"à la" + masculine

I'd like to say

I'm baking a cake à la Ramsey.

Here, à la means in the style of. My problem is: what if Ramsey is male? The French la goes with feminine nouns. So, should I write the following?

I'm baking a cake au Ramsey.

That might be more grammatically correct in French, but seems wrong in English, since au isn't a phrase in English in the same way that à la is.

Solution 1:

Literally, à la only means (in this case) in the. It's an abbreviation of à la mode de, which means in the style of. The de is not governed by the gender of the place/person/etc that follows.

So your usage is correct.

Solution 2:

Perhaps this might be relevant to the Cookery SE as well.

How about Turkey à la King?

As you say, à la means "in the style of". It's reached English and is now subject to English rules, which do not [for the most part] include gender-specific expressions. It doesn't matter whether Gordon Ramsey is male or not: à la is used regardless.

Further examples: Apple pie a la zing; Pumpkin pie a la Pigalle; Penne a la vodka

Where an entire phrase like au gratin or au naturel has reached English, that's treated en entière.