Among the international food royalty who received gongs at the San Pellegrino World's 50 Best Restaurant awards in London last night, one chef was notable by his absence: Gordon Ramsay.
Britain's most successful culinary export this century - who has restaurants worldwide holding 12 Michelin stars and who has TV shows in the US and the UK - has dropped not only out of the top 50 from 13th spot in the list, but this year hasn't even made the top 100. "It is surprising," says the event's director Nathan Garnett, "but you'd have to ask individual members of the academy why that is."
A spokesperson for Gordon Ramsay Holdings said last night: "Gordon takes all these sort of surveys with a pinch of salt. As always, Gordon regards his thousands of customers as his most valued critics. They are his judge and jury."
But the news will be a blow for Ramsay, whose reputation has taken numerous knocks over the past year as he has struggled to keep control of his recession-hit empire. Earlier this year he was hit by claims of financial problems among his businesses. There were rumours he was in danger of losing some of his stars and forced to close a number of his restaurants. And last weekend he fell victim to a sting by the Sun newspaper, which caught his London gastro-pubs using preprepared meals including boil-in-a-bag coq au vin.
Adding insult to injury, Ramsay's former protege Marcus Wareing's restaurant at the Berkeley in London narrowly missed making the top 50, but was tipped by organisers as a "guaranteed to breakthrough" in 2010. Wareing, who fell out with Ramsay after working with him for 19 years, said last night: "In today's world a chef is only going to be successful if he's in the kitchen. People want more than a name."
Less controversially, Ferran Adrià's El Bulli restaurant in Roses on Spain's Costa Brava was crowned the world's best for the fourth year running.
While the UK's share of the list has withered from six to four (Spain and Italy each have six restaurants on the list and the US and France dominate with eight each), Britain retains its number two slot thanks to Heston Blumenthal's Fat Duck in Bray, Berkshire.
The announcement will come as a relief to Blumenthal, who was forced to temporarily close the restaurant earlier this year after about 400 diners fell ill from eating there. However, the 806-strong panel of chefs, restaurateurs, food writers and restaurant critics upon whose opinion the list is based cast their votes well before news broke of the problems at the Fat Duck.
The second highest-ranking British chef was Fergus Henderson, best known for bringing glamour to offal. His St John restaurant in Clerkenwell, central London, moved up two places to 14th from last year's 16th.
Henderson's chunky dishes and unusual combinations, invariably involving offal, have included roast bone marrow and parsley salad, whole roast suckling pig, chitterlings and tripe and smoked eel with bacon and Eccles cake. St. John opened 15 years ago and was awarded a Michelin star earlier this year.
Henderson said: "We all like a pat on the back. As long as everyone has a good lunch at my restaurant then I'm happy. But it's a great shame that there aren't more British restaurants on the list. We clearly aren't very good at grasping our own food culture."
In 34th position, slipping down four places from last year, was Nobu London, a celebrity haunt popular for its stylish modern Japanese cooking.
Mark Edwards, Nobu London's executive head chef, said: "The San Pellegrino 50 Best Restaurants awards is a spectacular event which recognises restaurants all over the world. We are delighted to have received such recognition and to be included in the top 50 list once again".
Also in London, the Chinese favourite Hakkasan tumbled 17 places to 36th from 19th position last year.