Episode Report Card Keckler: B+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Day 3
By Keckler | Season 3 | Episode 3 | Aired on 06.17.2007
The Red Team is headed by Julia, who is clearly in her Waffle House element and is assigned to cook for the Army. The Blue Team, headed by no one in particular, cooks for the Navy. Aside from a minor screw-up from Joanna, who sent out cold and overly salted hash browns, the girls kick it hard and fast. Looking hungrily over at plates of omelets and bacon being served by the Red Team, a Navy customer cracks, "If I had known I was going to get my food quicker, I'd have joined the Army." On the other side, Aaron burns omelets and throws them away, and in general, the Blue Team just sucks. The Red Team finishes early and because she's just that much of a kick-ass, Julia is dispatched to help the pathetic boys. Who's sneering about the "freaking Waffle House" now, Tiffany? Oh right, you are. At home. Where you're watching this. At home. Not on the show. At home.
While the Red Team is awarded a Ramsay-escorted helicopter ride courtesy of the U.S. Military, the Blue Team pulls KP duty. Specifically, the storied task of peeling pounds of potatoes and oceans of onions to serve a military base. A military truck pulls up behind Hell's Kitchen and the boys watch as bags of potatoes and onions are tossed onto the ground in front of them. They get no hand trucks for this, and Scott even barks at them, "Throw them over your shoulder like a bunch of men, don't act like a bunch of girls!" Right, because if they were acting like a bunch of girls, they wouldn't be on KP duty.
During the KP duty, we finally get the promised scene of Aaron fainting and slamming backwards into a prep station. And, because this is a military-theme, we go to commercial with someone screaming, "Medic! Medic!" Aaron is zipped off to the hospital, and the boys get back to their KP duty with some minor squabbling about how to peel.
The girls and Ramsay heli over to the USS Midway, the longest serving aircraft carrier in the Navy's history. They take a tour and then have a champagne lunch with Ramsay, where, once again, he dispenses a few sentences of advice. I'm standing amazed that Melissa had the foresight to bring camouflage pants and an Army green kerchief to tie around her hair just in case an occasion such as this arose.
Later that night, the girls take a soak in the hot tub, and the boys decide they have to pick a team leader. They all nominate themselves, which would have been a hysterical dinner service had they actually carried it out, because all they could have done is order themselves around. I think I might have actually paid good money to see Ramsay's reaction to that situation. However Josh, in an attempt to get back at Rock for sending him up to be sacrificed last week, changes his mind and throws his support to Brad. As they prep for service the next morning, Ramsay puts in a solicitous and kindly call to Aaron's hospital room. Ramsay tells Aaron that he has a "serious illness" and cannot return to the competition, on doctor's orders. We don't ever find out anything more about poor Aaron's health, and his jacket is impaled and his photo eighty-sixed. On the girls' side, it comes out that Julia doesn't know what crème brûlée is, an admission that throws Nearly Naked Bonnie into a flight of sanctimonious blathering.