Marcus Wareing steps into the Savoy limelight

They used to call Marcus Wareing "the shadow": a result of standing side by side with business partner Gordon Ramsay for the best part of a decade. Ever since Aubergine first opened, in fact.

Now it's time for him to shake off his nickname. Over the past four years he has been gradually raising his profile by running the well-oiled machine that is Pétrus, but he is about to embark on several projects that will elevate him to almost Ramsay-like status.

On 7 May, Wareing will open the doors of the Savoy Grill as patron. One month later, he will convert the 50-seat dining room of Pétrus into a "more accessible" restaurant, to be named La Fleur. And in July he will relocate Pétrus to the Berkeley hotel in Belgravia, on the site that was formerly home to Pierre Koffmann's two-Michelin-starred La Tante Claire. Not a bad few months' work for a 32-year-old chef.

While Wareing sits with his three-pronged business plan in front of him, it is the Savoy, it seems, which dominates his non-cooking time. With opening just weeks away, he's in and out of the Savoy like it was his second home. He loves it there, he loves the tradition and he's proud to be associated with one of London's most elegant hotels.

It's a fine transition for a chef who, fresh out of college 15 years ago, first worked at the Savoy as a commis under maitre chef des cuisines Anton Edelmann. "I've been back to the Savoy only once since I left, but that was to a function. I haven't actually been back in the kitchen, so for me it's like going back in time," Wareing says. He adds that he found his first site visit, when the deal was initially put on the table, quite eerie. "It's almost as if nothing has changed here. It looks the same, the service is the same, the place even smells the same."

On first inspecting the Grill Room - a restaurant that was unfamiliar to Wareing, because when he worked at the Savoy in the late 1980s he was serving the hotel's River Room - he says he was left with an empty feeling in his stomach. "I thought to myself, ‘Jesus Christ, how am I going to make anything out of this?'"

But as time passed, Wareing was nagged by a feeling of curiosity. Having originally been asked by the Savoy's American parent company, Blackstone, to act as a consultant to the Grill Room, Wareing started to visualise himself in the room in a greater role. A consultancy, he decided, was out of the question - he wanted the Grill Room lock, stock and barrel.

Wareing struck a deal that gave him the lease on the Grill Room, the reading room situated just off the hotel's foyer (which will be converted to a 40-seat private dining room) and the oyster bar, known as "Upstairs", above the Grill Room. He then announced to the press that he was going to tip the Grill Room upside down. Not surprisingly, the restaurant's loyalists were outraged.

"I ran at it like a bull in a china shop with some of the things I said," he admits with hindsight. "Now I've slowed down and thought, no, play this one very slowly because it's huge and let's not tamper with it unnecessarily because it does have a place in history, it really has. I met a member of parliament at the GQ awards recently and he said to me ‘Oh, so you're Marcus Wareing - you do know that the Savoy Grill is Parliament's canteen?' They actually see it as their watering hole - I think that's fantastic."

Inch by inch, as the project started to develop, Wareing grew to respect the Grill Room for what it was. He learnt to respect the clientele that it had already, and he learnt to respect the fact that Angelo Maresca (the restaurant's manager) was key to 60% of that business. "We're hoping he'll bring the old clientele back to the Savoy and then it's down to me to turn it on for them - to show them that we haven't tipped it on its head after all."

Nevertheless, the Grill Room is being given its first face-lift in 25 years. Los Angeles-based designer Barbara Barry won't be touching the oak panelling, but she will introduce striped banquettes in black, nougat and tobacco, charcoal check carpets and black wool blinds. A suspended ceiling has been installed and covered with gold and silver-chequered paper. The chandeliers are also being replaced.

Back of house, Wareing is overhauling the sprawling, split-level kitchen. It will feature a raised, glass-fronted chef's table (for seven to eight) looking directly on to the pass. Doors at the back of the kitchen will lead straight into the soon-to-be converted 40-seat private dining room.

The entrance to the Grill Room, on your left as you go into the Savoy's foyer, will also, for the first time, have a bar. It's likely to be called the Laurent Perrier Bar (Laurent Perrier being the Savoy's house Champagne). So who's footing the bill? "The front of house is Blackstone," Wareing says. "We do all the back of house, and table tops as well."

But let's get to the serious stuff. What's happening with the food? "We're going to venture into classical things. Josh Emett (who previously worked as sous chef at Gordon Ramsay at Claridge's and will now be head chef at the Savoy Grill) and I have devised the menus, featuring some of the dishes I've done in the past, and I've spent a lot of time looking at what the Grill used to do.

"I think the food here will be different because it will be served more classically from the gueridon and from copper pans and silver trays. The style will be very different from Pétrus, but of course there will be elements of my cookery style in there."

Wareing has spent hours pouring over the Savoy's archives, looking at old Grill Room menus and identifying what have become known as "the Savoy classics". "I think everyone has a different interpretation of a classic dish, but what I looked for was recurring items such as potted shrimps, omelette Arnold Bennett, steak and kidney pudding and lamb on the carvery."

Lamb on the carvery, though, will be done Wareing-style. "I won't put meat on the trolley and let it sit over a paraffin lamp for four or five hours, that's not me. That will upset a lot of people, but you've got to understand that's not cookery of today - that's in the past and I'll be damned if I'm going to allow a piece of sirloin steak to sit on a trolley for that length of time.

Meat and fish will be cooked to order, he affirms. "It will still come out on the gueridon and it will still be carved in front of the diner, but it will be for them and them only and not for the other half of the dining room."

Other dishes likely to share the same amount of theatre are smoked salmon and gravadlax. The fish will be accompanied by sauces - the salmon with lemon; the gravadlax will have dill and grain mustard dressing - and they will be carved at the table. Bread, butter and toast will come from the kitchen. "That's very much what they used to do here."

The à la carte menu leans towards the old Grill Room menu format with starters split into three groups - cold starters, soups and hot starters - followed by meat and fish, the carvery and desserts. Dishes are likely to include fillet of slow-cooked rainbow trout with braised fennel hearts, avocado and Oscietra caviar, sauce mousseline and braised Wiltshire pork belly, saut‚d Jerusalem artichoke, braised red onions, artichoke pur‚e and apple sauce, sauce Banyuls.

Lunch menus, at £21 for three courses, might feature tian of potted shrimps with shiso salad, cocktail sauce and melba toast, roasted best-end of lamb with Provençal herb crust and traditional garnish and a dessert of plum tarte tatin with Amarillo biscuit served with caramel sauce and a roasted almond ice-cream. Wareing also plans to introduce a dessert trolley. "That's something you don't see much in London these days."

So Wareing is consciously making the evolution from chef to restaurateur. "I've always wanted to be a restaurateur. I've been a chef for 16 years and I still am a chef - I haven't changed. But there's another side to cooking and that is the restaurant. One thing I've learnt since being with Gordon is there's more to restaurants than just food. There's the dining room, your wine list, your staff, your customers. If you don't become involved in that, then you become just a head chef in an establishment. So by learning more and understanding more about your own business, you become a restaurateur."

Obviously, the questions on everyone's lips (as was the case when Ramsay diversified) are: is Wareing spreading himself too thin and - perhaps more importantly - is he compromising the exceptional standards displayed at his precious Pétrus? Wareing's response is firm. "I wouldn't be doing this if Pétrus wasn't as solid as it is.

"And I'm not moving away from Pétrus, not by any means. It's my flagship, my jewel and I'll be cooking there as well as overseeing the Savoy. It's going to be very hard, but I can divide myself over seven days rather than five days now because this [the Savoy Grill] is a seven-day-a-week operation. My main goal at Pétrus will continue to be to strive for two stars, even three."

Wareing's drive and ambition for two and maybe three Michelin stars is as strong as ever. He felt disappointment in January [when he wasn't promoted to two], but he says he knows there's got to be a good reason why. "I have respect for the guide, for what it is and what it does, but I can't allow it to bog me down or to sulk about it. The key is to pull your socks up and continue. I have got a lot on my plate this year and I want to prove to them that I can do what I'm about to do and still maintain my standards.

"One thing that does excite me is winning a star here - that's something that has never been done," he continues. "For the Savoy Grill to have a Michelin star would be fantastic and it's certainly got everything behind it to be able to do that."

So what does the future hold for Marcus Wareing? As he grows his business interest to a portfolio that mimics Ramsay's, can he ever see a time when he might split from Ramsay and go it alone? "I opened Aubergine with Gordon, I opened L'Oranger, I opened Pétrus and I'm about to do the Berkeley - my fourth major opening. I look at Aubergine as part of me because I was there from day one and I don't particularly want to do it again - it drains you. I don't want to go right back to the beginning and start where Gordon was 10 years ago at Aubergine and go through that hell.

"I'm 32, nearly 33. I've built what I've got by being a partner. To sever that we'd have to fall out, we'd have to become enemies. I built this, I'm part of this, if I went it would be complete madness."

Steak and kidney pudding
Route to the top
Marcus Wareing was born and brought up in Southport in Lancashire. He attended Southport Catering College where he studied for his City & Guilds qualifications. At 18, he moved to London, having secured a post with Anton Edelmann at the Savoy. Two years later he transferred to Le Gavroche as a commis and it was here that he met a young chef de partie called Gordon Ramsay.

"Marcus and I went through so much together," Ramsay remembers. "But the thing that stood out to me at Le Gavroche was that he was so organised - his mise-en-place was fantastic, so I used to nick half of it so I could come in a bit later in the mornings. Unfortunately, I got found out in the end."

In May 1991, Wareing went to work at the Point, a Relais & Châteaux resort on Saranac Lake, New York. On his return to Europe, seven months later, he landed a job at Albert Roux's concept at the Grand Hotel Amsterdam. The following year, a spell in the country beckoned and Wareing headed off to Gravetye Manor in East Grinstead, West Sussex.

In 1993, Ramsay launched Aubergine in Chelsea and Wareing was offered the job as sous chef. From the outset, Ramsay says, Wareing displayed qualities that Ramsay didn't. "He can beat me hands down with his amazing temperament. He's less aggressive and has an incredible way of dealing with individuals."

The pair worked closely at Aubergine for the following two years until Ramsay arranged for Wareing to work in the kitchens of French masterchef Guy Savoy. During his year in Paris, Wareing returned to London to take part in the Restaurant Association's Young Chef of the Year competition, which he won.

In March 1996, as part of the A-Z group, Wareing opened his first restaurant, L'Oranger, with the support of Ramsay. Three years later to the month, with financial backing from Ramsay, he launched Pétrus, a stone's throw from L'Oranger. Within seven months of opening, it was awarded a Michelin star and last year it was given the AA's ultimate accolade, five AA rosettes.

Wareing's role within Gordon Ramsay Holdings (Pétrus's parent company), though, is far more than as a chef-patron, Ramsay says. He's a mentor too. "While some members of the team might be guarded with me, Marcus is easy and approachable. For example, he has a great amount of respect for Angela [Hartnett, chef-patron at the Connaught] and she has phenomenal respect for Marcus. In fact I think she's got more respect for him than she has for me. He's like a father figure within the company."

Wareing's future empire

La Fleur (currently trading as Pétrus)

33 St James Street, London SW1
Tel: 020 7930 9702
Seats: 50
Opening: 5 June

Savoy Grill The Savoy, 1 Savoy Hill, London WC2

Tel: 020 7592 1600
Seats: 95
Opening: 7 May 2003

Pétrus The Berkeley, Wilton Place London SW1

Opening: July 2003

The relocation of Pétrus

In July, Pétrus, in St James Street, will relocate to the Berkeley, and the site will become a new restaurant - La Fleur.

Plans for the new-look Pétrus are already well under way. Interior designer David Collins has been drafted in to make over the dining room, which will house 12 tables, and a small dining room for 12. Wareing anticipates spending £500,000 on the front of house refurbishment alone.

While Collins's palette will give a reflection of Pétrus in St James's, the Berkeley location will have the advantage of more natural light. The walls will be covered in velvet. Deep burgundies will be used throughout. French-style shutters will be put at the windows and lights will be used to emphasise certain features - a table or picture.

The space at the newly sited Pétrus will allow Wareing to use trolleys there too. "I want to give the waiters the space to do that particular style of service."

Back of house, Wareing will use the basement kitchen at the Berkeley as a production kitchen, while the old Tante Claire kitchen, on the ground floor level of the hotel, will serve as the main service kitchen. A chef's table (for six), like the Savoy Grill, will be separated by a glass partition and look directly on to the hotplate.

Also to be housed at the Berkeley is Gordon's Boxwood Café, a 120-seat restaurant open every day for breakfast, lunch and dinner, which will take over the former site of Vong and run under Ramsay's direction. The New York-style café is due to open on 15 May with Stuart Gillies (formerly of Daniel's in New York and London's Le Caprice) at the helm in the kitchen.