(Personas) Episode 5 - 14 Chefs Compete

The fifth episode of Hell's Kitchen: Personas was published on September 25th, 2021. On that episode, a chef's initiative overcomes the setback of the challenge, one chef establishes themself as a silent force, and one chef snaps and loses it on their team.

## Intro

Coming back into the dorms, Nella hugs Ali and tells her that she's happy she's staying. Ali comments on how she's happy that Chef Ramsay saw something in her. Josiah, Lukas and Halle are seen bonding, with Josiah commending Lukas for his impressive comeback. Lukas pleads in the confessional that now that he's back on his feet, he's ready to go all the way. Meanwhile, Lilly and Tia start talking about the situation, with Lilly mentioning how she really felt Ali’s fire, since in her current job, no one respects her as a leader, and that she's here in Hell's Kitchen to prove she has what it takes to become great. Tia talked about how sometimes she felt like she wasn’t able to rise up, since as a child she was psychologically abused by her misogynistic father, a talk which brings her to tears.

## Team Challenge

The next morning, the chefs go downstairs, where Ramsay tells them that they have to be creative while thinking on-the-spot, before revealing a craps table. For the Craps Challenge, each chef would roll a die once, and choose an ingredient starting with the letter it landed on. Lilly claims that they’d already come up with a theme for the dish they’d do, come the Craps Challenge, and had given everyone a list of ingredients to memorise for it. The Blue Team went first. Louis rolls and lands on J, and after a bit of thinking, he says jambon (a type of cured ham). Lukas rolls and lands on D, so says duck so they'd have a protein. Chas rolls and lands on R, so says radish. Robin rolls and lands on T, and says tarragon. Eddie rolls and lands on G, and after some deliberation, finally comes out with grapefruit, which concerns the team. Halle rolls and lands on K, so goes with kale. Finally, Josiah rolls and lands on B, so says broccolini. The Red Team goes ahead. Lilly rolls and lands on S, so says salmon. Chantelle rolls and lands on T, and says teriyaki sauce. Nella rolls and lands on O, so says oregano. Christa rolls and lands on T again, so goes with tofu. Ali rolls and lands on P, so goes with pesto. Tia rolls and lands on H, so says haricot verts. Karie rolls and lands on A, saying aubergines.

Both teams had 30 minutes to cook their dishes, and while the Red Team seemed focused and ready to go, the Blue Team spent a bit trying to figure out how to make the grapefruit work. At one point, they try Louis’ suggestion, and Robin is really impressed with how it turns out. Chas states that Louis was a huge lifesaver and they feel they have a shot at the challenge now.

Eventually, both teams get their dishes plated in time. Christa presents for the Red Team, and the Blue Team pushes Louis to present for them. Ramsay compliments the Red Team’s cooking of the salmon and the classic flavours they brought to it. He then goes and tastes the Blue Team’s unorthodox duck dish, and while at first he seems confused, he compliments them on their creative use of the grapefruit in the dish. He congratulates both team’s performances, and admits it being a tough decision. He then announces the Blue Team as the winners of the challenge. Louis admits being very proud of himself for being the one who pulled the team through the challenge.

## Reward

The Blue Team is rewarded with a private jet ride to see locales such as the Paris Strip, Hoover Dam, and the Grand Canyon. Josiah expresses how he enjoys seeing his team rise up to the top, and Chas says that Louis is to thank for their day out.

## Punishment

The Red Team are given a simple punishment of having to prep both kitchens for the following dinner service. Lilly is bummed that her planning in advance was pretty much all for nothing, but acknowledges that the Blue Team is really starting to hit their stride. She tells them (in a confessional) to bring it on, because she’s gonna make it out victorious anyway.

## Before Dinner Service

During prep, Eddie is noticeably quiet, and while Lukas and Robin are asking him about his work, he aggressively tells them to fuck off. Chas gets increasingly concerned about Eddie’s behaviour, especially after the previous night’s communication breakdown with Lukas. Halle takes Eddie into the back, and tries to talk to him about it, but Eddie is noticeably dismissive of what she says. In the Red Kitchen, Lilly is seen helping Ali through the garnish station, making sure she got everything. Lilly noted Ali’s increasing cooperative effort, but was still concerned that she had to help her through.

The teams lined up, and Ramsay asked if they were all ready. They all said “yes chef”, but the Blue Team were skeptical about Eddie. After, Ramsay tells Marino to open Hell’s Kitchen.

## Dinner Service

A plate of shrimp scampi is being served tableside by Tia for the red team and Josiah for the blue team. The first ticket comes into the red team, and they begin cooking the risotto. Nella, somewhat quietly, tells Christa the mistakes in the seasoning from the sideline while she cooks the spaghetti. Christa tells Nella arrogantly that she knows what she’s doing, and ignores her. Nella states in a confessional that she’ll be able to take heat if she knows it’s not her fault, so lets Christa keep it as is. They, as well as Karie, send up their appetisers, and while Karie’s scallops are accepted, as is Nella’s pasta, Ramsay tells Christa that there is far too much stock in the risotto and tells her to start again, before berating Nella for not helping her. As they return to the station, Nella asks Christa why she isn’t listening to her, to which she doesn’t respond. In the blue kitchen, Robin and Lukas are immediately struggling, and Chas gets worried as they clearly aren’t getting on. They send up their components, and Ramsay tells them that they sent up two portions instead of the requested one, despite it being delicious. Eddie states that the section is being run by two half-wits and chuckles at them as Robin accidentally sets the flat-top on fire, which Lukas rescues. Ramsay doesn’t notice this, but Louis notes Eddie’s laughter and it peeves him. In the Red Kitchen, Nella once again notices Christa putting in the wrong seasoning amounts in the risotto, and while Christa isn’t on the pan, fixes it up. She completely owns up to this in the confessionals and even winks at the camera. They send up their components and Ramsay calls it delicious. Lilly makes note of it and calls Nella the “secret fixer”, especially since Nella didn’t take credit for the risotto.

In the Blue Kitchen, the appetiser station this time sends up components that don’t match the ticket, and Ramsay calls Robin and Lukas on this, asking Robin what was on the ticket. Robin struggled to recall it, which frustrated Louis once again. Chas repeated it back to Robin, and after a bit of struggling, Robin got it again. The appetisers were still sent out despite those minor errors, and the kitchen moves on to entrees, with Eddie exclaiming that it was his time to shine, as he begins with his first portion of meat. In the Red Kitchen, Nella’s secret fixing of Christa’s work allows the Red Team to move on to entrees. Lilly states her determination to gain their victory streak back, and immediately begins cooking multiple tables that received their appetisers. She asks Ali if she knows what she’s doing on the garnish station. Ali responds that she does, but when Ramsay comes over and asks for a time, they both give different answers. Lilly lets her know what she’s doing, but Ali doesn’t reply, trying to rush everything. This makes Lilly nervous as, not wanting to overcook her meat, she sends it up before the garnish. Ramsay asks where the garnish is, so Ali rushes it over, and it’s stone-cold. Ramsay tells her to put it back on the stove and tells Lilly to take her perfectly cooked meat back. Chantelle is mad at Ali but Lilly focuses on trying to keep Ali’s head down. In the Blue Kitchen, Chas keeps trying to communicate with the meat station, and while Halle is talking with Chas just fine, Chas can’t help but notice Eddie’s complete silence and sometimes outright ignorance towards him. Chas barks at Eddie and demands that he talk with him as well, and Eddie retorts at him and says he has to focus, to which Chas states in a confessional that multitasking is the bread and butter of a line cook, so doesn’t understand what the problem is. Regardless, everyone gets their components up and Ramsay even compliments the meat. Louis backs up Chas and tells Eddie to talk to the team, but the latter gets defensive and states that it’s not making a difference. Louis calls Eddie unprofessional and frantic.

In the Red Kitchen, Ali is seen taking on a large variety of orders, and Lilly is concerned after the communication break-down. She asks Chantelle to look after what was there, and rushes over to help. Ali is a little taken aback but accepts the help as she trusts Lilly knows when things are going wrong. Ramsay comes over and asks why Lilly is on the garnish station, and Lilly just says that she trusts Chantelle can handle the station, a response which leaves Ramsay stunned, so he just goes back to the pass. They send up their components and they’re accepted, and Ramsay compliments the team on their teamwork. The Blue Team seems to be hitting their stride, with Eddie ending up being more cooperative than before, and Chas comments that he’s overall proud of how service went, even if there were hiccups. Eventually both teams finish service and clear down.

## Post-Mortem

Ramsay lines the teams up and compliments them all for an overall solid service. He comments on how there were some hiccups, but that most importantly both teams recovered and bounced back. He then states that on this particular night, both teams had won the service. However, he would still be sending someone home. He asked both teams to come up with two nominees whom the team could do without, before dismissing them and complimenting them once again.

During deliberation, Lilly nominates Ali for having to recover her station when the going got tough. Ali seemed defeated about it, but didn’t resist the nomination, instead opting out of the meeting and heading to an area in the kitchen. Chantelle speculates about the second nominee being those on the appetiser station, and Nella calls out Christa for being uncooperative and not listening to her. Christa claims that Nella should’ve stuck her voice out more, but Nella says she was being too hard headed for it to be worth the effort. Lilly then points out the “secret fixing” thing, which spurs on Christa, who calls Nella deceptive. Nella believes it was justified as they had a job to do and Christa’s stubbornness was getting in the way.

Meanwhile, the Blue Team discusses their two nominees. Halle asks Robin what the hell happened, and Eddie remarks that it seemed like a senior moment when he kept forgetting what order was on. Robin told Eddie to fuck off as he was only 42. Eddie confidently nominates Lukas and Robin as their meltdown on the appetisers was their biggest setback, and the rest of the team seems to back it up. Chas just isn’t confident in the decision, as Ramsay did ask for whom they could do without, and he didn’t see Lukas as disposable in any way. He asked the team why they’re ignoring Eddie, since he’s likely the most toxic member of the team. Eddie is stunned by the remark and challenges Chas, who recounts all the times Eddie got unnecessarily aggressive. Louis backs up Chas, stating that even today he was being unresponsive and sometimes outright rude to them. Eddie calls his team full of shit, and claims he doesn’t deserve to be up on the block.

## Elimination

Ramsay asks Lilly to name the Red Team’s nominees, and she announces Ali as the first nominee for her communication breakdown and overall inconsistency, and Christa as the second for her immaturity and lack of teamwork (a comment which Christa rolls her eyes to). Ramsay then asks Eddie for the nominees, and he names Robin as the first nominee for his communication breakdown and overall mediocrity. But when asked for the second nominee, he pauses before saying it’s Lukas, for overall being a weaker chef than the rest of the team. Josiah then interjects and claims that Eddie is in fact the second nominee. Ramsay is dumbstruck, and asks Chas to explain. Chas explains that they deem Lukas overall a stronger asset to the team as they feel they can help him, while if Eddie screws up, it can outright lead to unnecessary conflict. Eddie tells Chas to go fuck himself, and Chas says “point proven.” Ramsay is in disbelief, and calls down Ali, Christa, Robin and Eddie.

During their pleas, Ali claims that even though she’s having a rocky ride, the one thing she isn’t doing is giving in, and she’s holding herself up pretty well, to which Ramsay reminds her that Lilly had to jump in and help her. Christa states that her trust had been shaken with the team after Nella was revealed to have been altering her dishes behind her back. Ramsay asks Nella if it was true, and Nella corrects Christa by stating that she was fixing the mistakes that Christa refused to fix herself. Ramsay sighs in disbelief before asking Robin why he should stay. Robin claims that he’d overall been consistent in performances and was more valuable overall. Eddie retorts claiming he’d just been hiding behind the good chefs on the team, calling him another brick in the wall. Robin then challenges Eddie, calling him the gear that tried to turn the other way, and toxic. Eddie asks Robin if he was after a fight, leading Ramsay to stop the altercation. He then asks Eddie why he should stay, and Eddie claims that him being up on the chopping block was just because his teammates were full of shit, and that he’d only been doing good things since his first time up, to which Chas sarcastically lists “bullying Lukas” as one of them. Eddie gives Chas the finger and turns back. Ramsay then calls Eddie forward, then Christa, and sends them back in line, before eliminating Robin for his poor performance and failure to do anything noteworthy. During his exit interview, Robin claimed that he didn’t think his journey would end so soon, and that Eddie was getting worse by the day and that he hopes the Blue Team can get rid of him as soon as possible.

After Robin’s elimination, Ramsay sends Ali back in line as well. He says that while he was happy with the performance, they were not to drop the bar from then on. While being dismissed, Eddie said that the blue team could kiss his ass after that nonsense, Chas was outraged at Robin going home when he wasn’t disrupting the team dynamic, Lilly claimed that this would be the hardest season to win since there were so many front-runners, and Ali said she knew she had what it took to rise above the rest, even if it wasn’t happening yet.

Ramsay's Comment: *"Robin showed himself to be fiery and full of passion. Unfortunately, that fire only showed when he was out of the kitchen, and that’s far too late."*