Gordon Ramsay's Bleep-O-Fucking-Meter: 9
Contestants' Bleep-O-Fucking-Meter: 27
Sous chef Scott's Bleep-O-Fucking-Meter: 8
Previously: We were down to four chefs, who had to recreate Gordon Ramsay's fish stew. Danny and Paula were pretty much tied, but Danny won. The service went okay, but Ben and Andrea both made mistakes. Ben and Danny wanted Andrea to leave, but Paula and Andrea leaned toward Ben. Ben finally got sent home. There was a supposed treat for the top three (Danny, Andrea, Paula), but the show ended before we got to see it.
It's the scene in every reality show where the contestants are really, really excited to see their family members, who they haven't seen for like a month. This always happens, so I'm not questioning anyone's sincerity, but... it's been a month. I've been on vacation for a month before, and I wasn't in tears when I saw my family again.
The chefs interview about how excited they are and how they want to win for their families and all that, but before you know it, it's time to kiss the families and send them on their way. Gordon says, "What a lovely surprise!" which I don't think you're supposed to say when you're the one giving the surprise.
The families leave and the chefs go up to the dorms cheering and hugging.
Full moon. season, I'm going to count them. That'll be exciting for everyone!
The morning, the chefs return to the dining room. Chef Ramsay lays out the challenge: they'll be serving lunch to 100 customers, who are special in some way. Each of them has 90 minutes to cook 100 portions of whatever they like. As they rush around, he tells them to just do small tasting portions. Danny interviews that he intends to put seafood and fruit together, because that is his signature flavor. Man, I wish I had a signature flavor. I wouldn't have to sign anything anymore; I'd just tell people to taste my checks. "Strawberry Kool-Aid. That's Montykins, all right!"
Paula interviews that Danny is her strongest competition because he keeps cool, unlike Andrea. As if edited together by a team of professionals who are trying to convey a story in the way they select and present footage, the television now shows Andrea cursing up a storm while looking for something in the kitchen. Danny also thinks Andrea will crumble. With ten minutes to go, Chef Ramsay is harassing Andrea, telling her she's running behind and needs to finish on time. Andrea starts talking to herself, telling herself to push things out and put things in jalapeño butter. Everybody finishes on time, and the customers come in. They're chefs from across Los Angeles, which means they ought to know a thing or two about good food. There are Zagat and Michelin-rated chefs here. They introduce themselves for awhile as Chef Ramsay points out which ones have gotten James Beard awards and Michelin stars. He's obsessed with Michelin stars, you know. Danny asserts that this lunch will be gnarly. Well, okay.
Since all the cooking is done already, the serving is pretty straightforward. The contestants bring their food out and say a few words about what they are. Andrea has a chicken dish, Paula has a poached sturgeon, and Danny has a blackened halibut with a peach salsa. We see the chefs eat. The customer-chefs, I mean. Confusing! They mark off their favorites and least favorites, and 76% mark Danny's dish as "least favorite". Gordon claims that means everyone hated his dish, which I think overstates it a bit. The most popular dish is Paula's. She gets a round of applause and seems quite pleased with herself. As well she might be!
Paula's reward is another of those spa days, with a haircut, manicure, and color. Gordon points out she's from Brazil, so he cheerfully throws a waxing into the reward. Well, great. She'll also get a surprise of some sort. The punishment for the other two is to clean and reset the dining room for the night's service. And also do a bunch of laundry. Chef Ramsay thanks the customer-chefs and sends them off.
In the dorms, Andrea tells Paula she's going to get a magazine spread. She seems quite happy for her friend. Danny, meanwhile, is a big mopey-pants about losing. He's got dead eyes.
Paula goes off to a beauty salon with Jean-Philippe. He's being sent along as a beauty helper, I guess. Paula seems surprised that he's not married. I'm staying out of this. Beauty montage!
Back in the dining room, Danny and Andrea are ironing the tablecloths while Danny complains a lot. Paula shows back up and she looks about the same to me. She goes off to the dorms and interviews that she is in a pretty good mood and can't wait to see what the half of her reward is.
Crescent moon. Crescent. I mean, honestly.
The morning, Paula goes out to the parking lot and joins Gordon Ramsay in a limo. He tells her that they're going to Good Morning, LA to cook live on television. Back at Hell's Kitchen, JP is making Danny and Paula use a steam cleaner on stuff. Specifically, the stuff in the hallway we hardly ever see that's lined by televisions so that they can be coincidentally cleaning the TV screens when Gordon and Andrea appear on them.
Andrea jumps up and down with glee and, in an interview, calls Paula a bitch. But she means it in a nice way. We see the morning show footage, but it's already pretty meaningless, and it's edited into incomprehensibility. I can report that there was some food-chopping and some talking about the future.
Gordon and Paula leave the TV studio and come back to the, um, TV studio that looks like a restaurant. Danny and Andrea keep cooking.
We jump forward to the chefs finishing off prep for the night's service. Everyone claims to be ready to cook well. Chef Ramsay tells them that two of them will advance and one of them will go home. He also informs them that he'll be putting each of them in charge of the pass. Not at the same time. That would be confusing. He instructs them to "make it yours", which means "shout a lot," I think. And here come the customers!
The voiceover narration tells us that "Tonight, every table is booked in Hell's Kitchen." Yeah, well, every table is always booked in Hell's Kitchen. Say, before we get into the dinner service, I have a personal anecdote I should like to relate. This last week, I got fed up with always seeing Beef Wellingtons being made (and burnt) and not having had any myself. So I found the official Gordon Ramsay beef Wellington Recipe (from the F-Word, I think) and made some myself. And it was, in fact, delicious. Mine looked a little lumpy and misshapen because my cut of meat wasn't trimmed as nicely as it was supposed to be, but I made the dish out of fresh, local ingredients and it was yummy. Also, almost all of the work is done during the prep. All the chefs have to do is to pop the Wellington into the oven when they want to start cooking it. So they should stop screwing it up, is what I'm saying.
Okay! Enough stalling! Let's get it on! Sous chefs Scott and Gloria are helping out in the kitchen because there are so few contestants left. Paula's Risotto and Andrea's ... something ... are good. Paula gets slotted into the pass. She's pretty nervous with her first ticket and says "Away" instead of "On order" and keeps stopping to say "Stand by". And this is the part of the show where Scott and Gloria purposely screw something up so Chef Ramsay can see how careful the contestants are. It's a little bit formulaic at this point. Anyway, Gloria is doing a squash puree instead of carrot. Paula doesn't notice, even though Chef Ramsay makes sure she tastes it. Paula shakes it off and starts shouting things in a proper manner. Scott brings something up, but this time Paula's on her guard: "Scott, I don't know what that is, but it's not the watercress soup. Can you redo that, please?" Gordon tells her it was really spinach soup, which looks the same.
Paula gets her orders up and out. Now it's Danny's turn and Chef Ramsay has some advice for him: "Look at me. You taste everything, run your [bleep] kitchen, you don't let the kitchen run you. They're not your mates. Is that clear?" Danny tells us that he runs the pass at home every night and that this is second nature. He'll have no problem! So here's Danny on his first ticket: "Um. Um, uh... um." Hey! Don't start a ticket with the word "Um". Banned! Anyway, he continues: "All right, listen up. Table 53, five covers. You have one scallop, one risotto, one soup, and one spaghetti." Everyone says "Yes, chef!" except for Chef Ramsay, who yells "Stop!" My guess is that he's going to object to there being only four things on this ticket.
Yep. JP has sabotaged the ticket by leaving off an appetizer and not including a time. Moving forward, we see Danny's voice crack as he calls out an order and Gordon catching Danny as he starts to put spaghetti in a bowl instead of on a plate. As Danny catches Andrea's well-done scallops, Gloria is sabotaging some potatoes and Danny doesn't notice that they're raw. Danny tells us that he just needs to calm down and get in the game. And just as with Paula, we see him being in charge and keeping track of things once he recovers.
Andrea's turn. She should be pretty good at the pass. She's bossy and she has a piercing voice. I mean, a lot of the time that's not great, but this is where those character traits start to pay off. The kitchen moves quickly until Scott brings her halibut instead of John Dory. She is cheerfully angry at herself in an interview. Can you be cheerfully angry? Well, she is. She does act like someone who's in charge, not being afraid to tell Gloria that there's too much salt on something and to refire it right away. Gordon looks nonplussed and a little impressed. When Andrea tells Scott he needs to season something, we actually see him mutter "Oh, come on!" and "You don't know what the [bleep] you're talkin' about." If anything, she might be being oversensitive here, but I'm not sure Gordon Ramsay acknowledges that as a possibility.
Andrea interviews that working the pass was the least nervous she's been. She tells Scott to redo some eggs because "these look like Hell". He asks if she's sure, and she affirms that she is. Scott mutters "Go [bleep] yourself, you stupid [bleep]." Gloria laughs at him. She continues to lean on him about various dishes with possibly imaginary problems and Paula is also openly snickering. Andrea interviews, "He just kept giving me excuses! Now I know why Chef Ramsay is such a [bleep] lunatic." Danny also smirks. Scott: "I'm telling you right now, I'm gonna [bleep] punch her in the face!" This is awesome.
After Andrea catches some unseasoned fish (from Scott, who is now muttering "[Bleep] you" every time Andrea says anything), she is sent back to the fish station. The service is getting toward the end and Chef Ramsay tells everyone it was their best service yet. Yeah, because Scott and Gloria did a lot of the cooking. And the service is over!
The chefs line up in the dining room and Chef Ramsay asks if they notice anything different. This appears to be a rhetorical question, because when they start guessing that his hair is different or that he has a new spot on his chef's jacket, he seems a little irritated. Finally, Andrea puts her finger on it: he's smiling! The service went well, for the first time this season. But someone's still going home. The chefs are sent back to the dorms with the instruction that each of them will come back and say who should go home.
In the dorms, they all seem tired and generally pleased with the evening. Finally, Andrea broaches the subject of who should go home, and suggests that Danny should go home for not being great at the pass. Danny defends his cooking ability and tells Andrea that she was just nitpicking when she worked the pass. Andrea claims that it's just that she has very high standards. So Andrea thinks Danny should go home and Danny thinks Andrea should go home. Paula says, "Well, I guess that leaves it down to me." No it doesn't. It comes down to Gordon Ramsay's whim. He might send Scott home. You don't know! He's just that crazy!
Down in the dining room, Andrea says that her decision is Danny for not being loud enough. Danny says Andrea because of her performance throughout the competition. Paula? Paula picks Andrea, who has struggled and was also overconfident at the pass. Gordon: "My decision is... Paula. You belong." That was pointless. Andrea, why should you stay? "Never once did I falter at the pass." Danny? "You know that I have what it takes to run the restaurant at the Borgata." After a pause, Andrea is sent home, although Chef Ramsay praises her as a determined fighter.
So it's down to Paula and Danny, which I think pretty much everyone would agree with, right? They've been the obvious top two for weeks. They appear to be surprised by something offscreen, which I expect is giant banners of their facs unfurling.
week: the chefs make their own restaurants, Danny wants fish mounted on walls, there are some domes that I bet have heads under them, and a bunch of contestants all come back.
In addition to his blog Monty on Movie Novelizations (latest review: the novelization of the two-hour movie that launched the original series in 1978!), Monty contributes to The Incomparable. You can email him at montykins@gmail.com if that's your idea of a good time.
Discuss this episode in the Hell's Kitchen forums, and see why Gordon Ramsay joins the ranks of the worst human beings on reality television.