{"id":131671,"date":"2026-03-06T21:57:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-06T21:57:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/131671\/"},"modified":"2026-03-06T21:57:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-06T21:57:07","slug":"upper-darbys-wilsons-secret-sauce-is-reportedly-closing-a-year-after-appearing-on-gordon-ramsays-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/131671\/","title":{"rendered":"Upper Darby’s Wilson\u2019s Secret Sauce is reportedly closing a year after appearing on Gordon Ramsay\u2019s show"},"content":{"rendered":"

When Steve and Kelly Wilson appeared last year in an episode of Gordon Ramsay\u2019s Secret Service \u2014 a FOX reality show in which the celebrity chef lends a hand to struggling restaurants \u2014 it appeared to be a victory for their Upper Darby<\/a> barbecue establishment, Wilson\u2019s Secret Sauce.<\/p>\n

In the episode\u2019s final moments, after executing a significant makeover, Ramsay stands with the Wilsons in the restaurant\u2019s dining room, which is brimming with patrons.<\/p>\n

\u201cA full house,\u201d Ramsay tells the couple. \u201cGet used to it.\u201d <\/p>\n

The reality, though, has apparently been different. <\/p>\n

Just a year after Ramsay\u2019s reality-TV glow-up, the Wilsons told Philadelphia magazine<\/a> this week that they\u2019d elected to close the restaurant and sell the building after a year of declining business.<\/p>\n

From the start, the couple\u2019s restaurant was an unlikely endeavor. Their foray into the local food scene came around 2010, when Steve \u2014 a former mechanic \u2014 began a barbecue catering service from their home. But when demand jumped in the ensuing years, they eventually decided to open a brick-and-mortar restaurant. <\/p>\n

Kelly, at least, was not exactly thrilled with the idea. <\/p>\n

\u201c[Steve] came home from bowling and asked me if I wanted to open up a restaurant \u2014 I literally said, \u2018[Expletive] no,\u2019” she said on the episode of Secret Service. \u201c\u2018I\u2019ve never worked in one, you\u2019ve never worked in one, and I don\u2019t think we could work together all day long.\u2019\u201d <\/p>\n

Nevertheless, Wilson\u2019s Secret Sauce debuted in 2018 in Upper Darby, specializing in barbecue dishes while also serving everything from pizza and lobster to egg rolls. <\/p>\n

But stress quickly ensued, and when Ramsay came to town last March, he set about transforming the restaurant. <\/p>\n

Over the course of the 43-minute episode, Ramsay chastised the couple for everything from food hygiene to kitchen inefficiencies before helping implement a variety of changes aimed at ensuring the restaurant\u2019s survival.<\/p>\n

Among the various changes pushed by Ramsay was significantly shrinking the restaurant\u2019s expansive menu, which the couple did, whittling their dozens of menu items down to just 13.<\/p>\n

But the Wilsons later told Philadelphia magazine that business slowed after Ramsay\u2019s suggested change, at least in part because customers missed the items that had been cut from the menu.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had a lot of customers coming in from day one of the new menu begging us to bring the old menu back,” Kelly Wilson told the magazine. \u201cWe were getting lost with his menu, and our menu really worked a lot better.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the Wilsons\u2019 sit-down restaurant is set to close, they said they\u2019ll continue the catering service that was once their bread-and-butter, operating out of a shared \u201cghost kitchen.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When Steve and Kelly Wilson appeared last year in an episode of Gordon Ramsay\u2019s Secret Service \u2014 a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":131672,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[147,149,148,150,61088],"class_list":["post-131671","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-upper-darby","tag-upper-darby","tag-upper-darby-headlines","tag-upper-darby-news","tag-upper-darby-township","tag-upper-darby-restaurant-to-close-after-ramsay-show-appearance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131671","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=131671"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131671\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/131672"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=131671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=131671"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=131671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}