Episode 9: Where's The Beef?

To say that the teams felt elated after Dani's elimination was putting it mildly, with Freya saying that the rest of the competition would be a breeze for them comparatively speaking, Matt agreed though pointed out that the last thing they should do is get too cocky whilst Leo and Mark told him to lighten up.

The Red Team were in a less celebratory mood as they had to lose the service to get rid of Dani but they were relieved all the same, Andreas made it clear to Yuri that he wasn't comfortable being put in the situation he was in when he had to nominate her alongside Dani but Yuri shrugged it off, calling it a means to an end.

## Individual Challenge

The next morning the chefs were met with a butchers block full of fresh meats on the other side of the room with several covered dishes directly in front of them, Ramsey announced that the next challenge was all about identifying meats using just their palettes and since the Red Team lost the last service, they'd be going first with the Blue Team waiting in the back, when asked if she had any parting words for her former teammates Freya told them "good luck, we'll be waiting in the Black Jackets Lounge" getting a laugh from her former teammates and current teammates alike.

The pairings of Andreas and Yuri and Rachel and Erika got the Red Team off to a strong start but they hit a stumbling block with the pairing of Henry and Taylor getting several proteins wrong and guessing the same protein twice, it took them seven minutes in total to get it right and whilst Andreas and Yuri's second go and Rachel and Erika's second gos finished their turn without much issue they were still left with a final time of ten minutes and forty seven seconds.

Freya joked that she was just getting fitted for her black jacket when the Blue Team were called back in and when they saw their time Mark asked if they should just go on the reward now, indeed the pairing of Freya and Matt got the Blue Team off to a strong start with Leo and Josh doing decently as well, however the pairing of Jason and Mark almost cost the Blue Team the challenge by taking even longer than Henry and Taylor giving the Red Team a chance, however Matt and Freya's second go fixed that as they identified the second to last dish within seconds allowing Leo and Josh to clutch the victory for their team.

## Reward

The Blue Team were taking on a fashion shopping spree with $1,000 dollars to spend and a professional stylist helping them pick their clothes, Freya admitted that she wasn't much for fashion as she was a tomboy at heart but welcomed the chance to try on some fresh clothes, that wasn't all though as when they returned to the dorms they found brand new vitamix blenders waiting for them.

## Punishment

The first part of the punishment had the Red Team deliver the Vitamix blenders to the dorms, which especially irked Andreas as he needed a new blender, this at least earned him some sympathy points from both Christina and the rest of the Red Team, after that they had to prep both kitchens for service, Andreas was determined to make sure that there wasn't a repeat of last night's service which Yuri agreed with, not wanting to but put up for elimination again if they could help it.

## Before Service

Once the Blue Team were in their chefs jackets they got to work getting ready for service, Freya had to be excused to get an epipen from the medic after she had a reaction from getting the scallops ready but it was a minor one this time around and she was soon back in the kitchen.

## Dinner Service

 **Meat** | Andreas and Yuri
 **Fish** | Erika
 **Garnish** | Henry

In the Blue Team Matt got his teammates off to a strong start, sending out excellent food and having a smooth service, however Taylor had her worse night on apps, requiring Erika to jump over from fish to bail her out but that ended up being the only hiccup in the service that day, the Blue Team however was a different story, whilst Freya and Josh sent up excellent meat Jason and Mark's mistakes on the fish and garnish station made their efforts for naught, eventually Jason and Mark got kicked out leaving Leo to run the fish station solo and Matt to jump onto garnish to save it, thankfully both teams were able to finish service.

## Post-mortem

The Blue Team were declared the losers in a close service and were told to come up with two nominees for elimination, Freya and Matt agreed on one thing, that the main problems were with garnish and fish, more specifically Jason and Mark, they were determined to fight their nomination knowing that they were both on their first nomination.

## Elimination

The Blue Team named Mark and Jason as their nominees and they were called up, Mark told Ramsey that he was ashamed by his bad performance that night and that he knew he was better than that, Jason said pretty much the same thing but with a lot less passion than Mark, this proved to be his undoing and Jason was eliminated, with Ramsey feeling that he had given up.

Jason's elimination statement: *"To go from a fantastic reward to going home is not something I was expecting but here I am, on my way home after one bad night on fish, Hell's Kitchen is no joke, you either adapt or you get swallowed up and that's where I ended up, swallowed whole by the pressure."*

Ramsey's elimination comment: *"He may have been able to get some high end fashion tips on the reward but Jason apparently never got the tips in the one area he desperately needed to work on: his cooking."*