HEDoubleEL's Kitchen

[crokett]

A reality show on Fox. I wasn't watching I was finishing the taping out in the new bathroom. I could hear the TV though. Does Ramsey really abuse his employees like that or is this just for TV? It seems like half the dialogue is bleeped out.

Ooops. I forgot about the forum censor in the title.

[jonmulzer]

I have never watched the show you refer to, but DVR every episode of Kitchen Nightmares on BBC. Very good show and different than that one. He goes into failing restaurants and turns them around to where they make money. He may have a mouth like a sailor but he knows what he is doing. In an industry where 90% of restaurants fail within the first year he has 5-6 multi-million dollar restaurants scattered throughout the world. He knows his stuff when it comes to the business.

[kirkroy]

I like the Kitchen Nightmares show too and I don't normally watch cooking or similar types of shows (except Alton Brown sometimes)...

[bruce hylton]

I have never watched the show you refer to, but DVR every episode of Kitchen Nightmares on BBC. Very good show and different than that one. He goes into failing restaurants and turns them around to where they make money. He may have a mouth like a sailor but he knows what he is doing. In an industry where 90% of restaurants fail within the first year he has 5-6 multi-million dollar restaurants scattered throughout the world. He knows his stuff when it comes to the business.

This sounds good but why draw a paycheck if your business is so good?

[crokett]

This sounds good but why draw a paycheck if your business is so good?

Ego. And/or advertising. Now that he is on TV and a 'celebrity' it is easier to open a new restaurant or get customers to his existing ones, etc.

[germdoc]

Never seen the program, but I have eaten many times at He**'s Kitchen in Minneapolis. As you might expect they have a certain theme revolving around fire and brimstone. Absolutely great brunch--highly recommended.

[poolhound]

We love all of Gordon's shows but are a little dissapointed with the current season of HK. This season has really been hammed up, undoubtedly by the TV producers. When HK first started it was much more of a cooking competition but this has been morphed into a kitchen version of Survivor or Big Brother and its more about the "entertainment" of the way they get the contestants to fight with each other and the overboard acting and humiliation served up by Gordon. I dont like this type of "entertainment" personally and if the show keeps going in this direction I may not bother.

Gordon really is an amazing chef and restaurateur and due to some early TV shows which were much more benign the media and TV moguls have built on this to create a certain "TV persona." Sure he can be tough in the kitchen but show me a successful chef who isnt. From the TV perspective the sayings "Make hay while the sun shines" and "Strike while the iron is hot" come to mind. From a marketing point of view when you get something the works milk it!

There are 2 versions of Kitchen Nightmares a British and American one. If you see some of the earlier British ones you will instantly see the difference in these he is much more friendly and really trying to help failing restaurants get back on their feet. It seems to be the American TV people who have focused more on the Ramsey "Beast" and have created and evolved this. I am not sure what this has to say about American culture and TV approval ratings.

If any of you get BBC America try and catch his other British show called "The F Word." this is more of a magazine style food/cooking program with a variety of angles. In this show you regularly see Gordon with his wife and kids and more of the real him (you would hope). LOML and I were only talking the other night as to wether US TV will try to import this show but we dont think it would work here as they would need to completley switch it about to bring in the Beast - shame really IMHO....

[poolhound]

Ego. And/or advertising. Now that he is on TV and a 'celebrity' it is easier to open a new restaurant or get customers to his existing ones, etc.

You may be right but from what I know of his restaurants he doesnt need too much extra advertising as they speak for themselves with 14 Michelin stars I think he is 3rd in the world.

If somebody came to you and offered you XX millon dollars to do a TV show are you going to say NO? And theres the benefit of improving his existing business - no brainer!

[430752]

The sad thing is that his brand of tell-it-straight-and-unvarnished is being associated with British personalities. Nothing wrong with the brits (well, unless you're irish or a scot,but that's another story), but that hard-nosed truth is becoming perceived as an imported quality. Witness Simon on American Idol, the only one with enough stones to say you suck, or you sound like a heyana being strangled, rather than the american judges who say mamby pamby things like maybe you need more practice, or you're almost there but not quite. Also witness the show Nanny 911, or whatever the name, in which truly moronic american families are assisted by a British nany seemingly airdropped into the home. The nanny takes no prisoners and makes no niceities in pointing out the mistakes of the children and the parents.

I dunno, but my upbringing in America was full of these characters. In fact, I thought it was an american character trait (and still thing it is despite pop culture) of the tough talking, no-bs, dead stare character. (the Cowboy, anyone?) It was the europeans who were mamby pamby, couldn't get it done, dance around the bush types. My how times have changed. And I was born in 1972. If my high school gym teacher were alive today he'd pull the (unlit) cigar stump out of his mouth, his foot out of my a**, and cry. That son-of-a-female-dog.