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Follicles and Fins: Gordon Ramsay makes headlines

By April MacIntyre Jan 4, 2011, 15:58 GMT

Can\'t tell, can you? - Gordon Ramsay - Gordon Ramsay Autograph Session For His Latest Cookbook \'Gordon Ramsay\'s World Kitchen\' in Toronto on November 14, 2010 - Indigo Manulife Centre - Toronto, Canada © Robin Wong / PR Photos

Allegations of plastic surgery, hair transplants and the news he was doused with gasoline in Costa Rica has thrust chef Gordon Ramsay into the headlines.

There's a new show on Channel 4 in the UK that features the top UK chefs, Ramsay, Jamie Oliver and Heston Blumenthal, as the men go on location to rip back the covers on some unsavory ingredients coming out of the sea.

The Daily Mail did a feature explaining the premise of "Big Fish Fight "series, as Ramsay noted it was his peers who aggravated an ongoing problem: 'Chefs are part of the problem. We're responsible for making people want certain fish,' said Gordon Ramsay.

Ramsay discusses his run in with South American gangsters as he filmed his segment on the illegal, lucrative and unregulated trade in shark fins.

According to Ramsay:

‘We traced some of the biggest culprits to Costa Rica. The day before we got there, a Taiwanese crew landed a haul of hammerhead sharks – police searched the boat and found bails of cocaine. These gangs operate from places that are like forts, with barbed-wire perimeters and gun towers.

'At one, I managed to shake off the people who were keeping us away, ran up some stairs to a rooftop and looked down to see thousands and thousands of fins, drying on rooftops for as far as the eye could see. When I got back downstairs, they tipped a barrel of petrol over me.’

Jamie Oliver, 35, may have less cache in TV and restaurant doors, but he is the king fish when it comes to publishing, as his cookbooks have earned him upwards of $200 million, putting him in JK Rowling's orbit, according the Mail.

Blumenthal, 44, is reportedly expanding his well-received restaurants.

Fear of losing many species of fish is making the chefs come together in a bid to educate people and their peer chefs that fish is now a bone of contention, and needs to be managed better.  ‘The seas have been pillaged,’ says Blumenthal, to the Mail.

Rival UK newser The Mirror is taking a more personal swipe at the Scottish chef, claiming Ramsay has had a facelift and hairplugs, and has unusual swelling that proves something was afoot, cosmetically.