Egon Ronay - critic who transformed UK's eating habits lauded

TRIBUTES have been paid to Egon Ronay, the food critic who helped transform UK eating habits, who died on Saturday aged 94.

By The Newsroom

Published 14th Jun 2010, 10:34 BST

Updated 14th Jun 2010, 11:41 BST

Ronay, who launched the era of restaurant reviews with the Egon Ronay guides, had been ill for a number of weeks.

He died at his home in Berkshire with his wife Barbara and two daughters by his side.

The former restaurateur became one of the world's most famous reviewers, setting standards throughout the 1960s, 70s and 80s.

The son of a prominent restaurateur in Budapest whose business was destroyed by the Nazi and the Soviet advances, Ronay escaped from communist Hungary after the war and came to London as a refugee.

He managed other's restaurants before opening his own establishment in Knightsbridge.

Chef Marco Pierre White. who worked in Yorkshire, said he owed "more to Egon than anyone else in the industry".

"He did more for gastronomy in Britain that any institution or individual."

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