘how many michelin stars have you got’ competition. His food at Petrus was well recognised for its quality and was easily the best of the rest of the Ramsay restaurants behind the flagship Restaurant Gordon Ramsay whilst some would suggest it was on a par regardless of their standing in the michelin guide.
Whatever happens Waering will not continue to operate under the Petrus name, Ramsay owns that and may open it up again under the same name. Talk is of Waering reopening as Marcus Waering at the Berkley, which would mean business as usual for his regular clientel who Ramsay cites as the reason for leaving because he didn’t want to upset them with the current refurbishment work going on at the Berkley. It is difficult to imagine guests at the five star deluxe two michelin starred restaurant being subject to the kind of disturbances encountered during refurbishment work at your average three star package hotel in Majorca, but hey, who are we to judge?
Miles,
In the past I have been interested in how a large organisation copes when it’s Ops Manager suddenly leaves. No one in a certain size business is indispensable, that used to come as a real surprise to me years ago but these days it’s what I tend to believe. Good luck to him, it must be both slightly scary and exhilarating to become your own boss, especially for those who believe they carry the business in the first place.
I take it we won’t be seeing Miles Collins at the Savoy then?
As and when you branch out into a chain of eateries, you can rely on Elsie and myself to manage them for you….. we’ll be the two fabulous women perched on designer bar stools, directing operations and taking only the occasional sip of Schnapps for medicinal purposes 
Perhaps you’d be kind enough to set up a video link in the restaurant so that we can see what we’ll be letting ourselves in for….. likewise we can 
shout ordersgive helpful comments in the same way without leaving the comfort of our respective hot tubsCid
June 9, 2008 @ 5:09 pm
Cid,
In fairness to him I am sure he has been left to his own devices for some time. I can’t help but wonder if he has had enough of the Ramsay publicity machine, perhaps he thinks a continued relationship would devalue his own product?
Miles
June 9, 2008 @ 10:17 pm