S21.E01: Let the Battle Begin

[jewel21]

Quote

A team of well-seasoned 40-somethings battle up-and-coming 20-somethings; each chef must cook a signature dish, to be rated on a scale of 1 to 5; the team with the most amount of points wins the challenge.

Airdate: 09/29/2022

[Yeah No]

I'm glad to see this show back with a season filmed during the pandemic but I'm a little confused.  So now he's back in LA but it looks like a different location than the previous LA seasons.  Although I can't find anything online about that.  So far I'm not loving how certain parts of the set look.  And now instead of male vs. female it's 20 something vs. 40 somethings, although one of the chefs made a comment during this episode leading me to believe they'll go back to the male vs. female teams in future episodes.  So yeah, I'm just confused.

[KeithJ]

Anyone else already hate truffle guy?

it’s always odd watching Hell’s Kitchen after watching Masterchef.  On Masterchef everyone (for the most part) is so supportive of everyone else and everyone genuinely seems pretty nice.

On Hell’s Kitchen everyone seems to hate each other from the very start and it’s hard to root for anyone because they’re all usually asses.

[AZChristian]

1 hour ago, KeithJ said:

On Hell’s Kitchen everyone seems to hate each other from the very start and it’s hard to root for anyone because they’re all usually asses.

A couple of folks referred to "working in high-end kitchens which had won Michelin stars and James Beard awards."

My first thought was, "Well, the dishwasher DOES work in the kitchen."  And red-shoe lady with boxed pasta and canned tomatoes should have been eliminated just for those three reasons.

[Tango64]

3 hours ago, KeithJ said:

Anyone else already hate truffle guy?

it’s always odd watching Hell’s Kitchen after watching Masterchef.  On Masterchef everyone (for the most part) is so supportive of everyone else and everyone genuinely seems pretty nice.

On Hell’s Kitchen everyone seems to hate each other from the very start and it’s hard to root for anyone because they’re all usually asses.

Yeah, I'm sure that's entirely on purpose. They format Master Chef as much nicer, with competent and likable chefs and a mostly kind, supportive Ramsay. Hell's Kitchen is intentionally structured with mostly idiot, unlikable cooks and Ramsay plays up the exasperated angry role.

I guess otherwise they'd be two versions of the same show. It makes Hell's Kitchen seem fakey and contrived, but eh, I still sometimes watch.

[patty1h]

Orange soda guy and premade pasta woman... you gotta understand who you're cooking for.

[AZChristian]

28 minutes ago, patty1h said:

Orange soda guy and premade pasta woman... you gotta understand who you're cooking for.

Pasta woman also needs to look up the definition of "fresh."

[MyMaui]

I'm sorry I don't know the names of everyone but the pop up guy and the guy who lost his restaurant to covid are my favs so far.  I think they are both talented.  I hope they both go more head to head in challenges.  The canned and packaged lady who interned at the Playboy mansion?  I'm guessing you made fries for Kendra on several occasions as your intern ability..  On to the 20 something who didn't now how to cook risotta?  Please you should be gone soon.  You have to have other people help you too.  Nice to see the Truffle King not be a part of the deciding factor even though he thought he was all that.  I'm guessing he is gone half way thru.  Have to get rid of the  idiots first and then he will be next.  He is not all that.

[Sir RaiderDuck OMS]

11 hours ago, Yeah No said:

I'm glad to see this show back with a season filmed during the pandemic but I'm a little confused.  So now he's back in LA but it looks like a different location than the previous LA seasons.  Although I can't find anything online about that.  So far I'm not loving how certain parts of the set look.  And now instead of male vs. female it's 20 something vs. 40 somethings, although one of the chefs made a comment during this episode leading me to believe they'll go back to the male vs. female teams in future episodes.  So yeah, I'm just confused.

It's been four years since Hell's Kitchen was filmed in LA: remember that the Las Vegas seasons were both filmed in early 2019 and held back for over a year. The show might well be filmed in a different studio now.

11 hours ago, KeithJ said:

Anyone else already hate truffle guy?

it’s always odd watching Hell’s Kitchen after watching Masterchef.  On Masterchef everyone (for the most part) is so supportive of everyone else and everyone genuinely seems pretty nice.

On Hell’s Kitchen everyone seems to hate each other from the very start and it’s hard to root for anyone because they’re all usually asses.

I can attribute that to a couple of things:

1) The HK chefs all live together in a big TV studio. The Masterchef contestants don't. Living together with strangers means more opportunity to be irritated with them, get in each other's way, etc.

2) If I had to guess, the Masterchef contestants are probably told to be supportive towards each other, as befitting the tone of the show.

3) Ramsay can afford to be nicer on Masterchef because it doesn't matter who wins: the producers will cut the winner a check, and Ramsay never has to see them again if he doesn't want to. The Hell's Kitchen winner will be working either in a Ramsay restaurant or a restaurant Ramsay's been pumping up the whole season. If the HK winner flops, it reflects directly on Ramsay.

4 hours ago, patty1h said:

Orange soda guy and premade pasta woman... you gotta understand who you're cooking for.

Orange soda might be OK if you really know what you're doing with it and why. I remember Morimoto stir-frying natto with Coca-Cola in an old Iron Chef Japan episode (the old-school Japanese chefs watching from the gallery were suitably scandalized, I might add). But as soon as he'd left a small puddle of soda around the base of the food, I knew he was sunk.

There is ZERO excuse for using boxed pasta and canned tomatoes when you're in a televised job interview for a high-end restaurant run by a celebrity chef who famously abhors anything not freshly made.

Meanwhile:

*It was great seeing Christina Wilson and Jason "Blue Jay" Santos back as the sous chefs. Ditto with Marino as the maître d.

*A rare moment of HK compassion from Ramsay when one of the fortysomethings described his restaurant going broke because of COVID. Ramsay probably knows a LOT of people whose dream restaurants simply didn't have the money to make it through that time.

*Is it just me, or do the fortysomethings as a group look seriously rough? I'm 51 and my wife is 53, and some of those chefs looked a decade older than either of us.

ETA: And I agree that Truffle Guy is an arrogant jackass.

Edited September 30, 2022 by Sir RaiderDuck OMS

[Pepper the Cat]

I like the guy who lost his restaurant best. I think he will do well. Most of the 20 somethings annoy me. I really don’t like the red haired girl, Alyssa I think her name is.

Pasta lady needs to go.

[patty1h]

Truffle guy acted jackassy on the first episode, but I will give him a pass.  If he keeps being arrogant I may come to dislike him.   What got me SMH was he and Ramsey talking about charging/paying over $200 for a dinner portion piece of beef and maybe 2 cups of vegetables or rice or whatever his side dish was.  I know truffles are expensive but whaaa? 

Just to get an idea what high-end dining prices are like these days, I checked the menu for Jean-George, one of the fanciest restaurants here in NYC.  They have a 6 course menu with things like Wagyu beef, caviar, sea bass, king crab, foie gras et al, and they ask $298 for all that.   Truffle guy may need to check himself and not think any one of his dishes deserves such high prices.

[xcrayon2215x]

Vlad looks like he will be obnoxious. It looks like that this season will have more drama than the last one, it doesn't surprise me since the last season had less drama than an usual season of Hell's Kitchen does.

There seemed to be a lot of good signature dishes this season, Nicole's move with the canned tomato sauce was not a good one. I hope that they don't switch this to men vs women this time around. I don't think Nicole will last long. The fact that Nicole interned at Playboy suggests that she will likely not be strong.

[GHScorpiosRule]

18 hours ago, Sir RaiderDuck OMS said:

It was great seeing Christina Wilson and Jason "Blue Jay" Santos back as the sous chefs. Ditto with Marino as the maître d.

It was! But I miss Jean Phillipe!

I had to watch on Demand because I accidentally deleted when cleaning out my DVR queue. Fell asleep during the signature dish Gordon was awarding. I think after orange soda guy one.

So, who won? Anything else happen,

As for Nicole of the boxed pasta/canned, or as Gordon said “tinned tomahtoes” was she really thinking to lie? The way she paused before admitting they weren’t fresh? Or was it as a result of the editing monkeys?

I had to laugh at Cheyenne getting a 3, since she was bitching and complaining about everyone (females) else’s dishes. She’s in the 20s group with the short hair. 

How Zeus survived being bitten by JAWS, considering he said his head was in its MOUTH, and he went back to finishing his service, had me 😒😒😒😒 because it’s unbelievable. Arm? Leg? Yes. HEAD? 

[mertensia]

Those red shoes looked incredibly uncomfortable. I hope she goes soon.

[Yeah No]

On 9/30/2022 at 11:33 AM, Tango64 said:

Yeah, I'm sure that's entirely on purpose. They format Master Chef as much nicer, with competent and likable chefs and a mostly kind, supportive Ramsay. Hell's Kitchen is intentionally structured with mostly idiot, unlikable cooks and Ramsay plays up the exasperated angry role.

I guess otherwise they'd be two versions of the same show. It makes Hell's Kitchen seem fakey and contrived, but eh, I still sometimes watch.

On Master Chef they're supposed to be home cooks although the most recent season featured second timers, some of whom had become professional chefs in the interim.  But MC was not always so "kind" by comparison.  In its first few seasons it edited some people to look like jerks and villains, and Ramsay and especially Joe B. were tougher on the contestants.  It has gotten kinder and gentler as the years have progressed.  Hell's Kitchen is based on a format that was popular in the first decade of the millennium.  Contentious villains, nastiness, backstabbing, manufactured drama, the whole nine yards.  It has changed to fit what people want now, thankfully, which is less of that and kinder, more supportive Ramsay.  Even Top Chef has changed in a similar way over the years.

On 9/30/2022 at 6:55 PM, Sir RaiderDuck OMS said:

It's been four years since Hell's Kitchen was filmed in LA: remember that the Las Vegas seasons were both filmed in early 2019 and held back for over a year. The show might well be filmed in a different studio now.

It's definitely different.  I guess they decided to move it or had to because they gave up the lease or sold the original location when the show moved to LV.  My husband reminded me that the move to LV was always supposed to be temporary and was done because Ramsay was primarily based in LV for a time opening a new restaurant there.

On 9/30/2022 at 6:55 PM, Sir RaiderDuck OMS said:

*Is it just me, or do the fortysomethings as a group look seriously rough? I'm 51 and my wife is 53, and some of those chefs looked a decade older than either of us.

I'm 64 and my husband is 66 and we thought the same thing!  Although I've always thought a lot of the chefs on this show looked old for their age.

[Colorado David]

On 10/1/2022 at 10:48 PM, Yeah No said:

I'm 64 and my husband is 66 and we thought the same thing!  Although I've always thought a lot of the chefs on this show looked old for their age.

A lot of the chefs smoke, so I think that ages them faster. 

boxed pasta and tinned tomatoes, that is galling that she thinks thats acceptable. 

i have never seen orange soda in a meat dish, thats so far outta left field - like combining chocolate and shrimp. blech.

Jay and christina, hurrah!! i like both of them immensely.

vlad - you talk a big game sir, lets see if you have the skills to back it up.

Edited October 5, 2022 by Colorado David

[Such A Flirt]

On 9/30/2022 at 7:59 AM, KeithJ said:

Anyone else already hate truffle guy?

I do! I hope he will be gone soon, but those douchey types seem to be kept around for the drama.

Didn't care for the ageism, as usual. And making fun of the guy with the sleep apnea machine? Uh, he needs that to stay alive! Not cool.

[My Girls]

I have a hard time taking Blue Jay (Jason) seriously.  The season he was in and trying so hard to nail Holly kinda sticks with me lol.

[Domenicholas]

22 hours ago, Chloe Dog said:

I have a hard time taking Blue Jay (Jason) seriously.  The season he was in and trying so hard to nail Holly kinda sticks with me lol.

Every time I see him, all I can think of is “Where the Smurf? Smurf! SMUUUURRRFFF!”

[Such A Flirt]

I still call him Smurf.

[bluepiano]

On 9/30/2022 at 11:58 AM, patty1h said:

Orange soda guy and premade pasta woman... you gotta understand who you're cooking for.

Her saying that her boxed pasta was "fresh" reminded me a of an episode from Fawlty Towers, when Basil says that the frozen peas are fresh, because they were fresh before they were frozen.

So GR said the orange soda dish rated a 5, but then deducted two stars on principle? If it tasted good, what difference does it make what the ingredients were? And in fact, Coca Cola and Dr. Pepper are both commonly used in cooking in the south, so the orange soda didn't seem that weird to me.

I'm also rooting for Alex, the chef who lost his restaurant because of Covid. I have two friends who opened restaurants just before the lockdowns. One survived but is deep in debt, one didn't. It's heartbreaking to lose your dream because of something completely outside of your control. Besides that, he seems like a nice guy and one of the stronger chefs.

On 10/6/2022 at 5:36 PM, Chloe Dog said:

I have a hard time taking Blue Jay (Jason) seriously.  The season he was in and trying so hard to nail Holly kinda sticks with me lol.

I must not have watched that season. But I know him as one of Jon Taffer's "kitchen experts" on Bar Rescue, which is hardly a huge recommendation. On that show he comes across as kind of an arrogant jerk. (Vic Vegas, from Next Food Network Star, is another of Taffer's experts, and is much more likeable).

[oliviabenson]

Red shoe lady acts very immature. I’m shocked a 46 year old acting like 22. 
 

Orange soda guy oof see ya.