THE fall-out from his restaurant's appearance on a controversial television programme is continuing but Neil Farrell, of Ambleside's Glass House, is anything but downhearted.

Since allowing Gordon Ramsay into his restaurant to film an episode of the Kitchen Nightmare series, Mr Farrell said bookings and website hits had soared.

Mr Farrell and his staff had previously said that they had been dreading the airing of the programme, during which head chef Richard Collins was heavily criticised. However, after it was broadcast, they breathed a sigh of relief as it was not as bad as they had feared.

And since the programme went out, the Glass House's website has had 182,000 hits, and restaurant bookings are up 50 per cent on last year.

"My site is also linked to a lot of tourism sites so at the end of the day it's not only me they are getting so I think it's going to be brilliant for Ambleside and Cumbria," said Mr Farrell.

Customers seeking directions to the restaurant were no longer just from the immediate area but were likely to be travelling from Carlisle, Penrith or Keswick, which Mr Farrell said showed people staying in the area were prepared to travel for an hour to eat with them.

He said he had received an apology from the programme-makers about the way in which the chef had been portrayed.

"I stood by Richard because, at the end of the day, I believe in him. We have really had to up the ante here, now we have opened our doors for criticism let's make sure we don't get it."

Such has been the response to the programme Mr Farrell added: "I would do it all again tomorrow."