For anyone who thinks of Gordon Ramsay as a TV chef, it may come as something of a surprise that his YouTube Channel has a whopping 21 million subscribers.
And the channel is not just an opportunity to re-tread old episodes of shows like Hell’s Kitchen. It is also home to popular digital first series like Scrambled, which is produced by Studio Ramsay Global, a joint venture with Fox Entertainment.
The power of Ramsay’s digital first platform has been underlined by a new episode of Scrambled which dropped on November 21st. Entitled ‘Gordon Ramsay Teaches Matthew McConaughey How To Make The Ultimate Steak & Eggs’, the 31 minute show achieved more than 4.1m views in its first 10 days. The episode is sponsored by cookware brand HexClad, which has a long-standing relationship with Ramsay.
An interview/cooking hybrid, previous Scrambled episodes have typically weighed in at 10-15 minutes in length, and it is not uncommon for them to hit 5m views or more. Previous guests have included Selena Gomez, Uncle Roger, Aaron Sanchez, Zedd, Olivia Culpo, WWE’s The Bella Twins and Jackass’ Steve-O. An episode of Scrambled featuring Mr Beast generated around 4.8m views last year.
Scrambled is not the only example of Ramsay using his digital first platform to build original IP. Recently, he also launched an online series called Idiot Sandwich, which is based on a famous Ramsay meme that went viral in 2015.
The phrase came about after a sketch on The Late Late Show with James Corden, where Ramsay held slices of bread on either side of news anchor Julie Chen’s face and asked her “What are you?” She answered “An idiot sandwich”. The clip was subsequently watched 14 million times on the YouTube platform.
Earlier this year, Studio Ramsay took the phrase and created a digital first show called Idiot Sandwich in which three content creators try to impress Ramsay with their own idiosyncratic sandwiches, to win a cash prize and the title of ‘Idiot Sandwich’. Episodes to date have clocked up anywhere between 500,000 and 1.7m views.
Not content with creating another internet hit, Ramsay has released his own Idiot Sandwich concoction, available at his Bread Street Kitchen & Bar restaurants.
Alongside his YouTube channel, Ramsay has a presence on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook and Twitter. His archive shows have also been used to create a FAST channel, which is available on Fox’s ad-supported streaming service Tubi.
