The seventh episode of Season 1 of Hell's Kitchen aired on Fox on July 11, 2005, airing as a double feature alongside the sixth episode. There was a big celebration before the challenge as the game changed in a significant way in that episode, and meltdowns by two people at dinner service.
Intro[]
Following Andrew's elimination, Jessica was happy to see Ralph still around but knew he was still her competition. Ralph knew that Andrew deserved to go home after being nominated three times consecutively, and Jessica told him he deserved to be there. Afterwards, Ralph talked with Michael, feeling that helping his team was starting to bite him in the ass. At the same time, Michael would have preferred him being eliminated instead of Andrew because he was his biggest threat at this stage of the game. Later, Elsie declared to Jessica that she was homesick. She did not want to be there anymore, even wanting to go back home with her sons and hanging with her sisters.
Black jacket celebration[]
The next day, both teams came downstairs, and Ramsay announced that because there were five contestants left, it was becoming clear that one of them would win their own restaurant. Then, Ramsay said their lives in Hell's Kitchen were going to change as they had now merged into one team, the black jackets team, and would compete as individuals from now on. Ralph was the first to receive his black jacket, followed by Elsie, Michael, and Jessica. When Ramsay gave Jimmy his black jacket, he jokingly said that he would give it to him only if he would promise to keep the plates clean, without any more "Dirty Bowl Jimmy". Jimmy answered there would be no more, and Ramsay finished by congratulating everybody, telling them he was proud of them. Afterwards, the final five went back to dorms to change into their new black jackets and celebrated by congratulating each other. Elsie compared herself to a black belt and was proud of her survival in the competition. At the same time, Ralph knew it was down to one final winner after the last couple of tests.
Individual challenge[]
When the final five came back downstairs, Ramsay announced their first-ever individual challenge by explaining the Fruit Flambé Tableside Challenge. Each contestant had five minutes to recreate Ramsay's fruit flambé dessert, and he gave them a demonstration on how to make it. Although Elsie did not know what a flambé was, she watched the demonstration very intently. Also, Ramsay revealed that the winner would have an amazing trip with him, while the losers had to clean the front of the house for the afternoon.
As the challenge began, Elsie and Jessica forgot their carts, so they had to go back and get them before getting their ingredients. All the chefs frantically grabbed their ingredients, which Jessica took notice of, while Elsie was trying to remember the demonstration, and told Ramsay she never did a flambé before. Jessica burnt her sugar, while Jimmy wanted to prove to Ramsay he was not just known for his dirty plates. However, he was careless and ran into his liqueur bottle a couple of times, which made Ramsay laugh, and Michael dropped and splattered his mango due to rushing. Eventually, time was up, and everybody had their flambé dishes ready.
When Ramsay commented on Michael's plate, he praised the taste but compared the presentation to Jimmy's because it was dirty, much to his embarrassment. Ralph's plate was good, but he forgot to dust his fruits with icing sugar. Although Jessica said she flambéd twice before, Ramsay saw she had bananas with raw sugar. After, Ramsay praised Elsie for her presentation and color on the caramel. Finally, when Ramsay tasted Jimmy's dish, he asked him if he did that before, which the latter replied he did not, and took three bites instead of just one, saying it was very good. After deliberation over Elsie and Jimmy, Ramsay chose Jimmy as the winner of the challenge. Jimmy felt good as he showed Ramsay that he could do well in an individual challenge.
Reward[]
As promised, Jimmy was rewarded on a helicopter tour of Los Angeles, and Ramsay gave him the choice to pick somebody to join him. Jimmy picked Michael to go on the reward with him, wanting to repay him for not nominating him in the past. During the reward, Michael saw some potential houses he and Jimmy could live in, and the latter was amazed at the view as he never been in a helicopter before. When they landed on a building, they were greeted by Jean-Philippe and two waiters, holding wine and caviar. As they enjoyed their snack, Jimmy received a rare compliment from Ramsay, after being called fat fuck several times, making him very good as he pointed out that he finally served a dish on a clean plate. Michael took notice of Jimmy's big smile, knowing he deserved the win.
Punishment[]
After hearing Jimmy's decision to pick Michael over her, Elsie was pissed as she was the runner-up. The remaining chefs were punished by cleaning the entire dining room ahead of the next dinner service. During the punishment, Jessica complained about losing again and wondered when she would win something as she wanted face time with Ramsay. When Jessica asked why Jimmy picked Michael, Elsie said because the former was an ass-kisser. Ralph called it fucked up that Jimmy did not take Elsie, especially since she has helped him in services, and she called him a punk.
Before service[]
When the three punished chefs got back in the dorms, Elsie explained what she thought of the situation. She felt Jimmy picked Michael because he owed him something after not being nominated two weeks before but continued by explaining that what Jimmy did not realize was that Michael got rid of Chris, who was his biggest threat. When Jimmy and Michael returned from their reward, they told them what happened. It made Ralph and Elsie envious, to the point where the latter did not want Jimmy to touch her anymore and flipped the bird behind his back. However, Jimmy did not care if Elsie would be a bitch to him as it was a competition.
The next morning, everybody was quiet at the dorms due to the animosity between them, and Jimmy knew it was now getting tense due to the smaller numbers. During prep, they were helped by the Sous Chefs, who revealed that the red and blue menus used in the previous service were to be merged and had a bit of upscaling to them. Despite Elsie feeling a little lost, she knew she could pull Sous Chef Mary-Ann for advice.
Later that night, Ramsay had the final five lined up and announced he was serving Caesar salad and the fruit flambé tableside, and as part of Jimmy's second reward, he had to choose which one of his teammates would run tableside. After struggling with a name, Jimmy chose Elsie as she finished second in the challenge, but she knew it was his way of putting her in the fire. Ramsay gave Elsie a demonstration on making Cesar salad tableside. At the same time, the other chefs do the last bit of prep work, knowing they now must serve the entire dining room out of one kitchen. Jessica felt it would be a huge challenge as it was double the workload. Before the restaurant opened, Ramsay gave Sous Chefs Scott and Mary-Ann would be taking the night off, although Ralph knew it would affect everybody without the extra help.
Dinner service[]
As service began, Ralph knew that everybody had to stand out as individuals now, but he would still help whenever he could. Ralph and Michael got the newly formed black team off to a good start by sending many appetizers out in record time. Elsie left her salad bowl in the kitchen in the dining room, so she quickly came back to get it. When she sent her first salad, it was well-received by the customers. As entrées began, a lot of meat orders came in, and very few fish orders. So, Ramsay told Jean-Philippe to push more fish entrées to the customers. Jessica had her biggest task on firing filets, but when a fire erupted in one of her pans, she blew on it, trying to get it away, without any success as the Sous Chefs noticed from the bar.
Forty-five minutes into service, food has made it to the pass faster than ever, and Ramsay asked Ralph to join him at the pass to plate the food. Moments later, the power went out in the restaurant, but Ramsay was not too concerned as they still had candles for the tables. Elsie could not see what she was doing, but Michael did not bother, as he was too focused on his cooking. Fortunately, the power was restored a few seconds later, at the great relief of the customers, who applauded. After, Jimmy mistakenly threw his cooked lobster away without realizing, in an attempt to keep the fish station clean. Ramsay asked him where the lobster was, and Jimmy answered he did not know. As it was lost, they had to start the table again, much to Ramsay's dismay. In the dining room, Elsie got a request to cut the lettuce thinner by a customer. When Jean-Philippe told Elsie the problem, she compared the customer to a baby, remembering cutting the meat for her kids.
An hour and a half into service, the kitchen was in high gear, but Jessica realized she ran out of filet mignons. She started panicking, claiming that Sous Chef Scott, who took the night off, misplaced them. When Jessica explained the situation to Ramsay, Ramsay accused her of having an attitude and was not happy she only had two filets out of the twenty-seven ordered. As the two continued to argue, with Ramsay accusing Jessica of not caring anymore, Michael ran to the back store to get some filets. Although Jessica did not think Michael was trying to sabotage her, she knew he wanted to win as Ramsay told her to do something. However, Jessica was lost, so Michael went to help her. In the dining room, Elsie was about to begin her fruit flambés but ran out of pans. Elsie went to the kitchen to grab some, and as she did, Jessica asked her to get some pans for the meat station on the way. Elsie refused, saying she was busy. On her first attempt, Elsie failed to light up the alcohol, so she gave customers fruit flambés that were not flambéed.
Two hours and a half hours into dinner service, the kitchen seemed to be working well as Michael helped Jessica on meat, and Ramsay praised Ralph on his work at the plating station. Jimmy forgot to fire the risotto on time, and Ramsay called it painful, especially when the former added fish stock. When Jimmy started to talk back, Ramsay schooled him on his attitude and restated the order. Then, Ramsay asked Ralph to help Jimmy at his station. In the dining room, Elsie bounced back from her first flambé and started to deliver great fruit flambés to most of the customers, who were all satisfied.
Three hours into dinner service, Jimmy was working on the following order, but when Ramsay asked him why his halibut was in the pan instead of a plate, the former snapped that he was trying to do two things at once. After a heated argument between Jimmy and Ramsay, Jessica set fire to her station again. Because of that, Ramsay decided to shut down the kitchen while telling Jimmy and Jessica that both let him down during service.
Post-mortem[]
When the final five were lined up, Ramsay told them that they broke down despite being proud of the first half, did not complete a fully booked service, and was pissed by that. However, he was impressed by Ralph's great work after being pushed around a lot during the last couple of weeks and named him "Best of the Worst". Ralph was told to nominate two of his teammates for elimination.
During deliberation, Elsie pulled Ralph aside and told him to nominate her as she was tired of competing and was not as fast as the rest of the chefs. Michael was not happy to hear Elsie say that, and Jimmy hoped he would not be eliminated that night. Later, Jessica and Michael talked about her friendship with Ralph with the concern that Ralph might put her up for elimination despite Jessica not doing so last time. Ralph knew he had gotten close to Jessica since their time on the blue team but knew he had to change up his gameplay now that they were competing individually.
Elimination[]
Ralph named Jimmy as his first nominee and Jessica as his second. During their pleas, Jimmy felt that he had been a team player but admitted that his argument with Ramsay was uncalled. After reminding him he was flying high 24 hours before, Ramsay thanked Jimmy for his honesty. Then, Jessica felt she had been an amazing player, and while extremely disappointed about her poor performance, she was ready to put her best foot forward. Ramsay eliminated Jimmy as he failed to bounce back from his mistakes and losing his temper. Before leaving, Ramsay congratulated Jimmy on how far he got in the competition and told him to keep his head up high. Jimmy received a retrospective montage of his run during his exit interview.
After Jimmy left, Ramsay said it was a tough decision and dismissed the chefs for the night. Jessica was ecstatic to be around still and wanted to bounce back from her first nomination, and while Ralph was sad to see Jimmy go home, he knew he had to get rid of him and the others to win. Then, Elsie knew everybody would try their best to win and predicted some backstabbing, while Michael knew their happiness was fake as anybody could snap.
Ramsay's comment: "Each and every one of these contestants now have to start emerging as individual talent. This is where we really start to find out who can handle the heat and who can't. Clearly tonight, Jimmy couldn't."
Trivia[]
- This episode marks the introduction of the Black Jacket phase of the competition.
- This marks the first time the chefs competed in an individual challenge with a reward at the end. The Signature Dish Challenge from the first episode does not count because it was more for Ramsay to assess the chefs entering the competition.
- As of this episode, Michael becomes the only chef left that has not been nominated once this season.
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| Day 1 • Day 2 • Day 3 • Day 4 • Day 5 • Day 6 • Day 7 • Day 8 • Day 9 • Day 10 |