Last night on Hell’s Kitchen, we picked up right where we left on Monday night. The chefs? were still standing in front of Chef Gordon Ramsey, wondering what else he was going to tell him. You may recall at the end of the last show, after eliminating Krupa, he told them he wasn’t done yet.
Calling on their lack of leadership, he wanted them to select the chef? from each team with the best leadership skills. The Blue Team wasted no time selecting Will as their nominee. The Red Team appeared to have nominated Jennifer. That is, until they got back to the dorm. Then Carrie nominated herself, and Elise nominated herself. These two girls are both crazy. They must have been a joy to be around in high school.
Standing in front of Ramsey, the Red Team finally selected Jennifer. When asked who the weakest leader was, Jennifer pointed out Carrie. When asked the same question by Ramsey about the Blue Team, Will pointed out Tommy.
To give them the opportunity to lead, and perhaps to prove Will and Jennifer wrong, Ramsey had Carrie and Tommy lead their teams in the first challenge. They had to select which American comfort food dishes they were going to prepare and lead their kitchens in preparing them in a challenge against the other team.
Helping Ramsey judge this particular challenge was none other than Wolfgang Puck. The Blue Team immediately has problems as Tommy can’t decide who is going to cook what and they have to decide for themselves.
First up, Jaime vs Tommy with burgers. Jaime got a “Not Bad” from the legendary Puck and it made her day. Tommy got the color of the tats on his arm compared to his burger and his burger paled in comparison.
Natalie got a very nice complement on her salad, which wasn’t a Cobb Salad, even though she called it that. That being said, Puck said he would call it something else and serve it in his restaurant.
Neither Will nor Elise did well on their spaghetti and meatballs. They were both a mess. It came down to the pizza at the end and it was Jonathon’s turn to present it for the Blue Team. He told Tommy to take it up. He outright refused to present it to Puck and Ramsey. Finally, Jonathon picked it up and brought it forward. But he shouldn’t have worried so much because Carrie’s pizza looked raw and was undercooked. However, the Blue Team’s pizza was disgusting. There was raw cheese, puddles of honey, and who knows what kind of nasty oil Wolfgang Puck was spooning out of there?? Honey on pizza?? Whose brainchild was that?? While the Red Team got the point, Jonathon bitched about being the scapegoat for his team yet again.
Somehow, the Red Team won the challenge 2-1. Quite honestly, neither team should have won this challenge. The whole thing was a mess on both sides from beginning to end. The Blue Team’s punishment was to clean the dorms and both kitchens for dinner service. Of course, as soon as they started, Jonathon had a pinched nerve in his back or neck and he couldn’t lift anything or walk right. And he kept disappearing. Meanwhile, the Red Team got to go to the Laugh Factory for the day, and they each won a set of cookware. They could have won a day at McDonaldland. It wouldn’t have mattered. They were just happy to have won some kind of challenge and not have to be cleaning anything for a change.
Jonathon finally showed up, ten minutes into prep and started helping, in his own stiff-neck, Franken-Chef manner.
They opened up dinner service and the fun began. In the Red kitchen, Carrie couldn’t roll out a pizza to save her life. While in the Blue kitchen, Jonathon had three portions of pasta in the pasta basket at one time trying to cook them all at once. But at least he was moving around a little more freely, stiff neck seemingly forgotten now that the cleaning was out of the way.
In the Blue Kitchen, Jonathon and Natalie had problems getting out orders of lobster cappelini for a table of Coast Guard and Ramsey was going nuts over it. He seemed to be taking the idea of treating them with honor and respect quite seriously, and tried to demand that their food be treated with a certain reverence. At one point he actually said, “They risk their lives for this country. The least we can do is give them an enjoyable night out!”
After watching Jonathon moving around like an extra from The Walking Dead, Ramsey took him aside and asked him what the problem was. Jonathon told him about the crick in his neck that had been bothering him all day. In yet another pep talk Gordon reminded him that there was someone in there two seasons ago that had a broken arm that won the competition. He told him that if he was giving up, to get out now. Jonathon told him that he would step it up a couple of notches.
The Red kitchen finally seemed to be working together in some strange, harmonious, symphonic, symbiotic group. It was almost shocking. Even Elise was part of the team for once.
The Blue kitchen, meanwhile, has been possessed with whatever demon had previously taken over the Red Team. At one point, Tommy had left an oven door open which Natalie nearly walked into causing Tommy to start laughing about it. It was as if the two teams had completely switched roles.
As the Red Team started getting their deserts out, the Blue Team fell further behind. After Tommy confused medium, medium-rare, and rare meats at the pass, and all of them being cold, Ramsey reminded him that he also embarrassed him in front of Wolfgang Puck and he was done with him.
In the Red kitchen, Crazy Elise told us all that she was so proud of her team, and the way they allowed her to lead them to victory. Um, they may have won, but who died and made her High Commander? Did I miss the Coronation? To make matters worse, after service Ramsey declared the Red Team the winners and said that he was most impressed with Elise. There will be no living with her now. He told the Blue Team that they were slipping and to go select two people for him to choose someone to send home.
They chose Jonathon, because he had a slow start. Slow start?? Really?? He was certainly the right selection but I think they could have come up with about ten better reasons. Their second selection was Natalie because they felt that appetizers was a big reason that they had a slow start. Jonathon told Ramsey that he wasn’t a quitter. He wasn’t at 100% but he wasn’t done. Natalie said she’s not a babysitter. She said that she was picking up after Jonathon.
He selected Natalie to take her jacket and…get back in line. I hate when he does that. He sent Jonathon home. It was the right choice in this case. Natalie has no business going home yet. She is on a downward spiral but she may be right. It very well may be because she is so busy picking up after the slackers. Let’s see what she does when she doesn’t have to carry Jonathon. But, she still has Tommy to worry about and he is every bit as much of dead weight as Jonathon was.
