Hell's Kitchen: Ramsay Says These Are The Best Chefs Yet
Gordon Ramsay has given up on Beef Wellington. It's just too heartbreaking to see chef after chef on his show, Hell's Kitchen, butcher this beloved dish. So that's it: It's off the menu. "I've thrown the towel in. I'm so frustrated. That dish cooks itself. I know how to do it perfectly. Even my children know how to do it perfectly. So when I see these muppets messing around, and all they have to do is prep it perfectly and it cooks itself --you don't touch it, you don't sear it, you don't season it, it's just done... I'm taking it off now. Hands down, no more Wellington."
But that's the only disappointment Ramsay ran into with this season's crop of chefs. This is the strongest field he's ever encountered on Hell's Kitchen. "I will stick my neck out on this one and say the top four contestants this year could have quite easily won in any of the previous years," Ramsay says.
That's not to say that there aren't a fair number of "donkeys" in this season of the show - and fans wouldn't have it any other way. After all, part of the joy of the show is tuning in to see Ramsay go off on one of his vein-popping, bleep-riddled tirades in the kitchen. But Ramsay insists that his rants are vital to crafting better chefs - and that's what he's really after.
"I scream for talent," Ramsay says. "I want to challenge everyone, because that's where I'm at home. I have that level of perfection that's been inside for a long time. Passing on that knowledge of making them better individuals is part of the enjoyment, I suppose - the payback for me."
This year, the 16 chefs are competing for the head chef job at the Borgata Hotel Casino and Spa in Atlantic City. That high-pressure, high-visibility job is what prompts Ramsay to be so hard on the competitors, he says - and what sets Hell's Kitchen apart from other competitive cooking shows. "My frustration with Top Chef is a challenge is a challenge. I put my contestants, my chefs, under real scrutiny because I'm giving the restaurant away."
Ramsay will be branching out into another cooking show in the near future - a live show that takes viewers from ingredients to table-ready dish, so they can cook along with Ramsay. "The sort of cooking shows on air currently don't cook. It's one that was prepped earlier by some home economist behind the scenes and that's not cooking. Cooking is a passion and it's live and it's really nice to show that journey from a raw ingredient to an hour later something finished."
But that live show may be Ramsay's greatest challenge yet:: "No cursing. That's the deal. So I'm f*cked."
"I scream for talent," Ramsay says. "I want to challenge everyone, because that's where I'm at home. I have that level of perfection that's been inside for a long time. Passing on that knowledge of making them better individuals is part of the enjoyment, I suppose - the payback for me."
This year, the 16 chefs are competing for the head chef job at the Borgata Hotel Casino and Spa in Atlantic City. That high-pressure, high-visibility job is what prompts Ramsay to be so hard on the competitors, he says - and what sets Hell's Kitchen apart from other competitive cooking shows. "My frustration with Top Chef is a challenge is a challenge. I put my contestants, my chefs, under real scrutiny because I'm giving the restaurant away."
Ramsay will be branching out into another cooking show in the near future - a live show that takes viewers from ingredients to table-ready dish, so they can cook along with Ramsay. "The sort of cooking shows on air currently don't cook. It's one that was prepped earlier by some home economist behind the scenes and that's not cooking. Cooking is a passion and it's live and it's really nice to show that journey from a raw ingredient to an hour later something finished."
But that live show may be Ramsay's greatest challenge yet:: "No cursing. That's the deal. So I'm f*cked."