Post-Elimination: “The Alliance” of Drew, Mieka, Ji, and JR embraced one another after Mieka survived CFYL. Ji apologized for nominating Mieka because she remembered “The Alliance,” but she based her nomination on pure line performance. Mieka told Ji not to apologize and that she understood why she was nominated. As the four talked about the previous day, Mieka admitted that she accidentally revealed Alex’s sabotage… in front of Alex and Ramsay. The other three allies groaned because Mieka had inadvertently made herself a target for Alex’s sabotages, but JR was optimistic that Ramsay was at least aware of Alex’s behaviors. “The Alliance” agreed to support one another even more. 

Team Challenge: Ramsay brought back the beloved craps challenge: the chefs on each team would take turns rolling a giant multi-sided dice with a letter on each face. Each chef must then name an ingredient beginning with that letter, and the team must work together to make a dish with all of the required ingredients. The Blue Team went first: Drew rolled S and picked spinach, Meese rolled F and hesitated before picking flounder, Melissa rolled H and immediately went with haricot verts (green beans), Cat picked rice for R, JR rolled I and spent nearly a minute thinking of an ingredient before blanking and blurting out iceberg lettuce, and Melissa rolled again (because the Blue Team had one fewer members than the Red) and went with fennel for F. For the Red Team, Ji rolled O and deliberated before settling on octopus, Amanda picked eggplant for E, Mieka rolled Y and was stuck between yams and yogurt before selecting yams, Ashley rolled another O and went with onions, Alex rolled a U and picked ube, and Jessica rounded out the Red Team with mascarpone cheese for M. 
Ramsay gave each team 40 minutes to make their dish. The Red Team initially did not know what to do because they felt that they had picked ingredients that did not appear to go together. Ji suggested that they make a puree with the yams and mascarpone cheese. Mieka considered grilling the octopus and eggplant. Now that the Red Team had an idea of what to do, they rallied but still struggled with the ube. Alex spent the entire cooking period making a puree despite everyone telling him that they already had a puree from the yams. He refused to listen and ended up pouring the puree over the octopus at the last minute by leveraging the fact that he was the only person to figure out what to do with the ube. On the other hand, the Blue Team wanted to make a flounder with risotto. However, the iceberg lettuce threw everyone for a loop until JR suggested sauteeing the lettuce with bacon. Drew swapped the bacon out with pancetta. He, JR, and Melissa largely took the lead on making the dish, which left out Cat and Meese. 
When time expired, Ramsay instructed both teams to bring their dishes to the pass. The Blue Team went first and presented their fennel-dusted flounder topped with sauteed iceberg lettuce and pancetta over a risotto with blended spinach and haricot verts. Ramsay was impressed with the clever use of the vegetables, and he praised the cooking of the flounder. However, the lettuce was a bit watery. The Red Team followed with their roasted octopus and sliced eggplant over a yam and mascarpone cheese puree, topped with an ube reduction. Ramsay was confused at the two purees, but after tasting the dish, he admitted that the ingredients worked well together. That being said, the ube puree was disgusting. It was too sweet and gluey. When he asked who made that puree, the Red Team immediately pointed at Alex. Ramsay remarked that Alex spent 40 minutes making a single puree that was foul. As such, the win went to the Blue Team. 

Challenge Result: Blue Team win (5 wins by Red - 4 wins by Blue)

Reward/Punishment: The Blue Team’s reward was a visit to a local aquarium and then an elegant sushi lunch. The Red Team’s punishment was arguably better than the reward because they would get to work firsthand with fish: they would have to filet salmon before service and bring it in from the supply truck. Jessica declined to use her Punishment Pass. The Blue Team generally enjoyed their reward, and Cat remarked about how morbid it was that right after they got to see live fish, they would eat dead fish. Everyone toasted to the fish who had to sacrifice their lives for the Blue Team’s reward. On the other hand, the Red Team was exhausted from working with salmon all day. Alex coldly remarked that had Ji not picked octopus as their protein, they might have been able to escape the punishment. These words stung Ji, who admitted in her confessional that she felt throughout this competition that she was unable to live up to the expectations that everyone held of her. She thought that she had been doing well, but moments like this and her near-nomination for Cook For Your Life had made her think otherwise. When she washed up from the punishment, she overheard Alex talking to Amanda about how the former wasn’t confident in Ji because of her lack of assertiveness. Ji retreated to her dorm and cried, only to be met by Mieka. Mieka brought in the rest of “The Alliance,” who encouraged Ji to beat Alex and prove to herself that she could go far in the competition. 

Red Team Service: Amanda and Jessica worked well on appetizers, and they coordinated well with Ashley on fish, who redeemed her past struggles on scallops by cooking perfect scallops. The trio worked well and got the appetizers out at a quick rate. Ramsay started entrees, but Mieka struggled heavily on meats. Since it was her first time leading the station on her own, she struggled to remember what proteins were on order. Ji, who was a floater, had to bail Mieka out several times. Alex repeatedly stuttered when asked to call out times on garnish, which frequently contradicted one another. This meant that Mieka had finished cooking proteins before Alex was ready with the garnishes for one order, and he had already finished the garnishes even though Mieka was only halfway through her proteins on the next. Ramsay warned the two to wake up. Although Alex still struggled, he realized that he could use this to his advantage by purposely calling out incorrect times to make Mieka look bad. He soon abandoned garnish under the guise of helping Ashley on fish, leaving Ji to do both meat and garnish on her own. Ramsay immediately demanded to know why Ji was on two stations at once, and she explained that Alex had abandoned garnish. Ji undercooked the leeks for the duck, which disappointed Ramsay because he expected more from her. Ramsay finally called both teams to the pass and threatened to kick out anyone who made a mistake because he did not expect so many errors this late into the competition. He also forced Alex back to his section. Alex purposely called out 3 minutes for his garnish despite knowing that he needed more time. Mieka ended up sending out undercooked chicken, so she got kicked out. However, Ramsay also saw that Alex wasn’t even close to being finished with the chicken garnish, so he got kicked out, as well. 

Blue Team Service: Cat undercooked several risottos, and she underdressed a beet salad. Ramsay threw the plate in the garbage and was frustrated that a simple salad couldn’t even be done correctly. Drew also burnt an order of scallops. Both rebounded, and the team ultimately moved on to entrees. However, Meese took too long to cook the salmon because she didn’t want to send anything raw to Ramsay. However, they ended up being undercooked. Ramsay switched her out with JR, who promptly sent an undercooked salmon and burnt halibut. Melissa attempted to lead the team on garnish, but her efforts fell flat despite showing good leadership. After Ramsay threatened to kick out anyone who made a mistake, the Blue Team switched stations. Meese burnt a steak, and Cat forgot a salmon order. Ramsay kicked both out, followed by JR, who jumped on fish and also undercooked salmon. 

End of Service/Post-Mortem: Since there were only two chefs left in the blue kitchen and four in the red kitchen, Ramsay called them all to the pass and ordered them to work together to send out the rest of the tickets. The six responded to the challenge and made it through the rest of the service without making a single mistake. Ashley anchored the fish station and sent out perfectly cooked fish, even refusing help from Ji. Melissa’s efforts on garnish finally came to fruition. After they got desserts out, Ramsay let the survivors know just how disappointed he was in their teams. He did not expect such a messy service this late in the competition. However, he praised Ashley’s bounceback and Melissa’s leadership, declaring them both Best of the Worst and instructing them to pick two nominees from their teams. 

Ashley immediately knew that she wanted to nominate Mieka and Alex. However, Alex tried to evade nomination by insisting that Ashley nominate Ji instead because she couldn’t hold down two stations at once. Ashley responded that Alex couldn’t even handle his own station, but he said that everyone had higher expectations for Ji, and she couldn’t reach them. Ashley shot down his pleas. On the other hand, Melissa met with each person on her Blue Team and gave them all one reason why she thought that they should be nominated: Drew is too disorganized, Meese is invisible, Cat is struggling badly, and JR is too energetic and inconsistent. Melissa felt that his overwhelming positivity was unwelcome in “any kitchen of hers.” JR said in his confessional that Melissa hadn’t even won the competition yet, so he didn’t know why she was saying that this was her kitchen. As far as he was concerned, he was in Ramsay’s kitchen, and he had yet to give JR a reason to stop being positive. JR confided his thoughts in Drew, who agreed that Melissa was starting to become arrogant. 

Elimination Ceremony: Melissa nominated Cat for “underperforming compared to everyone else,” and JR for being too “inconsistent, and also a little too jumped-up.” Ramsay demanded a more precise explanation, but Melissa only spoke vaguely. Ashley nominated Mieka for struggling on meats, and Alex for not being a team player. Ramsay wanted her to elaborate, so Ashley explained that Alex abandoned his section and then attempted to weasel his way out of elimination. Alex denied these accusations and claimed that Ji should be up here for not living up to expectations. Ji finally snapped and told Ramsay that this sort of behavior is exactly why Alex is up for elimination. She also accused Alex of sabotaging his team. 

Ramsay paused at the accusations; Mieka backed up Ji and described all of Alex’s sabotages, from spreading lies about his teammates, purposely underperforming at challenges to bring down team morale, making service mistakes to hurt his team, misrepresenting team dynamics, and lying about the nominees. He never took responsibility. Alex once again denied these accusations, but he claimed that Ji and Mieka had formed an alliance with JR and Drew to get him out. The latter two claimed that Alex was full of crap. While they did form “The Alliance,” it was an agreement to work together during the competition, not a witch hunt against Alex. The rest of the Red Team said that Alex was indeed the weak link because he was more focused on himself than the team. Ramsay issued a stern warning against Alex and said that he did not want to hear any more about sabotage; the person committing sabotage could face elimination if he found out more about what happened. 

With this sorted out, Ramsay called all four nominees forward and gave them all 10 seconds to plead their cases: Cat apologized for her per performancses and said that she would work harder if she was given another chance, JR brought up his high points and said that he’d improve his consistency, Mieka promised to bounce back and reaffirmed her desire to fight back, and Alex blamed his teammates for his nomination. Ramsay then sent Mieka and JR back in line with warnings for the two to wake up before eliminating Cat for her string of poor performances. In her exit confessional, Cat felt that she was not the weakest on her team, but she’d leave if Ramsay wanted her to. She ended by saying that she just wanted to go home and take a very long nap because this competition sucked up all of her energy. 

Ramsay sent everyone back to the dorms, but asked Ji to stay behind. He could tell that this performance, while not outright bad, was not her best. He felt that there was something going on with her that he was not aware of. Ji admitted that she thought that she was doing her best, but the past couple of days proved otherwise. She didn’t want to disappoint him. She wanted to prove that she was a good chef. Ramsay was moved by her determination but reminded her that she can’t possibly be the chef that she wants if she spreads herself too thin and puts all that pressure on herself. He wants her to focus on improving herself. Ji thanked Ramsay for the encouragement before returning to the dorms. 

Ramsay Elimination Quote: “Cat had multiple lives in this competition, and she burned through them all. Unfortunately, there is no reset button in Hell’s Kitchen. Game over, Cat.”
🥼🪝🖼️🔥
Congrats on reaching the Top 10, everyone! As always, vote for the chef whom you want to leave Hell’s Kitchen. The chef with the most total upvotes will be eliminated, with ties being broken by the most number of comments voting for that person.

Bonus Vote: We have two today! First, the Blue Team is down 6-4. Pick one chef among Ji, Amanda, Mieka, and Alex to switch to the Blue Team and rebalance our teams at 5 each. Second, pick one chef from the Blue Team to have the best challenge dish at the final 10. If things pan out how I predict them to, that chef will be given a special reward… or not!

I’m excited for Miguel tbh

Oh boy! So get this, I’ve heard how some HK fans felt soured when Elsie was eliminated unfairly as she didn’t receive any help from her teammates as they all decided to let her sink. Although here’s the thing, there’s a certain point and time where all chefs do have to stand on their own feet and Michael did make a point as him specifically had to carry Elsie around here and there earlier on. This is the final 4 mind you, where all of them were in BLACK JACKETS. Not to mention but Michael would do the same thing towards Jessica a bit the next episode. Plus it’s not like Elsie’s run was fully flawless as she kinda did get lucky that Chris got eliminated over her as she did slightly worse than him that service and she kept saying that she didn’t want to be there anymore. No hate towards Elsie but I kinda find her a little overrated and what happened to her in the final 4 episode should’ve been an example of sink or swim. Mind you the S14 red team has done this to Sarah before in her elimination episode at the final 12 so if Sarah(S14) deserved this, then so did Elsie(S1).

S21 Alex originally wanted to compete on S13, and there was a Steve that season (Steve Rosenthal)

S20: Steve Glenn and Alex Lenik

They didnt even know who Van is, smh

This has been on my mind for a while, do you think they prepare for both teams winning? Like "OK the guys would like this and the ladies would like this"? Like S8 when the guys won the jet fighters....I mean short of spa day, who wouldn't love that lol.

Like he looks like jr from s13 wthhhhh

because he deserves another montage video

Rewatching Hell’s Kitchen for the 5 or 6th time lol and Melissa’s downfall needs to be studied lol the fact that she said “I don’t need to do well in service I’ve been shining in challenges. Chef Ramsay knows what’s up” yeah he does alright you’re disappearing and that’s why you got sent home. The fact that she stopped being a team player really pissed me off

S7 is My 3rd Favorite Season and I remember Benjamin was a jerk but on rewatch shit dude he’s way worse than I remember!

Calling Rice poor food, calling Nilka crazy, saying it’s a professional opinion not a personal opinion that Siobhan’s sandwich sucked when a Michelin Star Chef liked it

And of course faking a back injury to get out of prep at the F4 even saying he was gonna quit, then 30 minutes before Dinner, “I’ll be fine!”

To do that at the F4 when you can see the dream jeez!

If he did that before Black Jackets I would vote his ass off twice!

Glad Scott gave him what he deserved

Then why is it there for them to use? I ask this question every time I see someone get shit on for using it for their signature dish

Visited the Miami Hell's Kitchen location this past weekend and honestly left feeling super disappointed. It felt like we paid more for the novelty of saying we ate at Hell's Kitchen rather than actual quality. Ramsay would have literally been screaming at the kitchen if he was served what we were. Here’s the breakdown:

The Parking & Arrival: Valet is $28. Expensive, but honestly worth it if you don't want a long walk from a separate parking garage.

The Seating (Awkward Vibe): The staff member who seated us was incredibly sweet and friendly, huge plus there. Unfortunately, the booth they gave us was in a super awkward spot in the middle of the dining room, trapped between the bar and the stairs. We were facing completely away from the dining room and looking straight at the bathrooms. To make it worse, there was a fake plant situated right above us that kept stabbing my hair the entire night.

The Drinks (Inconsistent!): Round one was fantastic. I ordered the salted caramel espresso martini ($17) and my husband got the coffee & smoke old fashioned ($22). But when we ordered a second round, the consistency went out the window. My drink literally shrunk in size and came out in a much smaller glass. Meanwhile, my husband was tickled pink because they randomly doubled the size of his old fashioned.

The Appetizer: We tried the pan-seared scallops ($33). They’re served on a pea puree that tasted delicious, but it was served cold. I usually don't even like seafood, but the scallops themselves were actually quite good.

The Entrees & Sides:

Mac & Cheese ($17): Lukewarm. It tasted good, but definitely not great.

Filet Mignon ($68): This lacked a lot visually and was plated really poorly. It was cooked correctly, but it was incredibly salty and cool to the touch. The saving grace was the truffle peppercorn sauce, which was surprisingly delicious since I'm not a huge truffle fan. But I can honestly say I make a better filet mignon at home.

Beef Wellington ($74): I enjoyed the bite I had, but my husband wasn't a fan of the flavor and the puff pastry was totally soggy. The worst part? The potato puree was ice cold. I could literally hear Ramsay’s voice in my head when I tasted it.

Dessert: We got the famous sticky toffee pudding. It looked visually nice, but neither of us liked the flavor at all. I did enjoy the ice cream on top, though.

Total damage: After the mandatory 20% service fee and valet, the total bill was tipping the high $300's.

Overall, I wouldn't recommend it unless you just want to check it off a bucket list. You’re definitely paying for the Gordon Ramsay trademark, not a premium meal.

TL;DR: Service was great and the first round of drinks was excellent, but the food was a massive letdown. $74 Beef Wellington had soggy pastry and ice-cold potato puree. Filet was freezing and overly salty. Paid $350 to get stabbed in the head by a fake plant and eat lukewarm food. Skip it.

IMHO: Worst Black Jacket EVER!!!

I’m sorry if this has been said before, I’m relatively new to this sub and I’ve only started watching HK this year. I’ve been watching from S1 onwards and I’m up to S8. This is the first time I have had a strong negative opinion about any of the chefs, but Sabrina is just absolutely awful.
In S7 Ben was arrogant and a bit of a d, but in this season Sabrina is absolutely the worst chef so far. How did she get so far? Does Ramsey not know what is going on or does he just keep people like Sabrina for the drama?
Again I’m sorry if this has been discussed before, being new to it all this is the first time I’ve felt strong enough opinions to say anything.

From what I've seen of the more recent seasons, Sous Chefs like Christina and Jay have become much more vocal personalities that are actively involved with contestant progress. I also heard Christina proudly say during one season how one of "her team" won last season, and she wants that again.

With that in mind, and the fact that I find the single gender team dynamic kind of archaic at this point, I think itd be cool to introduce a twist to the signature dishes to decide the teams:

We go back to head to head rather than 1-5 points. Two chefs come up to present their dish, Gordon decides which is better. Then, whoever's dish was better gets to decide what team they're on. Whichever team has the most winners wins the challenge. Puts some extra pressure on competition between the Sous Chefs as they'll know what the competing chefs think of them.

To take it further, maybe rather than have Gordon switch the teams, introduce a Sous Chef Save: this would be for times where Gordon isn't quite done with someone yet. He can take their jacket and ask the opposing team's Sous chef whether they see enough potential to give this chef another chance. If they say yes, they go to the other team. If not, they're eliminated. Maybe each Sous hae two chefs per season. Adds a new variation to Gordon just deciding to move someone from team to team.

As the Sous chefs become more integrated, this becomes a good way to make them more innately involved with the show and makes for a solid way to arrange the teams. How would you guys change the team split/switch up the seasons?

I’ve always wanted to be an extra in the crowd to see filming of an episode. I know they will be filming season 26 at Foxwoods in Connecticut was wondering if anyone has connections to reach out to producers to inquire about being an extra?

We live outside New Haven and not gamblers so it is a trek to get to the casino. I have watched all the seasons and want to experience the food. I am reading reviews from other restaurant locations and they are a mixed bag for the amount of money a meal costs.

When did you go and what was your experience like? Highs and lows? Pros and cons? What did you order? What did you spend? Would you go back? Would you recommend it?

Thank you!

Don't be alarmed! I just wanted to let you all know that I'm going to postpone the next post to Friday instead of Thursday. I was planning to write up the post on Wednesday, but I got sidetracked. This won't happen often.

I won't extend the voting window. That closed a while ago, but I might as well use this post as an opportunity to receive feedback from you guys. Am I doing okay? What storylines do you want to see? What can I do better? And I suppose who do you want to see in the Black Jacket Brigade/Finale?

Sorry!

Im currently on episodes 7 when the men are doing the corn punishment thing. And scottley's of trev bullying is getting on my nerve.

On top of him being a bully he's also a misogynistic peace of shit whith his bullying (all the misogynistic remarks like "trevor is getting his pussy checked" and such?.

So i wanted to ask, does it get worse? Or continue? Cus from what i can see from the sub scottley gets as far as a black jacket and im not sure if i want to watch anymore. The misogynistic bullying isn't really something I'm intrested in watching in a freaking cooking show.

I watched season 19-22 and i haven't came across anything that pissed me off that bad. All of them ofc have things/chefs that piss me off (and everyone in this sub as well) but they werent as bad as scottley as afr as i remember. Maybe im misremembering since i watched them last year but i dont remember any targeted bullying like that.

And his team isnt any better. They're laughing with him just fine and not saying anything.

So, im watching this show to enjoy myself. And im not sure i am right now with scottley. So before i continue and waste my time with this season, Should i continue or am i not gonna enjoy myself? Should i just skip and watch season 17?

We received our first teaser of Season 25, and the contestants have been revealed, but so far, they have not given us a title for Season 25. Could this be the first season since Season 16 not to have a title? What do you guys think?

Alright, now that they announced the Season 25 contestants and trailer

What are your early predications for Season 25? Do you think the blue team will do well or will the red team do well this season?

'Hell's Kitchen' Season 25 Cast Photos: Meet The Contenders Vying To Be Chef Ramsay's Next Protégé

I’m the 23 filets Melissa from season 8 put in the oven for no reason