By Jennifer Larson

Chef Ramsey is back! After taking a two-week hiatus due to the World Series, KITCHEN NIGHTMARES is back with another disastrous restaurant in need of major help. This week they move on to Burbank, California, and I shudder to think what my hometown has in store for this formidable Chef. After watching some miraculous turnarounds for what must be some of the world’s most disgusting and downright dangerous restaurants in New York, I’m keeping my fingers crossed that California won’t be as bad. That being said, this is KITCHEN NIGHTMARES, which means it isn’t going to be pretty. After all, helping a restaurant that just needs a few minor tweaks doesn’t make for riveting TV. What does make for good TV, however, is poor service and a complicated menu, which is what Gordon Ramsey is up against tonight.

We see this complicated menu issue a lot on this show. It never ceases to amaze me how restaurant owners don’t know that they should have a clear direction as far as the food is concerned. Even the fanciest of restaurants keep the menu to a manageable minimum. As a frequent diner myself, I can’t stand too many choices, especially if I’m at a themed restaurant. I mean if I’m going to someplace that is supposed to serve French cuisine, I don’t want to see a fancy hamburger on the menu. On top of that, some of these restaurants are making complicated dishes that are usually hit and miss, as far as quality is concerned. I think chef Ramsey’s taught us all that it is better to have three or four items that you make really well than 10 or 12 that are just so-so. Maybe the fact that so many restaurants make the same mistake is the reason why Gordon is so good at fixing the problems. He really ends up telling them all the same thing, which may sound boring, but when delivered by this crazy chef, is more than entertaining.


The good news is that Sebastian’s wasn’t a horrifying mess of a restaurant that was crawling with rats. The bad news was that the owner/head chef was the biggest ego maniac I’ve seen since … well Chef Ramsey. The difference is that Chef Ramsey has the goods to back up his claims. The owner of Sebastian’s, who surprise, surprise is named Sebastian, filled his cupboards and refrigerator with every frozen ingredient needed for his dishes and called his items freshly made. Here’s the worst par, he had two beautiful brick ovens, and yet he microwaves his food. Why should anybody pay money for that, when they can microwave a delicious Wolfgang Puck frozen pizza at home? As if that wasn’t bad enough, his menu included, what he called, his 20 different styles of taste, or something stupid to that effect. What it amounted to was a mishmash of frozen pizzas, bite size steak bits and frozen calamari.

While the menu was a disaster, Sebastian’s did have a few good things going for it. First off, this guy is lucky enough to have a manager, Lou-Bertha, who was gung-ho and looked to be much more loyal than he deserved, it’s in a prime location right next to several studios and the rest of his staff seemed like a friendly bunch of people. So, you would think that this guy would be jumping out of his skin, when Gordon shaped up his menu and redecorated his place. Instead, Sebastian seemed to resent the fact that Chef Ramsey did a better job at running his place than he did, and in one of the best fight scenes on TV I’ve ever seen, Sebastian broke through the locked door to the office the production staff was in and promptly told Gordon where he could stick it. Now, is that a nice thing to do to somebody who’s there to help you? Granted, Ramsey did tell the guy he had less confidence in his ability as a chef than anybody he had ever come across, but still, kicking him out of the restaurant when he was the one who asked these people to come was just poor form.


After a brief cooling off period, Sebastian came back and made nice. I would like to say that Ramsey turned this place around, but this is the first episode that didn’t show a follow-up. I guess I’ll have to go check it out for myself. Until then, I can’t wait to see what fresh new hell Gordon has in store for himself next week.