Review of Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares

Posted on | November 12, 2007 | 11 Comments

Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares

Ramsay at his best, entertaining and interesting reality TV as he tries to help failing and struggling restaurants.

Forget “Hell’s Kitchen USA” and the “F word”, this is the only series in which to watch Gordon Ramsay. You can see why he has become such a successful chef and restaurant owner. His passion for food and for people who are willing to give their all in running a restaurant as a business very apparant.

Last week’s episode typified his drive. By god, he did his best to instil some sort of enthusiasm and “get up and go” in Rachel. She was originally from Scotland, but now trying to run a vegetarian restaurant in Paris, which was failing and bleeding money from her father who was keeping it going financially. By the end of the episide, you just wanted to give her a good shake and get her to cop on.

She was running the restaurant for a laugh by the look of things, not taking anything seriously, not willing to put in any work and then wondering why it was all going wrong for her. One of those people who always believes its someone elses fault and that they’re hard done by and misunderstood.

Ramsay began by getting rid of her chef, a Brazilian guy who was for the birds, totally unreliable who served brutal food. Then her friend who was the waitress left. No loss really.

However, then things began to improve. A new young chef, India, from her native Scotland arrived. This woman could cook, was eager to learn, and was efficient in running a kitchen.

One of the best scenes of this episode was Gordon Ramsay running a lunch service single handedly. Taking orders, cooking the dishes and serving them to the customers. Ok, it was just a basic soup and sandwich, but it looked great, cost only €6 so was great value for money and the customers enthused about it tasting delicious. After taking in a few hundred euro over one lunch service, he proved that she should quit being so lazy and get in to open up for lunch, despite her earlier protests that it wasn’t worthwhile financially.

India began to get into her stride, and the restaurant began to serve up decent, tasty vegetarian food. The customers began arriving and leaving very happy. Things were looking good. All happy?

No, it turns out that when India went home for a short while to sort herself out for a permanent move to Paris, Rachel decided it was all too much hassle. India arrived back to Paris to find the restaurant shut.

Arggh, Rachel was shown to be a spoilt, lazy woman. India was employed in one of Ramsay’s London restaurants.

Great tv as it was so obvious what enables a person to achieve success or to face failure. A “couldn’t be bothered” attitude versus a “let’s get on with it” and learn something enthusiasm.

I’ll definitely be watching the rest of the series.

Rated 4/5 on Nov 12 2007 by ManicMammy
Review Tags: food, gordon ramsay, reality, series, tv, tv series
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Category: Reviews
Tags: cooking > ramsay > reality > review > tv

Comments

11 Responses to “Review of Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares”

What Would Ramsay Do?
November 13th, 2007 @ 8:51 pm

Have you seen the U.S. version of Kitchen Nightmares? If not I’ve posted all the episodes on my website. Let us know how it compares to the UK version.
Manic Mammy
November 15th, 2007 @ 2:19 pm

No, I haven’t yet seen any of the US versions of Kitchen Nightmares. Must check it out. Didn’t like the Hell’s kitchen US so hoping its not along the same lines.
Love the name of your site.
Steve Barton
November 21st, 2007 @ 12:36 pm

I agree; great show – Gordon knows what he’s talking about. I can understand why Rachel would come across as lazy, spoilt and not bothered; but having been there (as in I have had a restaurant fail), I can also sympahise with that feeling of just having enough of it all. Her comment on “feeling like a huge weight has been removed” once she shut the place, rang all too true for me.

Owning a restaurant is a popular dream for many of us. Only sometimes the dream can keep you awake at night.
Manic Mammy
November 21st, 2007 @ 12:44 pm

Hi Steve,
Can only imagine the work it takes and I am very happy just to enjoy restaurants from the customer point of view.
Fair play to you for giving it a go.
Looking forward to reading your blog.
mary bush
January 8th, 2008 @ 3:37 am

Ramsey’s Kitchen Nightmare show as seen today January 7th, 2008 he talks about filth in the kitchen being so discusting,
food poisoning by the chef and of the 10 beginning minutes that
we watched found that the filth from his mouth was worse than the filth of the kitchen and the words were worse for poisoning the brain. How can you have a food show and have to warn people that there will be course language. Can he not talk properly without using the F… word or equivalents. Does he not know any other lanuage. He must have used the F… word
at least 15 times in the first 10 minutes.
Had to move on to another channel because of it.
Granted he is probably a very good chef and gets result, but could do so without that word.
Manic Mammy
January 8th, 2008 @ 8:46 am

Hi Mary,
Sorry to hear his language put you off the programme. To be honest, I dont find the F word that offensive, so it doesn’t really inhibit my enjoyment of the series. I think in Ireland and the UK, the F word is part of alot of people’s everyday language.
Yep he does use it alot, but if you can get over that, the programme is very entertaining.
Pat
February 2nd, 2008 @ 3:31 am

India is beautiful……..The UK version is MUCH better than the US conterpart. I first got to know Chef during his Hell’s Kitchen Shows. Then when FOX started showing the US Kitchen Nightmares the first thing i wanted to see was some sort of check-in after he was gone. I found the UK version on BBC America and I love it>>>>> Again only giving this post because INDIA IS BEAUTIFUL……….. Thanks Ramsay and BBC America
Sylvia
February 14th, 2008 @ 11:04 am

this show was shown on TV in New Zealand tonight and the first of this series I have seen It changed my opinion of him completely from negative to really positive. I also think the best scene was the lunch he did and his food was great. No wonder he is such a sucessful chef. Im so pleased he gave India a job.
Ben
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:17 am

Mary all chefs use the the f word alot every chef swears its just how the kitchen works if you can’t stand it don’t watch it
Lewis (USA - VA)
October 9th, 2008 @ 2:34 pm

I agree with many of the posts. I came on looking in the forums to see if we could get more information on how India is doing. Shes beautiful not only because of her looks, but also because shes so dedicated and has a great work outlook. I was happy that they mentioned at the end of the show that she got a job in London; but i wish they would check up on her again soon and show how she had progressed since then. It would also show how good Ramsay’s perception of another’s character, ability, and willingness to succeed (further adding to his badassness =) ). I think it’s tough for some people to understand how encouraging Ramsay can be because like the prior post, some people can only see him cursing and bashing people.. but you have to understand that many of those people just bring it on themselves and need a good kick in the butt. When he comes across people who are really excited and have a passion for cooking and what they are doing, he is a very compassionate person.

The show is great, I hope they never run out of poopy restaurants to fix =P

Lewis
Manic Mammy
October 9th, 2008 @ 4:54 pm

The show is great, I hope they never run out of poopy restaurants to fix =P

Agreed Lewis