Ramsay host takes on Yorkshire pub

The licensee who featured in Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares has left the pub featured in the Channel Four show.

Brian and Elaine Rey's Punch lease, the Fenwick Arms at Claughton, Lancashire, featured in the programme in 2006. The couple had run the pub for six years. They have now taken on a Scottish & Newcastle Pub Enterprises five-year tenancy at the Ship in Aldborough, North Yorkshire.

The pub, 10 miles from Harrogate, has 70 covers and the menu will focus on traditional British food. It has a separate dining room and bar and five letting rooms, which the couple hope to reopen in the future.

Rey said: "The Ship is half the size of the Fenwick Arms and will be easier for us to manage, and we don't need so many staff. The pub used to be my local years ago. It is a fantastic pub and we are really looking forward to running it."

Rey set up a Campaign for Real Gravy with Ramsay to try and get Britons to ditch gravy granules. The campaign has a website selling Campaign for Real Gravy chef's hats, aprons, mugs and thongs, which will run from the Ship.

The 64-year-old has also joined forces with food brokers May & Rayburn to try to launch a gravy under the Campaign for Real Gravy brand into supermarkets by Christmas.

Rey was praised by Ramsay for his Yorkshire puddings in the show and a range of ready-made Yorkshires is also planned.

Before Ramsay's visit in 2006, the Reys were struggling with their business after ploughing £250,000 of loans into the Fenwick Arms, over three years.

Rey said: "Appearing in Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares was a really worthwhile experience and it really opened our eyes.

"Gordon said we ran the pub too much as a home and not a business.

"But a pub is a house open to the public and I want people to feel at home and welcome and comfortable."