by Arthur Perkins
 
Ramsay first demonstrated how to cook a lobster with spaghetti and tomato sauce dish. He then tested the 5 remaining chefs on their ability to duplicate his dish by teaching the dish to non-culinary housewives (who looked more like actresses of models from the FOX studios) in the new Hell's Kitchen Cooking School (which I predict will last through tonight's episode and disappear into the sunset never to be seen or heard from again). Some of them came to the kitchen wearing seductive dresses and high-heeled shoes, not the best footwear for serious work in a kitchen. The results were:
 
Petrozza's student - thinly rolled pasta, overcooked
Bobby's student - looks and taste not good
Jen's student - not very tasty
Christina's student - outstanding
Corey's student - nicely seasoned and outstanding
 
Ramsay's decision was between Corey and Christina. He chose Christina. The prize was not the usual, but lunch with Ramsay, chef Mark Peel of Campanile and chef Ben Ford of Ford's Filling Station. However, the really neat part of it was she got a private culinary lesson from Peel and Ford while they were all preparing the lunch of salmon with a special sauce. As the dishes were taken away Jen, who had been trying to overhear what was going on in the lesson, ate some of the scraps (although the plates looked almost untouched to me) and was criticized by Bobby. 
 
The dinner challenge was to use a menu of 12 appetizers, 12 entrees and 12 desserts. In practice, nobody ordered most of those as they went for favorites like risotto, beef Wellington and John Dory fish. So I think the 12/12/12 menu was just for show and not really meant to be realistic. It would have been quite difficult to teach the chefs new dishes in the short time frame involved. There were theoretically 120 customers, a full house. The stations were Petrozza on vegetables, Jen on fish, Bobby on meat, Christina on appetizers, and Corey a floater (she got assigned to help Christina with apps for the last table before they both went to desserts).
 
Christina ran into trouble first, but she worked her way out of that by excelling at appetizers. Jen did pretty well on food, but her attitude got her in trouble with Ramsay, who does not want to tolerate any sass, which he gets in abundance from Jen. This happened when Jen failed to coordinate simultaneous completion of her fish with beef Wellingtons on the same order. I thought she got a bum rap because he accused her of bringing fish to him too soon, while it looked like Petrozza actually carried Jen's dish with his garnishes. Petrozza called Jen's responses to Ramsay "disrespectful." However, he screwed up himself and had to say that his own timing was off in this service. Assignment to the meat station has been the harbinger of bad results throughout HK4. Bobby got that assignment presumably because Ramsay wanted to test him. His results were raw meat and failure to communicate with the rest of the kitchen (a common failing). Bobby's comment in the middle of service was "It's like a war."  That's when you look to the General for leadership, but it was not happening for General Bobby. The final challenge of the evening was when 12 Hawaiian Tropics models came to fill a 12-top, or table for 12. The simultaneous completion of apps, then later meat/fish/veggies, and finally desserts (although that was not shown) required the ultimate in teamwork. This group of chefs did get it together for the 12-top. However, during service Ramsay singled out Jen and Bobby as being Inconsistent and Petrozza as dreamy.
 
Ramsay stated that the only performer that evening was Christina, so she was directed to nominate two of the chefs for potential elimination. She easily selected Jen who she rightly said is missing team spirit (I would have said is so me/me/me oriented that teamwork is never a possibility). The second nomination between Bobby and Petrozza could not have been easy. She chose Bobby. Ramsay then put her on the spot by asking her who he should fire. She said Jen, but Ramsay went with Bobby. The meat station was his downfall and he failed, except on a few occasions earlier in the competition, to show the leadership and communication skills Ramsay obviously wants to see demonstrated.
 
The preview said that next week they will be cooking for celebrities, who typically have had enough fine cuisine to know what is excellent and what isn't. If I were Jen or Petrozza, I would be worried. The teamwork between Christina and Corey was duly noted mentally by Ramsay. It's what he likes to see, so the Finale is now likely to be between those two. Petrozza might make it in place of one of them, but Jen has little chance due to attitude, not culinary skill.

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