'He Made Us All Cry' — The Iron-Fisted Chef That Intimidated Young Gordon Ramsay

Most of us know Gordon Ramsay as a straight-shooter chef, for better or for worse. He has immense culinary knowledge and a deep desire to teach; at the same time, he also has quite the fiery temper and a stunningly sharp vocabulary. But before there was Gordon Ramsay, there was Marco Pierre White — the legendary chef who mentored him.

"We call him the Great White for a reason, let me tell you," Ramsay said in a clip posted by HuffPost-UK on YouTube. In his early twenties, Ramsay worked under Marco Pierre White at the legendary restaurant Harvey's. "He made us all cry," he said of the experience. Admittedly, it's hard to imagine someone bringing the fearsome Gordon Ramsay to tears, but the chef doesn't hold that against White at all. He acknowledged that it's often the pressure of the job that can make one cry and even pushed back slightly when questioned whether White was mean. "He was firm," Ramsay responded.

It's likely that White would agree with that assessment. "My reputation is a product of exaggeration and ignorance," he said in a viral clip on YouTube. "Did I shout? Yes. Did I scream? At times. Service is service, and in the service, chefs shout." He also pushed back on the crying incident, saying, "No, I didn't make Gordon Ramsay cry. He made himself cry. That was his choice, to cry." Yes, chef.

Regardless of who made who cry, White was an immense influence on Ramsay. His approach to cooking was unlike anything Ramsay had ever experienced before, and he especially admired his mentor's discipline and drive for perfection. When he was 32 years old, White became the youngest person to win three Michelin stars. He eventually realized that Michelin stars may be more of a burden than a blessing and willingly gave them all up, but this kind of success that early on his career certainly made him a tough act to follow.

Once Ramsay soaked up all the knowledge from his mentor and knew how to replicate his dishes to perfection, he started yearning for more individuality. "I need to step away from what he's shown me, and I need to search for my own DNA," Ramsay shared, recounting his thought process on "The High Performance Podcast."

In many ways, Marco Pierre White influenced Ramsay's cuisine not only in what he taught him but also in what he couldn't teach him. White never went to France, so Ramsay made it his goal to go there and immerse himself in French cuisine. He also took up baking, something he didn't get to do under White's tutelage. As a result, Ramsay became a more multifaceted chef, continuing to push himself on his career path — which definitely explains his many restaurant chains and cooking competition shows.