HK:NY Episode 5

## Intro

Once returned to the dorms, Seth said he was happy to get rid of Franky. He said that he was an anchor for the team and now he believes that the team can now succeed once they make sure the fighting would end. Jacob and Cedric met up together in their bedrooms to talk about the team morale and how to not get into these kinds of fights. They ultimately agreed on making sure a held decision between the group is resolved.

Over with the women, Brittany met with Rebecca to talk to her about her confidence during services. She said that she was worried about her eventually going home if these mistakes keep happening day after day. Rebecca told her that she is just trying to control her stress and she wants to be confident enough to hold her own station. Katie happened to be listening in to that conversation and started to lighten up on her thoughts about Rebecca, wondering that this is the point where she steps up instead of someone on the team babysitting her.

## Team Challenge

The following day, both teams came downstairs to see Gordon in an empty dining room. There was the usual table set up, but everything seemed to be strangely normal. No other people or crazy decorations were seen anywhere. Holly was a bit cautious about the situation to hope nothing bad was about to happen. Gordon asked how all the chefs slept, to which they all responded positively. Gordon was happy about this because this challenge was going to need the chefs to be wide awake. As soon as Gordon said the following, a loud police siren blared through the dining room. Multiple confessionals from random chefs were describing the loud sound. If that wasn’t already surprising, multiple police officers began running through both entrance doors and through Gordon’s office doors and down the stairs. Mike was afraid that the competition was going to get shut down after the restaurant was being “raided” by officers. After the commotion stopped, Gordon revealed the officers to be part of the New York Police Force (or N.Y.P.D.). He explained that this police force is one of the most respected forces in all of America. The officers were respected for their service in crime, justice and most importantly, their work in 9/11. Gordon revealed to the chefs that this challenge will be a brunch service to serve all the officers who came in that day.

Both teams entered the kitchen to help serve scallops, omelets, chicken & waffles, and steak & eggs for the dining room. Both teams received their first orders, and Gordon told the teams to take it easy and not stress over easy things. Seth felt completely fine cooking the scallops because he worked on the fish station in the past and did a good job with the scallops, and got his plate accepted.

Holly and Natalie served their scallops in the red kitchen, both teams easily pushed them out, making the appetizers easy to do. Moving onto entrées, Rebecca served the women’s chicken and waffles, only for Gordon to first praise the perfectly cooked waffle but to slice into an overcooked chicken. He told the women to get a grip and to not overstress on the first ticket.

In the blue kitchen, Taylor told Mike that the chicken was taking longer than expected as he did not want it undercooked. Taylor knew that even though he cooked with a lot of proteins, chicken wasn’t always his strong suit. So, he wanted to confirm that it’s nicely cooked and that he’d rather put up overcooked chicken than deadly undercooked chicken. Taylor was accepted on his attempt. Diego was busy cooking the steak and eggs with Omar. Diego said he was a bit shaky about working with Omar after last night’s fight. Omar was able to bring up the steak perfectly cooked, however when Diego put up his scrambled eggs, Gordon came back to show that the eggs didn’t have an ounce of seasoning. Gordon immediately told Diego to redo the eggs. Omar said he was a bit upset about having a perfect steak at the window but it had to wait because of Diego’s mistake. The next send up of eggs was accepted.

In the red kitchen, the women began working on the more complex items, but Holly overcooked an omelet due to the stress of the challenge. Emily told Holly to turn down the heat as Gordon demanded the extra omelet. Fortunately, they were accepted.

Mike asked Taylor for a second opinion on his steaks in the blue kitchen and had Jacob walk them to the pass. However, the steaks were mild, and Diego told Mike to get it right. Gordon demanded the New York striploins, but the third attempt was accepted.

Both teams raced to finish first as they made it to their final tickets. Cedric felt the men had it while both teams worked on their final ticket. However, the women got their final order out first, and Lauren rang the bell. The women won the challenge, because Omar and Seth failed to cook the chicken fast enough.

## Reward & Punishment

The women were rewarded at the Manhattan hotel with a Korean themed dinner. During the reward, the women made it to the hotel and took in the scenery before playing darts and cornhole. People like Rebecca and Natalie said that if they keep this up, the men wouldn’t stand a chance.

The men were punished by preparing peppercorns for future services. With chef Aaron watching over them while talking to each other. Cedric said this was the worst punishment they’ve had yet because his fingers were killing him by separating something as small as peppercorns. Omar wanted to bring up last night’s service and Franky’s elimination. He asked if it was right if he went home. Everyone agreed in saying that Omar staying was better. Taylor said in confession that of course everyone is going to say yes to him to make him feel better but inside he knew that emotionally, the team would have been better without Omar.

## Service

Later, the women came back from their reward, and while changing into their chef jackets, Rebecca said good luck into hopefully winning their second service in a row. After prep, Gordon had both teams line up and announced that he decided to invite some special VIPs to dine at the chef's table as they would be serving two special groups. The men would be serving The Tenderloins (AKA the cast of Impractical Jokers), James “Murr” Murray, Brian “Q” Quinn, Sal Vulcano, and Joe Gatto. The women would be serving the female rock band, Little Mix. Afterwards, Gordon asked Marino to open Hell’s Kitchen.

 Meat
 Fish
 Garnish
 Tableside

A special Parmesan frico appetizer was served tableside by Brittany and Mike.

While Holly felt that it was redemption after letting her team down during the previous service, Natalie noticed that she was missing many ingredients on her cavatelli, with the latter commenting that Holly had no idea what was going on. So, Natalie helped Holly, and her dish was accepted.

In the blue kitchen, Diego put too much butter in the risotto, which led to Seth calling him confused. While Diego was able to fix this mistake, Gordon came back telling them that the risotto was perfectly cooked, but the scallops that Taylor brought up were completely rubbery and overcooked. Gordon berated Taylor on trying to not make the scallops like hockey pucks, which Taylor agreed to not do. Jacob was concerned if Taylor was having the heat get to him and didn’t want that to happen because Taylor is a talented chef.

In the red kitchen, Emily felt that the dishes were simple enough and knew that elevating them would not be that difficult. However, Emily stated that her difficulty was with her partner Katie, who was confused about what to do. Gordon came over and called a ticket, which Katie had to ask Gordon to say that again. She called Katie over and say the ticket three times to make her remember it. After a bit of time, Gordon asked for the lobster tail from Rebecca and the wellingtons from Katie. He had to tell Katie again that she wasn't talking and asked her to wake up. Rebecca was annoyed but a bit happy from this because she was happy on the inside that she wasn’t the blame for something and her chances of staying in the competition were rising because of her mistakes. However, Gordon called the red team to the back of the kitchen to show that he still hasn’t received the wellingtons and Rebecca’s lobster tail is raw. He asked the ladies if that should be accepted or not, which everyone said no.

In the blue kitchen, the men were on their second table of entrées. As Seth remembered how poorly his last night on meat went, he forgot another order of lamb for the ticket, with Cedric a bit annoyed at how Seth could have missed that. Then, Seth was able to bring up the lamb, but had to wait because Omar was not only not communicating, but still working on the spinach. Chefs like Jacob and Diego were trying to contact him. Omar said that after an explosion from the last service, he needed to stay quiet and have his members be quiet for a second. Gordon asked Omar for the spinach and when he got it, it was mushy. Gordon compared the spinach to baby food and demanded a refire.

Meanwhile in the red kitchen, Rebecca was still working on the refire of the lobster tail along with the help of Brittany who returned from the tableside station. Brittany said that she wanted to help lead the team to have them potentially win another service. However, Rebecca’s second attempt on the lobster tail ended up being completely collapsed. Gordon asked all of the red team if they had given up, especially Rebecca. The ladies refuted. Rebecca said she was at her breaking point because of how much she’s messing up on lobster, even though she stated that she had served lobster before. Holly was able to help out Rebecca on the lobster tail and finally, this attempt was accepted. Holly said that she was happy to help but wasn’t happy being a babysitter.

In the blue kitchen, the men were pushing out their entrées. Jacob felt that he was becoming the leader for them and declared that being under the radar ends now. However, Gordon found out that Taylor’s salmon was overcooked. Once again, Omar refused to speak up about the fennel salad with the salmon. And when Taylor was trying to get answers about the times, Omar shouted with anger to calm down and he’ll be ready when he’s ready. This surprised Ramsay and his teammates. Mike said that Omar was the one that needed to calm down and that others were just trying to help.

## Automatic Elimination

Back in the red kitchen, Ramsay called an order of two cod and one chicken. Emily and Katie were able to communicate together on the chicken, and were able to get the chicken to the pass but had to wait on Rebecca and Lauren on the cod and Natalie with both garnishes. Gordon berated Lauren that they both needed to hurry up. After 5 minutes of waiting and after Natalie was able to send up the garnish, Gordon sent the meat out without the fish. This annoyed Ramsay so much that he stood at the pass staring down the kitchen. Once Rebecca put up the two cod dishes to the window, Gordon immediately found out that one of them was stone cold. He called all the girls into the back pantry and showed the first cod that was cold and then revealed the second one was slightly underdone. Before sending them out, he pointed at Rebecca and told her that she was ultimately done with her. Gordon told her to pack her bags and take off her jacket, demanding her to leave Hell’s Kitchen. Once she left, he asked anyone else if they would like to join her. They all denied that. They all went back to the kitchen and Gordon told Brittany to get on the fish station. Lauren was completely shocked to see Rebecca leave since she was her partner that night.

Back at the dorms, Rebecca was angrily packing her bags. She said that she didn’t deserve to leave this early in the competition. She sacrificed too much to be a chef and she knew that she couldn’t live up to Gordon’s standards. She left through the back door.

In the blue kitchen, Taylor and Mike stammered on timings which annoyed the rest of the team by putting them at a stop. As the men sent out the proteins, Ramsay sliced into an undercooked steak and discovered a burnt chicken. Having had enough for the night, Ramsay kicked the men out of the kitchen and told them to nominate two people for elimination. As the men returned to the dorms, Diego was frustrated that they failed to complete their second service in a row.

In the remaining red kitchen, Natalie sent out the garnish for the steak in the red kitchen, but Katie sent up a raw steak. Frustrated, Emily and Katie both took responsibility for that mistake and said the refire could take three minutes. Emily sent up the steak that Katie made but however, it was raw again, and Ramsay kicked the women out of the kitchen, telling them to nominate two people for elimination. Lauren was not pleased to be kicked out after their strong start and felt that Katie had sunk the team.

## Deliberation

During deliberation, Katie believed that their failure was a team effort, but Natalie considered her and Emily for their poor performance on meat, to which Holly agreed. On the blue side, Diego said that Omar and Taylor got messed up more than the rest of the men, which most of the team agreed with. That caused Omar to get disappointed, which caused Seth to try and reassure the team before getting into another explosive fight.

## Elimination

At elimination, Mike and Brittany’s immunity pins were used up, meaning that they were safe. Gordon reminded the chefs that the service that just happened was catastrophic and their worst service yet. Before asking for nominees, Gordon revealed to the competition that Rebecca is officially out of the game.

Natalie announced Katie as the women’s first nominee and Emily as the second, while Cedric announced Omar as the men’s first nominee and Taylor as the second. During their pleas, Emily believed that there were many communication problems with the women, but she was willing to learn from her mistakes. Gordon said that even though the meat station on the red team fell apart, Emily was on the good side of it. Gordon respectfully sent Emily back in line. Then, Katie said that she wanted to learn from Ramsay and gain his trust, but he told her that she couldn’t help that after sending not one, but two missed meats. Omar said that he had the skills and experience to become Gordon’s winner of Hell’s Kitchen. Gordon then reminded Omar that this was his second time in a row because of miscommunication and a bit of a temper. Taylor said he was a soldier and wanted to own up to his mistakes that night to bounce back. Gordon then used Taylor’s words and said that he can’t be a “soldier” if he can’t fight. After saying that he was ashamed by all four of their performances, he said that he would eliminate the person who believes that the heat of the kitchen got to their head. He then finally eliminated Omar after not talking on the garnish and believing that he gave up on the team.

During his exit interview, Omar believed that he shouldn’t have been the one to be sent home, and that Taylor was too arrogant and stuck up to be there any longer. After Omar left, Ramsay told the chefs that he wasn’t done. He said that there were so many mistakes tonight and previous nights that he said he wasn’t comfortable with how the competition was standing. He called down both Jacob from the blue team and Brittany from the blue team, which led the teammates to confusion. Gordon then told Brittany and Katie to join the blue team, and Jacob and Taylor to join the red team. Before sending the chefs off, Gordon said that maybe a change in environment would help both kitchens improve with someone who is lacking and someone who can help fix the teams.

Jacob said he was surprised to hear that he would be leaving the blue team after feeling like a leader on the blue team but he knew a shift had to come some day. Taylor said that he was ready to bounce back from the fight and that he’s not ready to collapse. Brittany was ultimately shocked by Ramsay’s choice but was happy that she could be on a team that wasn’t on the verge of falling apart. Katie said that she was ready to show Gordon that she will improve, no matter what conditions.

***“To be a head chef, services need to be award winning performances. Rebecca and Omar’s performances tonight were more like Razzie’s.”***