Season 1 Episode 4

The fourth episode of Season 1 of Hell’s Kitchen aired on Fox on June 20 2005. On that episode, there was the first challenge win for the blue team, the red team accomplished a first at dinner service and the contestants learned that Ramsay is always watching them.

Please watch the full episode before you read (below) to avoid spoilers about this episode.

Intro

following Wendy’s elimination, Jessica was already crying because she lost one of her friends. She was quickly comforted by Mary Ellen. But on the red team’s side, Jeff’s departure was a great relief because they thought he was more of a problem than a solution and they believed that not having him in the way anymore was what helped them to win their first service.

Ralph and Andrew spent time alone discussing the latter’s behavior and ego. Ralph told Andrew that he had to shut his mouth when entering the kitchen under Ramsay.

Team challenge

After the Sous Chefs woke up the contestants with air horns, they got down to their kitchens to begin prep. Ramsay invited them in the dining room for some time with Jean-Philippe, who explained them how to properly set a table. That was the introduction of the Perfect Table Challenge. Each team had 5 minutes to recreate Jean-Philippe’s table with the fewest mistakes possible.

After taking a look at the red table, Ramsay noticed four major mistakes. Some chairs were pushed out, the lids of the plates were to close to the border of the table, there were fingerprints everywhere and the napkins were not folded properly. When he came to the blue table, only one major mistake was noted, which was the lids of the glasses too close to the rims of the plate. Therefore the blue team won their first challenge.

Reward

As a reward, the blue team went back in the dorms for a day of relaxation, massages, and spa treatments, while drinking champagne and having candles everywhere.

Punishment

For losing their first challenge, the red team had to polish all the glassware and silverware for the next night’s dinner service. When Chris brought champagne to the blue team during their reward, he told his team what the reward was when he came back to the kitchen, making Elsie jealous. Jimmy was noticed by Jean-Philippe not being very careful as he dropped two glasses while cleaning them.

For the second part of their punishment, the red team had to arrange every table in the dining room before the doors of the restaurant would open. That made them lose valuable time of prep.

Before service

The night before service, Elsie discovered a huge billboard outside the dorms showing Ramsay’s face and the title of the show. She made everybody else take a look at it, all laughing when they saw it saying they could not believe it.

The next morning, Ramsay added frogs legs and pigeon to the menu. He showed the contestants how to prep those two items. Elsie was disgusted by the smell of the pigeon, but she went through it as her determination level was high.

The blue kitchen had a high level of confidence, while the red team was arranging the tables in the dining room. Ralph helped Andrew remember the garnishes by writing them on pieces of white tape. Ramsay announced the winning team of that service would be the one who would complete all its tickets first.

Dinner service

When the first tables arrived, Andrew acknowledged, after receiving tips from Ramsay and Ralph, that he had to shut his mouth if he wanted to succeed. Mary Ellen got the blue team off to a great start on the appetizer station with her tuna, leading the blue kitchen succeeding to get most of their appetizers out. In the red kitchen, Elsie started panicking after the first tickets entered, not being able to give a proper time for her spaghetti dish, and was comforted by Chris. When Jessica brought her first Wellingtons to the pass, they were cooked perfectly, and Ramsay told her to bring them all like that. However, Andrew could not deliver on the garnish station, not remembering what garnish was going with what dish, and bringing the wrong garnishes to the pass, which led Ramsay to lose his patience.

An hour and a half into service, the blue team completed all of their appetizers, despite Andrew’s troubles on the garnish station. In the red kitchen, Jimmy sent a cold garnish to the pass, and Ramsay asked him to start over. When he talked back to Ramsay, the latter threatened Jimmy by saying he would wash pans for the rest of his life if he would send another cold garnish. In the blue kitchen, Andrew failed to bring the right garnish again as he forgot the endives. When he was asked where were they by Ramsay, he did not answer, so Ramsay explained Jean-Philippe why the table was not ready yet, and the blue team had to start it again because of Andrew. Moments later, Jessica was praised with a good lobster spaghetti. In the red kitchen, Elsie was anxious but had a positive attitude, which led her to bring properly cooked Wellingtons to the pass.

With an hour left into service and five tickets to go for the blue team, three of Mary Ellen’s risottos came back because they were bland. So the blue kitchen came to a halt for waiting on her new risottos. In the red kitchen with six tickets to go, the team showed great teamwork by encouraging each other and congratulated Elsie for her good job on the meat station. Mary Ellen got a whole table back because she could not deliver a proper risotto, which showed that she was the main reason why her team could not keep up with the red team, which saw their tickets going down fast. Then, Jimmy was jokingly asked by Ramsay to stop dancing like a ballerina because of the blue team’s halt on risottos, the red team rallied to complete their side of the restaurant before the blue team. After that happened, Ramsay shut down the blue kitchen.

Post-mortem

Ramsay declared that this was the best service ever, as both teams made a comeback. However what shocked Ramsay more is that despite the red team had to go in the dining room to arrange all the tables before service, they managed to get all of their tickets done before the blue team. Therefore the red team was declared winners but Ramsay praised Jessica’s cooking and improvement, and named her “Best of the Worst”. She was asked to nominate two teammates for elimination.

Back in the dorms, Jessica knew that the feeling was bittersweet as, despite being happy for the praise Ramsay gave her, she had to decide which of her teammates would go home. As Jessica and Mary Ellen talked in the bedroom, Ralph feared that he might be going home even though Jimmy disagreed. Andrew was also worried as he had already been nominated before and there was little possibility of surviving another elimination. While Jessica thought of getting rid of Ralph for strategic reasons, she ultimately made her final decision.

Elimination

Jessica before calling her nominees, stated to Ramsay that her choice was hard because of the friendship that were developed between teammates. Then, she named Andrew as her first nominee and Mary Ellen as her second, hoping Andrew would be kicked off. Ramsay however had other plans and eliminated Mary Ellen for her inconsistency and the fact that she sunk her team’s chances of winning. Jessica took Mary Ellen’s elimination very hard emotionally as they were close friends. During her exit interview, Mary Ellen believed that Ramsay made the wrong decision in sending her home and that Andrew was the weak link in the blue team before predicting that the latter would be joining her very soon.

Ramsay’s comment: “Mary Ellen has left Hell’s Kitchen because of her inconsistency. What the rest of the team should understand, is that it is very crucial to get better and more consistent. That didn’t happen with Mary Ellen.”

My opinion

Intro

One of the blue chef was sad then Wendy was eliminated out of hell kitchen. The red team was happy that Jeff left yesterday.

Team challenge

For this challenge, the teams have to set up a table without make a mistake. The team who make the most mistakes are the losers.

Dinner service

Andrew was have trouble with the garnish for the blue team. For the red team Jimmy sent a cold garnish to the pass, and Ramsay asked him to start over. When he talked back to Ramsay, the latter threatened Jimmy by saying he would wash pans for the rest of his life if he would send another cold garnish. Mary-Ellen have her dishes sent back to her which make they have six tickets left to do but Gordon shut down the blue kitchen because the red team have finished all of their tickets.

Elimination

I agree with Jessica eliminations with Andrew and Mary-Ellen to go with Mary-Ellen to go.

My comment: The blue team would have won tonight if Mary-Ellen was not where, so I sent her packing.

Gordon pick Mary-Ellen to go.