Hell’s Kitchen Recap: No Dinner Tonight


Gordon finds Clemenza’s steak to be slightly undercooked, and I brace myself for a RAWR that never comes. Does he save that particular show of melodrama for dinner service? I was hoping he’d make everyone else come up and touch the meat, as per usual, but no luck. Instead, he praises the flavor, and says Clemenza made it work. Then he moves on to Robyn’s coffee-encrusted ribeye, which sounds sort of blegh. I like coffee and I like ribeye, but I’m not sure I’d like them combined. Gordon hates it, says the rub is wet and soggy and the meat is overcooked. Kimmie gets the smugs in the background, Clemenza gets the point, and the Blue team wins. Robyn thinks Kimmie should get over it because the team made the decision to send her crappy attempt to the front. Man, you know if the roles were reversed she’d be howling all over the kitchen about how no one listens to her and they deserved to lose. Shut up, Robyn.

And since Gordon wants to know what he was missing, he tastes Kimmie’s and loves it. Of course Robyn thinks this is a conspiracy against her, because Kimmie’s plate looked like a pile of shit. Then Gordon makes everyone taste said pile of shit, all while telling them they made the wrong choice. Kimmie’s smug gets even smugger. If I remember correctly, I think the same thing happened to perpetual outcast Carrie last season—her dish got tossed, and it ended up being one of Gordon’s favorites. Wow, it’s so unlike this show to repeat stuff like that.

The men get sent on another shopping spree/lunch expedition, and the ladies are tasked with dismantling an entire cow carcass for the dinner service. I think that happened last season, also. Can we have some fresh ideas, please? I know it’s ten seasons in, but damn.

The cow arrives, and Kimmie endears herself to me by making a fat joke at her own expense. It was also at Clemenza’s expense, but he makes more fat jokes than anyone, so he’d probably be cool with it. Dana thinks that the boys should be the ones punished with the carcass, because they’re stronger. Shut up, Dana.

The Blue team gets to shop at Sur la Table, which is an awesome place I can’t afford. They start loading up on kitchen supplies, and Clemenza isn’t shy about piling every damn thing he wants right on the counter. Good for him, I say—he’s probably not going to win, so he might as well exploit that Ramsay money while he can.

In the Red kitchen, the team is sawing on the cow and griping about how they should have felt the steaks for doneness earlier. It sounds like they weren’t allowed to taste them, just send one up on a whim, which doesn’t make a lot of sense. Then Christina says Kimmie should have sold hers a little harder, and Kimmie says that Robyn was talking over her, so she just got railroaded. Robyn feels like she’s getting talked about behind her back, which makes no sense because she’s standing right there the entire time. Robyn isn’t the smartest, is she?

At lunch, Patrick feels too mature, like he has to be everyone’s dad, because Royce and Brian are burping at the table. That’s not immaturity, that’s just disgusting.

At least he’s not crying. Yet.

Because Robyn is pissed, she’s now determined to take every little incident and word as a personal affront. She’s tearing around the kitchen, muttering about respecting people’s knives, and it’s a little like watching Tom Waits as Renfield, circling his cell and babbling about flies and spiders. Robyn informs the room as a whole that everyone is giving her dirty looks and being bitchy, and she’s not going to speak to anyone unless she feels like it. Well, that sounds fine to me, but of course it’s not true—she can’t stop talking to herself, and she starts baiting Kimmie, and this progresses naturally to Kimmie getting pissed. Christina has to chill everyone out and tell them to quit their bullshit and get back to work. Who else loves how Barbie never says a damn word during any of these altercations, even when she’s involved? It’s great. Her teammates tried as hard as they could right from the start of the season to push her buttons and alienate her, but that girl just rose above it all and watched as they fucked up and got sent home.

That’s a fighter, folks.

BlueCanary is as unorthodox a blend of optimistic and bitter, laid-back and anxious, motivated and straight up lazy tas one is likely to meet outside an unspecified institution. She spent the past decade holding a variety of job titles, including reporter, tech writer, production manager, and administrative assistant (the go-to job in this economy for folks who just HAD to get that English degree). She is currently living under the tiny yet powerful thumb of an awesome, pint-sized little dude, who wets himself and can't form full sentences (read: stay at home mom). Another tyrannical little thumb is gestating in her womb. She is a regular on The Neutral Corner podcast and blogs at www.mamamuzzle.com. 

Blue's as-yet-unpublished YA novel, The Nature of Echoes, is currently a Quarterfinalist in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest. If you'd like to check it out, a free excerpt is available to download at http://www.amazon.com/Nature-Echoes-ABNA-Entry-ebook/dp/B00B9N3XFQ/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1363378599&sr=1-1&keywords=eva+gibson+abna.

17 Comments

  1. 1
    WaffleBoy
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 11:43 am

    If you like crispy bacon, deep frying it is the best way to do it. The bacon cooks quickly and evenly, and it’s damn near impossible to burn. That being said, deep frying bacon is a great way for a breakfast cook to get fired in a restaurant, because cooking bacon in a deep fryer will break down the oil in nothing flat, and even 10 years ago when I was working in kitchens that oil was like 22 bucks and some change ( do not ever F with a chef’s food costs)

    “It’s also Family Night, so kids will be allowed through the doors to eat $25 plates of artfully arranged chicken nuggets and listen to Gordon Ramsay scream “fuck” all evening” That was the line of the post, awesome! oh and thanks!

  2. 2
    featherhead
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 12:04 pm

    I was cracking up at the fact that the girls in the other bedroom had a fit that Robyn HAD THE NERVE to sleep in “their” room!! What, does she smell? She looks like she does.. They told her next time sleep on the couch, the looks on their faces when they realized she was in their room were priceless!! These people are nuts!

  3. 3
    MummyButterfly
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 12:42 pm

    1) I adore Barbie. More and more. Plus, her “Hobbit” reference when she freaked out and saw Robyn was priceless.

    2) As for the Robyn vs. Kimmie steak choice – I was under the impression they had to do it by sight (and tasting sauces) alone. Robyn’s dish DID look more put together, so if Kimmie really felt like her’s would taste better, she did need to “sell it”. And Gordon’s complaint seemed to be about the steak, not the sauce. Entirely possible that Robyn had a better tasting sauce, prettier plate – and was the logical choice. The rest of the team seemed to take the lost point in stride. The drama was between Kimmie and Robyn.

    3) Oh, back to Barbie and her disdain for Tiffany as she corrected her mistakes. I think she and Christina may be my favorites for their ability to just rise above. I think in a “real” kitchen, I would rather have Barbie, Christina or Patrick as my boss, than ANY other person on either team.

    4) What is up with Justin? Does he exist really, or are they only paying him part-time to show up?

    5) Brian… I wish he could get himself together, he had such pretty-people potential.

    And finally…Kimmie’s burn? I wish we had a better view of what actually happened (not hidden by a stack of pans), but it was obviously scary. The Blue Team was in that Kitchen in nothing flat, so they had to have all realized it was REAL drama, not made up TV-crap. The made up TV-crap comes tonight… YAY!

  4. 4
    annie Annie
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 1:11 pm

    Yeah, I re-wound the DVR over and over, and I could not see how she got burned. Looked painful from the aftermath though. Ouch!

  5. 5
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 1:46 pm

    I have no dog in this hunt, except maybe Christina because she’s relatively drama free and Barbie because she just could not care less, but I will say that Clemenza had some mookishly charming moments. First when he kissed Brian’s head in solidarity, then when he joked about A New Car! being behind the curtain and finally the impish way he added one candy to his Sur la Table bill, making sure he used as much of his money as possible.

    Meanwhile, Patrick just completely creeps me out. Royce, Brian and Clemenza all have their moments, and Royce is just one big, constant moment of gross Shut the Fuck Up, but there’s something so unctuous and disconcerting about Patrick. Praying, on his knees, to his kids so that daddy can win was just the cherry on his creeper sundae. You know, Bryan Voltaggio loved his little boy and got homesick and wanted to win TC, too, but he just channeled that frustration into calling his brother a dick.

    With regard to the great ribeye debate, Robyn’s steak looked dry and overcooked to me before Gordon cut into it. The sauce may have tasted good but the steak looked like shit. And when Gordon cut it you could see it was gray. I know they couldn’t taste the steaks to tell how much Robyn screwed up, but it looked like crap, too.

    As for Robyn “disrupting the energy of the room,” since Barbie woke up when she came into the room, I doubt Robyn sneaked in quietly so as not to wake the others. So if she made a show of switching rooms, or was loud about it, I can see their point. Of course, presenting everyone in the worst possible light is HK’s bread and butter, so who knows, but I doubt they just randomly chose to pick on Robyn, because when has Robyn ever let anyone shit talk her, even with provocation? And yet she left the room to whine to Tiffany.

  6. 6
    Mimo
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 2:12 pm

    Wasn’t there some drama in one of the first episodes about Robyn not letting Barbie in their room? I don’t sit glued to the show, but that rings a bell. Ring a bell for anyone else or am I tolling all by myself?

  7. 7
    MummyButterfly
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 2:20 pm

    @Mimo – I want to say you’re right, or it was something like when they all started changing bedrooms and no-one wanted Barbie in “their” bedroom. No clue how it works (no Big Brother-esque live feeds), but I wonder if the producers assign them a space to begin with, then they can all move as people go home. Or if it just wasn’t working what the girls choose in the beginning.

    I want to say it was the same episode as Barbie waking everyone up early…

  8. 8
    PopePhilly PopePhilly
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 3:51 pm

    BlueCanary, between you and I, we need to make t-shirts that say “Shut Up, Royce!” and “Shut Up, Robyn!”

  9. 9
    BlueCanary
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 4:16 pm

    Yes, PopePhilly, we need to make that happen. There might be a fight over who gets to wear which one, but they’d both work.

    Also, am I hallucinating, or are we actually recapping from the same region?

  10. 10
    PopePhilly PopePhilly
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 4:26 pm

    I’ll take either one! I hate them both equally. I have a friend who works for AC Moore and gets a crazy discount. I could totally work something out. Hahaha.

    I’m in DC (well, Alexandria, VA to be exact). My heart remains in Philly, however. Where might you be?

  11. 11
    BlueCanary
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 4:33 pm

    Ha! I’m in Herndon. Royce needs to steer clear of NoVa!

  12. 12
    PopePhilly PopePhilly
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 4:38 pm

    That is awesome! We could totally have a finale party!

    I hope you guys didn’t get knocked out too bad with the storm last week. I never lost power, but my cable and internet was out. Luckily, it came back on today in time for recapping.

    I think if Royce ever reads what we say about him, he’d run far away from the DMV. I don’t want Robyn to find us. Bitch scares me.

  13. 13
    BlueCanary
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 5:18 pm

    We never lost power, just the Internet. We had lights, A/C, and cable–definitely one of the lukh households. Glad you made it through! I stayed inside the entire weekend soaking up the A/C because I was still recovering from running my dumb ass through 104 degree downtown DC Friday night to make my dinner reservations. Not the best plan, in retrospect.

  14. 14
    sagittariuskim sagittariuskim
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 6:30 pm

    I don’t eat whole beef so all the dishes during the challenge looked unappealing to me.

    I didn’t know Justin existed until he was mentioned in the recaps.

    Can we just ignore anything that comes out of Royce and Robin’s mouth?

  15. 15
    Leto
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 7:08 pm

    At the beginning i couldn’t stand Kimmie, but she’s growing on me. She seems to be very shy and emotionnal and compensate for it by sometimes acting like a bitch. I can relate to the frustration and anger tears, and it looks like to me like she was hanging with bitch Robyn and gross Tiffany just because they gave her attention.
    But I really like Barbie too and those two can’t stand each other so i’m torn.

    In the red kitchen, i like christina because she’s not a drama queen and doesn’t fuck up too much (even if she’s friends with dana who is the worst a girly girl can bring), Barbie because she couldn’t care less about the bitchiness, and Kimmie because I feel she could rock if she trusted herself.

    In the blue kitchen… well I only hate Royce who only have a big mouth and no skill to back it up. The others leave me pretty indifferent, they all have moments where they are loveable and moments where they are just plain horrible/creepy/stupid.

    Concerning Kimmie’s burns, I saw my brother once do exactly the same thing : he droped a pan full of burning oil and tried to catch it (stupid reflex). Oil burns are pretty severe (my brother had to have skin grafts on the inside of his wrists, where the skin is very thin) and i don’t think Kimmie will be able to cook, depending on where the burns are.

    Unless she pulls it like that guy who won with his wrist broken, don’t remeber his name, but burns like this are extremely painfull, my brother had to take morphine, and working the line while pumped full of opiates seems a little utopic to me. Hope for her that she’s not too badly burned, in spite of her size she seems very fragile.

  16. 16
    BlueCanary
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 8:06 pm

    Leto, I agree about Kimmie’s attitude being a cover for a more sensitive personality. I think she could do much better in the kitchen with a little more confidence.

  17. 17
    MummyButterfly
    Posted July 3, 2012 at 8:19 pm

    While I agree about much of Kimmie’s attitude being because she needs more confidence, I think that will eventually hurt her in this competition. The confidence is what makes the “Head Chef”… I feel bad for her, though. Robyn is awful!

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