Gordon Ramsay's Bleep-O-Fucking-Meter: 30
Contestants' Bleep-O-Fucking-Meter: 26
Gordon Ramsay's Quote of the Night: "Un-shuckin'-believable!"
Previously: Chefs were chosen and talked a big game. It was "the best signature dish tasting ever". Giovanni was mean to Seth. Coi was mean to Lacey. Both of them kind of deserved it. Colleen messed up, and Wil was on Planet Cuckoo. Carol made her customers happy by giving them free wine; Giovanni did not. Seth and Wil were nominated, and Wil got sent home. Good bye, Wil, we hardly knew ye. I mean it. In a couple weeks, I'll be staring at you in the credits wondering who the heck you are.
As the chefs walk back to the dorms, J interviews that "J is upset that he has to spend another day with Seth". Oh, really? Third person? It's going to be like that, is it? Look, J, I like you. Your name is only one letter long, which means it's easy to type. But don't push me. The other men also don't seem happy about Seth being here. In contrast, Coi apologizes to Lacey for going off on her in the last episode. Then she and LA berate her some more, telling her that she has to do a better job. Lacey seems to think her lack of line experience is an acceptable excuse, but they don't seem to be buying it.
At 2:53 am, everyone goes to sleep. Then, at 5:49 am, a tiny marching band (two drummers and a guy on cymbals) wakes everyone up. Gordon is already in the parking lot, giving the Disappointed Father routine. There are two piles of trash bags, which he claims are full of the wasted food from last night. But they won't be digging through the trash, because coincidentally, two crates of scallops have arrived.
Both teams will open their crates and put all the scallops in the designated buckets. It appears that scallops arrive at restaurants in large wooden crates full of seawater and seaweed, which I did not know. Colleen falls into one, which seems like it would take a lot of effort on her part, what with the sides of the crate coming all the way up to her shoulders. The teams bring the scallops inside, and it's time for the challenge. LA interviews that she has no experience with scallops and didn't even know they came in shells. Neither did I, but then, I'm not the one who auditioned to be on a show where you have to impress a known Scallop Fancier like Gordon Ramsay.
Chef Ramsay demonstrates the fine art of scallop removal, which we're told will give the chefs a healthy respect for the food. Between this and Top Chef, it seems like there have been a lot of people disassembling seafood on my television this week. Because it's eight against seven, the women have to sit one out, and Chef Ramsay selects Andrea. Both teams do their thing, and Lacey interviews that it's gross. Well, I'm sure it is. We see Robert open a shell. Other people do too.
Carol gets eight perfect scallops. Paula has one acceptable out of ten. Coi has six. Colleen gets five out of six. LA has eight out of eight, and interviews that she should have done better. Ji has four. Lacey has three out of six for a women's total of 35. Bring on the men! Ben does poorly (three out of eleven), which leads Danny to mock him in an interview. Yeah, I feel like in a situation like this, you should save the smack talk until the third or fourth episode. You never know when you'll look like an idiot. But Danny does get nine out of ten, so that's pretty good. Giovanni has thirteen out of fifteen as Robert interviews that the women "went from hero to zero. Boop!" I include the "boop" in case it turns out to mean something. But I won't hold my breath. Robert has five. Charlie has two. The men are behind by three with Seth and J to go. Seth has three. The score is tied! Will J get any in? He only has six finished and the first five are rejected. He interviews that "It's not looking good for J." So I guess he's committed to the third person. Why would you do that? We've recapped a lot of reality shows on this site, and I'm pretty sure that no recapper has ever said "Oh, this guy talks about himself in the third person a lot. He's pretty cool!"
Anyway, before we find out about J's last scallop, we go to commercial on a tropical fish that breathes bubbles in the shape of the Hell's Kitchen pitchfork. Nice job! When we come back, I learn that the technical term for scallop disassembly is "shucking". Oh, and J's last scallop is acceptable and the men win a prize Gordon claims is "quite unique". They'll be going to Catalina Island (along with thousands of other people. How unique!) with Gordon while the women spend all day shucking things for a Raw Bar they'll be having at the dinner service. Lacey shakes her head ruefully and Ramsay demands to know if she really cares. She says she does, but no one believes her.
The men are sent upstairs to get dressed for the helicopters. Ben interviews that he knows nothing about islands, being from Chicago. I wish I knew enough about Chicago to dispute him on this. According to Wikipedia, there is an island in the Chicago river, but I don't know if it's a prominent enough island that I can make fun of Ben for not knowing about it. Be that as it may, the women file glumly into the dorms and Lacey gets into bed and starts sobbing that she wants to go home. Ji tries talking to her in the vain hope of getting her to stand up and stop being a drag on the team. Suddenly Robert gets a call from Chef Ramsay to meet him in the office that I always wonder about. It's a room above the dining room with a desk in it, but I don't think he really uses it.
Chef Ramsay calls Robert "big boy", which I think is usually a term of affection with him. But he has bad news for Robert: the helicopters' insurance policy won't allow anyone over 300 pounds, and Robert is 400. Robert is understandably disappointed, and Chef Ramsay emphasizes that he'll still go to the island with the rest of the team; he'll just have to use the ferry. Well, that's not so bad. I like Robert so far, and I'm wondering how Chef Ramsay (who says in his book that the one thing he really can't stand is a fat chef) will treat him. So far: not that bad.
The women put on their chef clothes and prepare to head downstairs to get a-shuckin'. Except for Lacey, who is under the covers blowing her nose. Someone (I can't quite tell who, because there are still a lot of people on this show) orders Lacey to come down with them and help, but Lacey "doesn't feel good". Oh, [bleep] you, lady.
Sous chef Gloria tells them to save the shells and asks what happened to Lacey. The answer, which is harsh but probably accurate, is "We're a stronger team without her, chef." Carol interviews her disappointment with Lacey the Quitter. The men helicopter over while Robert takes the ferry with a somewhat sour look on his face. The men go into a submarine or something. Three hours into the shucking punishment, Lacey is still in bed (and still blowing her nose, unless they used the same shot three times). The women are squeezing lemons and Andrea manages to make lemonade by suggesting that at least Lacey will be well-rested. Did you see what I did there? With the lemons and the lemonade line? That was awesome. Seriously. You wouldn't believe how proud I am of that bit. If this were a reality show, I'd be interviewing about how great I am right now. I might even refer to myself in the third person. Just this once.
In the submarine-thing, Seth is showing off by how much research he's done on Gordon Ramsay. We learn that tomorrow is Gordon's birthday (which means this was shot on November 7) and that Seth knows where Gordon was born and the name of his last book. Gordon seems shocked that Seth knows his children's names, so I guess he doesn't know how often BBC America is running The F Word. Actually, the Internet says this was shot back in 2007, which might have been before BBC America fell in love with Gordon Ramsay. Everyone else finds the depths of Seth's knowledge a little creepy. Back at the restaurant, Lacey is ready to work, only six hours in. She slinks in, muttering "Sorry I'm late". You might think this begs for mockery, and the rest of the women's team agrees with you. LA gleefully asks her how her nap was. Robert gets off the ferry and is greeted by everyone. Gordon tells him that everyone else had a great time and now he has to turn around and take the ferry back home. Robert interviews, "Well, what the hell did I win? A free [bleep] ferry ride? [Bleep]." [Bleep] indeed. Gordon seems kind of gleeful about the whole thing, so I think he likes Robert.
The day, Lacey announces that she's ready to work. She's at least moving around and making noise, which is what a good kitchen looks and sounds like. Suddenly! Ji slides on the floor and clutches her leg. The medic puts her ankle on ice, and we go to commercial on a spreading pool of oil that forms the pitchfork. See, because she might have slipped on oil. I guess.
I like this '70s-style ad for Terminator and Dollhouse. Sleazy! And suspiciously similar to the fake trailers in Grindhouse!
Ji limps into the kitchen and Chef Ramsay rounds everyone up for a pep talk. For the very first time ("ever!"), there's a Raw Bar, which means everyone gets a raw oyster as they walk in the door. Huh. Enjoy! Chef Ramsay hopes this will buy extra time for the chefs, which isn't a bad idea. Paula is assigned the raw bar for the women, and Robert for the men. Paula did poorly on the Scallop Challenge (one out of five), so I guess that's not what Ramsay's basing this on. I think he just likes taking people out of the mix to see what the rest of the team does without them. Robert is not looking forward to squeezing through the tables.
Customers arrive and order scallop and lamb and so on. The women give a rousing "Yes, Chef!" to their first order. Jean-Philippe checks to see that Robert and Paula have everything at the raw bar, and points out that Robert is sweating. Robert notes that he's 400 pounds. Back at the women's side, Carol has burnt the garlic so her risotto is slow. When it shows up, Ramsay asks "What is that?" roughly five thousand times, because most of the risotto is stuck to the pan. Carol starts over. Andrea interviews that she's going to have to take control no matter who she works with. On the men's side, Chef Ramsay deems Charlie's risotto undercooked. Also, he says, "No cream in there, no mascarpone, no seasoning, more ham in there." Charlie's excuse is that he has never cooked a risotto before, and Gordon doesn't believe it, but he's not as theatrically disbelieving as I am. Ben is assigned to show Charlie how to do it.
Robert brings raw shellfish around to the tables and shows people his koi tattoo (which is on his forearm, luckily for all of us). People seem to like him. Now, back to the kitchens. Colleen's scallops are sitting in the pans even though they are cooked. This apparently makes her a "stupid cow". Because Lacey made the scallops last episode, she's brought over to show Colleen how to do it. Also, Gordon has not forgotten that Colleen is a cooking instructor with no training of her own. Gordon checks on Ji's ankle, but only as an excuse to claim that he has a headache. Well, a [bleep]ing headache, technically. I guess that's worse than a regular one.
Ben has a replacement risotto. Scott and Chef Ramsay taste it and it's termed "delicious". Lacey's scallops are also good enough, which means Chef Ramsay can again harangue Colleen about getting cooking lessons without paying for them.
It's 7:23, an hour and a half into dinner service. Seth and Charlie have a lobster spaghetti with no lobster in it. This goes over about as well as you'd think, and Charlie is reduced to saying "We're stupid" as an excuse. Gordon demands that Seth tell him the name of the dish (which is "Spaghetti Lobster" according to Gordon), but all Seth can do is fumfer. On the red side, there is a burnt salmon that's raw in the middle and no John Dory. That's apparently Colleen's fault, and Chef Ramsay smells blood. He gets right in her face and demands that she admit that she doesn't really have a cooking school. Colleen responds, "I have a business just like you do." Gordon shouts, "You're robbing people! You're a thief! I'm concerned for the poor bastards that you've taken money off of!" As he shouts at her (and she visibly bites her tongue), she burns some salmon and she gets thrown out of the kitchen and over to the raw bar. Lacey's now on fish.
Colleen interviews that she will not be broken by Chef Ramsay. She might get eliminated, but not broken. Well, okay. I guess. Moving on! Danny's got some nicely cooked lamb, and we hear Chef Ramsay and Sous Chef Scott apparently discussing how good Danny's meat is. Um. Not like that. The point is that Danny's got blue team entrees going. On the red side, Ji is barely maintaining. That is, she's doing okay but would prefer not to be reminded about her ankle. She's putting it out of her head. On the blue team, Giovanni is dared to eat his own raw salmon, which he declines to do. Giovanni interviews that he doesn't like being yelled at from two inches away. Well, would you?
The voiceover claims that the chefs are of high quality as the teams are just a few tables from being done. The men have four tables to go and the women have five. Whichever team finishes first will win! Faster faster faster! Shouting! Plates! Ding!! Ding! Final ticket! Exciting music! Loud noises! Commercials! Carol needs three minutes! Ben has a hot plate! The men win! Ben shouts at everyone to clean up. Ji limps into the back to elevate her foot and get it on ice. The team tells her she'll be fine and that she won't be going home. She certainly didn't seem like a problem.
Gordon rounds up the teams. He praises Ji for not giving up, unlike some people. Then he harasses Colleen with the lie about what "Those who can't do" do. (They recap. Wait, no, that's not right, is it? Where's my Bartlett's Familiar Quotations?) Colleen explains that she can too cook; it's just that he made her nervous. LA can't believe Colleen is still talking. Chef Ramsay sends everybody back to the dorms. The women are to pick two people. The men are to piss off.
The women want to nominate Lacey even though they acknowledge that she did a good job with the fish. Carol in particular is still incensed by Lacey spending all day crying in bed while the rest of the team worked. Lacey thinks this is not fair. Andrea thinks Carol isn't that great either. I think as long as they nominate Colleen it doesn't matter what else happens. As they go down to the kitchen for elimination, Ji is in a wheelchair and flinches pretty hard when it hits a bump. I think she might have a bigger problem than a sprained ankle. The flinch kind of turns into a shudder, too. Ouch.
The nominees are Colleen and Lacey. Ji looks awful. Lacey, why should you stay? "I woke up and I do have confidence in myself." Colleen? "I want prove to myself and to you that I'm worthy." Lacey points out that she may not be great, but she had to take over fish from Colleen. After a lot of stalling, Chef Ramsay is prepared to announce his decision. But Ji raises her hand to volunteer to leave. She feels she's only at half power, although Andrea thinks half a Ji is better than a whole Lacey or Colleen. Ji's near tears as Chef Ramsay agrees that she should go. But! She gets to keep her chef jacket, which is a really nice touch. And she gets a standing ovation from both teams. I mean, the red team was already standing, but the blue team stands up for her.
Ji is sad. Chef Ramsay praises her courage and commitment. Lacey resolves to keep her mouth shut. Ben thinks that the red team losing Ji is good for the blue team.
week: Sides of beef! Something called a "bitch switch"! Vomiting! Crying! Grilling! Wasted meat! Gordon yelling at Colleen! Something about "Today, I was supposed to be married!"
Montykins is having trouble thinking of Gordon as "Chef Ramsay" after seeing him sad about killing his piggies. Monty also has a blog devoted to Movie Novelizations, cleverly entitled Monty on Movie Novelizations. You can email him at montykins@gmail.com if that's your idea of a good time.