Hell's Kitchen: 7.28.09

How can this group mess up this week? Will anyone prove to be a worthy chef? Will Van and J.P. come to blows? Can Joseph be a bigger ass? What will come of all the fire/evacuation foreshadowing? Let's see.

The confrontation from last week between Joseph and Ramsey ended in Ramsey booting Joseph and Joseph calling Ramsey a bitch. Repeatedly. Why the heck did he go on this show anyway? He was complaining after being kicked out about how he didn't need anyone to talk to him like Ramsey does. Has he never seen this show?

In the end, someone else is also leaving. Lovely and Tennille are up from the Red Team. Andy and Tony are up for the Blue Team. I think Tony is either an idiot or he gets really nervous under pressure. He can't form a coherent argument as to why he should stay, and he is gone. The men are down by 2, and Ramsey shuffled Robert over to them.

Discussion back in the apartment was all about how much of an idiot Joseph was. Tennille was reduced to text-speak. (OMG!!!! - she said each part of it)

After a little sleep, there is a fire (drill) at Hell's Kitchen and everyone is evacuated. Right there, Ramsey gives them their next challenge. It's all about preparation and team work - they will be serving a pasta meal to the fire fighters on site quickly. The first team to get their pasta served first wins. They have to cook chicken alfredo, meatball marinara, and a garlic bread appetizer.

Lovely is the first one to have issues at her station. Complaining about not having enough sleep and not having had a chance to brush her teeth yet, she was slow on the garlic bread. Andy wasn't doing that well on his side, either. 20 minutes into the challenge, and there is nothing out. Ariel jumped in and got some garlic bread out despite Lovely's worst attempts.

Over in the men's kitchen, the pasta is al dente, but the garlic bread is still not out. The women are rolling on the entrees, and their meatballs get good reviews. The garlic bread finally left the men's kitchen. Entrees followed in short order. And for the women? Ramsey was not happy that there was not enough chicken in the chicken alfredo. That problem was fixed in short order. It was down to the wire for the finish..... until undercooked meatballs were sent back to the women's kitchen, and it was Tek's fault. They fixed it, and it was again neck and neck. The women pulled it out in the end. Good for them. And yay, Firefighters are awesome!

As a reward, the women get to go to a spa for the day, and they will be going by helicopter. The men will be cleaning the firetrucks and the dining room. Dave managed to injure his wrist during the firetruck cleaning, but hid it from his team mates. And going up the stairs? Kevin rolled his ankles and had a medic come to look at it. While the medic was there, Dave had them look at his wrist, too. Both of them looked to be in really rough shape, and went off to the hospital for x-rays.

Dave had a torn FCR and a slight fracture of his wrist. He decided to keep on keeping on. Kevin had a severe sprain on one ankle and a ligament strain/stretch on the other. He's got a boot on one foot. He was also planning on staying.

Ramsey gave them a pep talk before the service. One member from each team will be waiters fir the night. Dave volunteered to wait for the Blue Team so as not to hold them back cooking. Ramsey made Lovely the waiter for the Red Team. He had them repeat after him - "We must complete a dinner service." Let's see if that works.


Ariel and Sabrina produced good appetizers, but Tennille couldn't finish them with good scallops.

Van is on appetizers for the men, and though his shouting in the kitchen didn't impress Ramsey, his risotto sure did. Tennille was using too much oil to saute her scallops, and Suzanne tried to stop her, pouring out the oil, but Tennille wasn't hearing it, until Ramsey told her she had it wrong.

Robert was clumsy in the Blue Kitchen, and Andy was crowding the scallop pan, and Robert got blamed for the sub-par scallops. Suzanne tried to help her, but Tennille put the same ol' rubber scallops back in the pan, which obviously didn't go over well with Ramsey... She couldn't handle more than one person talking to her at the same time. She has also obviously never seen the show before.

The men are busting out the appetizers, and Tennille nearly set the kitchen on fire in her insanity. She finally put out edible scallops, and the appetizers started moving out of the Red kitchen.

Out in the dining room? Lovely is taking her own sweet time getting orders into the kitchen, and then JP sent her to get a special bottle of wine, which caused her to be slower still...

Amanda can't count (and thinks that multiplication is addition and 3x3 is 6) and also has a hard time cooking lamb. Not good.

And Kevin, with his bad ankles? He's producing great meat at a good pace. Dinner service is going to be completed by someone - and it was down to the wire as far as which kitchen was going out first. In the end, the Red Team went out first, and the Blue Kitchen fell behind because Robert forgot a salmon. All in all, a MUCH better showing.

Ramsey has customer comment cards from the finished service. Red Kitchen's rating was 81% above average. Blue Kitchen's rating was 83% above average. Based on that, the Red Kitchen lost. Ariel is named the best of the worst, and has to put people up for elimination.

In the end, she put up Lovely because she is less experienced than the rest of the team. Her second nomination is Tennille because she was pan frying scallops and because she seems to be a weak link in the team. Ramsey told them that he didn't think either of them would win, but didn't end up eliminating anyone, because Joseph eliminated himself. He then did kind of a funny impression of Joseph, saying "I'm nobody's bitch." Before they left the room, he quizzed Amanda in some more math and she failed. Again. It's kind of funny.