Hell’s Kitchen: Rookies vs. Veterans Episode 5 Recap: Like a Wrecking Ball

The rookies VS Veterans experiment may be over, but there is still plenty to be had on a new episode of “Hell’s Kitchen.” Beware, this episode absolutely reeks.

In this episode, the chefs were greeted in the dining room by pianist, composer and songwriter Stephan Moccio (Miley Cyrus’s “Wrecking Ball.”) Ramsay had him there to show the chefs that a great chef should be able to work with a wide variety of styles. Meaning, their challenge was to cook a halibut in seven different styles: steamed, wood burning oven, baked, grilled, poached, hot smoked, pan seared and shallow fried.

Marino brought out a huge cart filled with sardines, which was just a way for Ramsay to surprise the chefs by having a huge halibut fall from the ceiling, scaring the chefs. “I almost farted,” Kanae said. That’s a new one. T remarked that it was “the snakes all over again.”

Scotley said, “chef, do we have any yellow food coloring?” What, really? Food coloring in a fine dining restaurant? Sous Chef Christina even said, “get the *bleep* out of here.”

To help judge the dishes, Ramsay called on chef David Lefevre. The way this challenge worked was Ramsay and Lefevre would give a point to the best dish in each category. The final score was 5-3 Blue. Their reward was a day playing virtual reality games at “VR Territory.” You know what happens whenever someone plays a VR game and there’s a table filled with drinks? If you answered they hit the table, causing everything to fall, you’re right. Also, everyone looks ridiculous just swiping at nothing playing VR. Also, everyone on the team got a “Vitamix.” “Hell’s Kitchen” is really giving “Vitamix” a ton of business.

The Red, on the other hand, had to shovel manure and mix it with compost from the leftovers from “Hell’s Kitchen.” Going on “Hell’s Kitchen” to win a head chef gig at a fancy casino in Las Vegas and one of the punishments is shoveling crap. The restaurant business in a nutshell.

At dinner service, these teams had to prove they can work better the way they are now than before. That wasn’t the case, especially for the Red Team.

Chris, working tableside, had zero tableside orders so Ramsay told him to just come into the kitchen to help. He decided to do scallops and undercooked his first one. At entrees, Scotley had communication issues with garnish, which caused Kevin to be behind on his salmon and undercook it. This caused Ramsay to tell the entire team to go into the pantry and sort things out. One cold Wellington sauce was enough to make Ramsay kick the entire team out.

T started things off for the Blue by making one perfect scallop dish and one that wasn’t. She even said she had to start over, but Ariel brought those up which made Ramsay give T a talk. T even said she had to make another one, but Ariel didn’t listen. At entrees, Mia cut in half four undercooked Wellingtons, which is not what you’re supposed to do. Ramsay told her just cut the end and that will tell you if they’re ready or not. They finished dinner service.

The Red nominated Scotley and Kevin with getting eliminated.

For someone who came in second, Kevin should have gone much further than this. OF course, Ramsay did say that Kevin did have his own restaurants which caused Kevin’s drive to win “Hell’s Kitchen” to disappear. It would have been nice to see him win, but life doesn’t always work out that way. This season is still underwhelming but now it seems like the only reason to watch is to see how long the veterans will last.