Masterchef Australia contestant Dominic Corrigan appears to have fallen off the wagon at a recent function at Star City Casino. The now eliminated Dominic has said he was in rehab for alcohol issues previously but said he did not abstain but had it under control. At the time I thought that sounded  a bit like Dicko who stopped then started again, and has now stopped. (Source: Sunday Telegraph).

Dancing With The Stars commences tonight with Pamela Anderson as a guest. Awesome. Apparently Jo-Beth Taylor is on with her partner, Rachael Finch has denied she is on with hers. Jason Stevens dance partner is injured so he has a new one. I suspect he will be the first to be eliminated, unless he gets the sympathy vote.

Tamara Jaber who will also be on Dancing With The Stars has again denied that her and Kyle Sandilands marriage is on the rocks. Both camps have said they both are busy with their careers therefore have difficulty spending time together at the moment. However their house will be featured on Better Homes and Gardens this Friday. I have to confess I will be tuning in.

Rumours are the Masterchef Australia might be filmed in Melbourne next year. TV Tonight thinks that this would not be a wise move.

Hells Kitchen on GO has been moved to Tuesday at 10.30pm. This will be up against a new series of The UK Apprentice on channel 7 at this time (thanks Wurstsemmel).

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“It’s Vyvyan from The Young Ones versus Crystal from Dynasty” runs the promo, which also promises two teams, no Marco, 72 customers… who will win? The decision is not actually up to Marco, despite the misleading ads. British viewers will decide.

Recap, and this week it takes us back to the first episode with Marco glowering, gripping a knife, and telling his new batch of celebs that the restaurant doors would open in an hour. “If we fail, he fails, so we’d better not fail,” says Bruce. They should have realised that the “if we fail, he fails” equation would really mean that Marco wouldn’t let them fail.

Marco interviews that the celebs looked like rabbits in the headlights during the first service. And then we get another clip fest of Marco ranting: “I’m waiting, I’m waiting!” “I want my crab! I want my crab!” As much as I love Marco, this is filler that we’ve seen over and over. I have a feeling that we’ll get approximately ten minutes of new footage tonight.

“I never complain in restaurants because I believe that chefs spit in the food… which we have, actually.” Ade’s comment  completes a montage of crabby customers.

Next up is the Jody package. “Fucking wanker”, “tosser” and “cock”, to quote Ade and Anthea. The Jody reminiscing leads us into a “best of” sackings – Jody, Grant and then Anthea. We’re 15 minutes in and I might as well be reading my own recaps or watching the recordings. I do get to see the Bruce departure for the first time, however, so that’s good. I wonder whether he quit just before the public vote started because he wasn’t sure that he’d have much support against Ade, Linda and Danielle. Not that his “my wife needs me” reason wasn’t enough *snort*.

We are finally back in the “present”. Ade and Linda are opening Marco’s last missive. They read it in unison. Marco’s cooking breakfast! And Ade’s daughters are joining them! They all “blub”. And then Linda’s “friend Gary” turns up. More blubbing.

After breakfast, Marco gives Ade and Linda their last “mission” – “their toughest task yet”. Marco is having a guest for lunch and it’s Raymond Blanc. Our celebs have an hour to turn out a starter and main each. Ade suffers a bit of prep fright, then decides on pheasants eggs and Linda sticks with her old favourite, the crab. Ade, fortunately, has a plan B for when his pheasants eggs won’t crack: the “huntsman’s breakfast” from the earlier egg challenge. Raymond thinks a poached goose egg might have been better than the boiled one.  Linda’s crab dish is noted for its “simplicity”, but M. Blanc doesn’t explain if that means he likes it or not.

Claudia’s in the dining room canvassing the level of support for our two finalists – so far three for Linda and one for Ade.

Back to the lunch for Raymond. Both Linda and Ade seem to be getting frustrated. Ade’s happy with the meat and vegies, but feels that the sauce ruined the plate. Raymond agrees, and suggests that the sauce should have been on the side. Still, he loves the lamb. Linda’s hoping her main course makes up for her starter and Raymond seems to like her salmon.  So, who wins?  Raymond liked Ade’s starter best, but loved Linda’s main, which makes Linda the overall winner of this challenge. Precedent says that the challenge winner loses the war – will this be true tonight? We’ve only got 20 minutes left to find out.  Ade’s confused by the verdict – he thinks Linda’s starter was superior, but that his main course was the best. “Perverse,” he muses.

Now, the bombshell! Marco’s not going to be in the restaurant tonight. As compensation, each celeb is allowed to choose two of their former colleagues to help them achieve service. Ade generously allows Linda to choose Bruce, and then he takes Danielle and Niomi. Linda completes her team with Anthea. It seems that Linda definitely has the stronger team, on paper. Her team gets the red bandanas and Ade’s team is yellow.

Linda’s team gets off to a good start, although it does seem like Anthea is in charge, not that Linda minds. Anthea notes that not only has Linda never worked the pass, she’s always been right up the back. Lucky Anthea’s there to run the whole thing! “Anthea was a take charge woman – that’s why I chose her!” says Linda.

Ade’s also looking at a different style of leadership: “dictatorial consensus. I decided how it was to be done and then we all agreed.”

Reds are falling behind, and Linda’s having trouble understanding Bruce’s accent. Still, there’s not quite the level of madness the previews suggested. Ade does a bit of hand-burning in honour of Marco and Danielle appears to be calmly marshalling orders. Anthea and Bruce are working hard – Linda acknowledges that she was “lucky” to be with them. Ade realises that he’s about to send out a lump of raw lamb, so pulls Marco’s stunt of halving it and bunging it on the grill. Claudia pulls him out for an interview and asks what else he’s learned from Marco: “to be very, very tired”. We get Ade highlights.

Linda obviously didn’t learn Marco’s meat trick, as one of her customers is pretty much having to slaughter the lamb himself. He returns the dish to the pass and Anthea and Linda prepare a new one for him. Ade’s team finishes! Yay – they’re done first! Except that a customer brings an “overcooked, cold” dish back, so another one must be prepared. That’s a bit of an anti-climax. I’m not sure how “Britain” is going to be able to choose a winner, since we haven’t seen much of our two finalists in this service. Now it’s time for Linda’s highlights. She reiterates that she’s going to have “Ade withdrawal” and Claudia asks what her favourite English word is. After some consideration, she chooses “wanker”. Judging by the reaction she gets from the diners, she could well win just from that.

Teams are now lined up in the kitchen for Marco’s final address. He says that he underestimated Ade and that he’s very proud of Ade’s achievement tonight. He acknowledges that Linda worked hard as usual and that she’s a “very graceful lady”. Ade notes that his team enjoyed the evening and “had fun”.

Nick comes in for the final diners’ verdict. I shall have Nick withdrawal. Linda and her team get lots of compliments. Ade also gets compliments, including (for the veal) “once in every life time/comes a dish like this”, but nobody seems to respond to the reference.

Marco delivers the final marks: Linda 7/10, Ade 9/10. So, that’s it then! Ade wins!

Ah, but wait. We must wait for the phone verdict…

“The vote was incredibly close.” Ade mouths the cliché as Claudia says it.

LINDA!!! Confetti, squeals, and… is that Jordan?

The Food channel promises double Hell’s Kitchen from next week, but it’s the US version, so no substitute at all.

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*Because the final episode is next week.

There are only two celebs left in the kitchen and the pressure is on. How will they manage to serve diners and maintain calm in the face of Marco’s clam mantra? Hopefully, they won’t; meltdowns are far more entertaining than ruthless efficiency (except when it comes to public transport, Connex).

Claudia reminds us that Danielle has recently departed and that our two finalists are Ade and Linda. “A journey without knowledge is just a mystery tour” according to Marco. Claudia shares this with us as an awkward segue to a recap of last episode’s eviction (the “unbearable agony” of waiting to hear who was out was an improvement over listening to Marco’s proverbs is how that link was made. Clumsy, yes). In this version of the announcement we follow first-to-be-safe Linda as she heads back into the kitchen sobbing and getting a warm hug from Marco. “I don’t want them to go!” she weeps, clearly not understanding that they won’t BOTH be going. “The British were generous,” she interviews, and adds “How sweet England is!”. The cameras are still on Linda as Claudia announces that Ade will be joining her in the final. “Oh, no!” she screams. But then claps, so it’s all okay.

Ade is very flattered and happy. Also somewhat amused that he and Linda are the finalists in a cooking competition. “Who would have thought that would happen, twenty five years ago?”.

We have gone back in time, so Danielle is still on deck as they read through the challenge for the day. It’s a taste test.    Claudia explains that Marco has a very sensitive palate, and that the celebs will have to match it. “Imagine having Marco’s tongue in your mouth,” she says.  ”How d’you think I got this job?”  I’ve really warmed to old Claudia.

Ade goes first at tasting the sauce and starts trying to identify the ingredients. Marco goes through the ingredients for Nick, as they both watch on the CCTV. Ade thinks he’s identified ketchup. “That’s ketchup! Fuck me! That’s ketchup! Bloody hell!”. He makes his version from olive oil, ketchup, parsley and shallots. He’s missed half a dozen ingredients. Marco tastes and Ade tries to interpret what the wink means. Danielle picks the shallots, oil, vinegar and tomato – and when she realises that ketchup is an ingredient she blobs half a bottle into it. Marco tastes, and smiles. Linda notes that she doesn’t even know what some of Marco’s ingredients are. “You’ve confused her with your love of bottles,” says Nick. They both giggle as Linda dashes around the kitchen grabbing as many ingredients as she can. Marco tastes, and clears his throat ambiguously.

Scoring. For every correct ingredient, they score a point. The catch – for Linda, who seemed to go a bit bananas with her choices – is that they also lose a point for incorrect ingredients. Ade ends up with two points. Danielle has three points. Linda got the most ingredients right, but also the most wrong, so joins Ade on two points. At this stage, Danielle should have seen that the writing on the wall – Niomi won the challenge before her booting, too.

Letters from home time. Linda reads Gary’s letter to Danielle and starts crying straight away. So does Danielle. Ade starts crying before Danielle even starts reading his letter from Jennifer. As Danielle reads, he lies back with his face covered. Ade reads Linda’s letter from her sister. Linda’s crying even as she remembers it in the interview. By the end of this segment, everyone is drowning in tears, but laughing, too and it’s much nicer than the Survivor letters segments.

Claudia’s in the dining room with some people I don’t recognise, except that one of them is a “lady actor”, so she’s going for Linda. “This is going to link in lovely” says Claudia, for the American viewers, presumably.

Linda clip package. She reminisces about her early experiences. Actually, it’s not so much a Linda montage as a “crab, crab, crab” montage. This is not a criticism – Hell’s Kitchen is always better when Marco is a strong presence. We also get to revisit Linda learning to say “wanker” and “tosser”. For some reason, we also get – as a highlight – Bruce farting.

The next challenge for our remaining three contestants is to revisit sandwich making. Ade is bringing everything he’s learnt to his beef sandwich. “Feeling pretty bloody confident,” he says. Linda’s making a kidney sandwich (“She’s American,” is Ade’s explanation for this odd idea) and Danielle’s doing egg mayonnaise.

They present their sandwiches. “Doesn’t come much better, does it?” says Marco, of Ade’s sandwich. Danielle has decorated her sandwich with cress. “How good’s that?” asks Marco, rhetorically as it turns out. “You should be proud of yourself,” he adds, as Danielle’s about to apologise for her effort. “That’s a proper sandwich.” He’s pleased that Danielle characterises him as “blokey” and even adds a little extra Yorkshire when he says “straightforward”. Marco looks astounded when Linda reveals her kidney sandwich. Marco suggests that she could have fried the bread and served the kidney on top. He pronounces Ade and Danielle joint winners.

“Three weeks with a Michelin starred chef and Danielle can nearly make an egg mayonnaise sandwich” is Claudia’s assessment.

In tonight’s service, Marco tells his chefs that he will do the first nine tables and then will disappear, leaving each celeb in charge for a portion of service. “Nick! Let them in!” signals the beginning of the battle. We see the usual parade of famous-in-Britain diners.

Ade and Marco watch Nick talking to himself as he organises the first orders.

“Take them back, start again. Take them back, start again. Take them back, start again.” “Clams, clams, clams, clams.” Ade interviews that he thinks Marco is making fun for himself because he’s bored.

It’s time for an Ade montage. He says that he thought, at first, that the intimidating part of Marco must just be an act, but that he soon realised that Marco is genuinely scary. “I’m only his fish bitch. He’s the fish master.” The highlight of Ade’s time in the kitchen has been running the pass. He talks about bonding with the others, but says that he values the friendships with Bruce and Linda most of all.  He doesn’t mention Jody at all.

Claudia sets us up for tonight’s drama: “To say that service didn’t go well is like saying the people on the Titanic had their holiday spoilt”. Oh, good. As Marco leaves the kitchen , the three chefs get together to plan how to run the night. First, Danielle and Ade have to teach Linda how to run the pass, since she’s only been doing crab for three weeks. Her first table seems to go well. Each celeb has been allocated tables, but since the tickets are coming in at once, the celebs are running the pass together – and sometimes not at all. As Ade points out – there’s no General.

Ade laments the fact that halfway through, they were called out to face the sacking and the dishes that were underway just went out the window (not literally, of course). Marco steps in and tries to get the kitchen back on track. “We were running round like headless chickens, burning cockles and mushrooms” says Ade, which is a surreal image. “Danielle, the lucky bitch” is how Ade welcomes the end of service.

We’re back in the present and the kitchen has been divided into two. Ade is running half and Linda is in charge of the other half. The soundtrack is an 80s disco version of Beethoven’s 5th and Nick is reminiscing about how daunting it’s been dealing with so many celebrity diners. Barry McGuigan, Phil Tufnell… the star power is out of control. At least we see Nick falling over again (although we also have to suffer seeing Chris deBurgh, too).

Service is winding down and our celeb diners are rhapsodising over the celeb chefs. From what we see, opinion is divided, although those who support Linda seem to do so with a great deal of passion. Marco calls service “…the biggest mess I’ve ever seen in a kitchen in 31 years. I was about to ask Nicholas for a snorkel”. Ade is disappointed that they didn’t meet the standard they’d set for themselves. Marco calls on Nick to give the diners’ verdicts. Starters get 8/10 and mains are 7/10. I’m not really sure what that proves. Marco congratulates our celebs for reaching the final and says that they would have been the two he’d have chosen.

Ade and Linda retire to share a glass of champagne. Linda wants to “ask Jennifer if they can come to Seattle, because I’m going to have Ade withdrawal”. As will I, but not – it seems – until next week when we find out who’s cuisine reigns supreme.

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We’re down to three chefs: Linda, Ade and Danielle and the previews are promising quite the Danielle meltdown. It seems her journey has taken her from meek to minx as she mouths off at Marco.

Before we get to tonight’s action and the next victim of the public vote, Claudia wants us to revisit the ditching of Niomi. Once again we see the four celebs lined up holding hands and Danielle interviews that the feeling was worse than being at the sacking table. Ade didn’t find it so bad; mostly, he explains, because there’s some sort of quantity theory of nervousness and Danielle was hogging it all. She looks as though she’s going to pass out when she’s saved first – apparently she was convinced that she was going to go. Ade’s reaction to his “save” was a holler and pretend disappointment, as he went to the back of the kitchen with a pantomime glum face and “shit”. In his interview he reveals that he doesn’t really remember the moment, he was just trying not to cry. Awww. As Claudia announces that Niomi was going, the others do look genuinely shocked. Danielle says that she believed Niomi would win. Anyway, enough recapping the recap…

The morning after Niomi’s departure, the celebs are in their kitchen, listening to Danielle read Marco’s letter. Their challenge for the day is to create their own dish for the Hell’s Kitchen menu. They are to come up with a starter or a main and they have 45 minutes to have a crack at getting their dish on the menu. As the contestants work on their dishes to a rather soporific soundtrack, Marco is watching from his office. He qualifies the outcome of the contest – if even the best dish is not worthy of the menu, it won’t be included. Nick joins Marco to watch the competition. And falls off his chair. Marco doesn’t laugh nearly enough at that.

Linda’s doing a starter, based on one of John Wayne’s recipes. Apparently he was a friend of her ex-husband. It’s a crab dip and not so much the Duke’s handiwork, as that of his wife, Pilar. Still, name dropping of that calibre should take her places. Except that when Nick asks Marco what it is she’s making, Marco’s response is “a brick”.

Ade’s mulling over the difference between special and good, and elects to go with good. It’s a salmon dish he’s done many times before and is “steamed in it’s own lemony marinaty juiciness”.

Niomi is still there. Huh? She’s making a pumpkin soup that was taught to her by her gran. I’m guessing that grans get as much Marco-love as kids do, so perhaps Ade had better start thinking of an old person to link his salmon to. Marco likes the look of Niomi’s dish: “It’s authentic, innit?”

Danielle is preparing sea bass with roasted tomatoes, spinach and aioli, which she messes up (again). Linda’s helping out and adds pretty much a whole bottle of oil. Marco and Nick giggle at this because the oil is going to thicken, rather than thin, Danielle’s dressing. What japes! And more fun for our spectators comes when Ade’s salmon sticks and he burns his hand trying to get it off the foil.

Here comes Marco for judging. Danielle’s is the first dish to be judged and it looks very plain. She uses “rustic” as a synonym for boring, which is a nice try, but way off the mark. Marco eats off his sharp knife once more. Linda reveals her crab dip and Marco finds it very nice. Ade says that his dish is not good, but Marco thinks it’s fine. Niomi’s is “usually” pumpkin soup but she explains that this is butternut squash soup. She gets in the Granadian Gran connection and Marco deems it worthy of the HK menu. Perhaps the public would have voted differently had they seen this part of her performance. God knows why she was judged without this. She chooses to name it after her nan – Marco gives her a copy of the menu and she’s really chuffed.

Claudia’s out on the floor with a guy from the Fun Loving Criminals and he wants to vote for Ade, being a die-hard Young Ones fan. Diner Melanie – who is a celeb of some sort, too – is also going to vote for Ade from his Vyvyan days. Bless.

Who is Marco Pierre White? According to Claudia, “he’s an enigma, wrapped in a mystery, wrapped in bacon”. Mmm, bacon… Queen’s “It’s a Kind of Magic” provides the soundtrack for the “who is Marco” clip package. We get “wizard”,”complex” and “irresistable” from Linda, “magnetic personality”, “sexy” and “cult” from Ade, “captivating” and “crazy” from Danielle, and a series of aphorisms and strange facial expressions from Marco. “It’s a full time job, 24/7, being myself.”

For some reason, our celebs now have to face another challenge: to create a dessert for tonight’s service. Ade makes Eton Mess, Danielle tries a trifle and Linda makes a meringue stack. Come judging time, it seems that Linda doesn’t know what “pudding” means. What she’s created does seem to fit the bill, but shouldn’t she have clarified that? “Sometimes, as strange as this sounds, I don’t know what you guys mean when you speak English.” Marco tastes a bit of her dessert and asks “what’s it called?” which… she doesn’t understand. Danielle and Ade can’t stop laughing as she repeats in a confused tone “whassa cold?”.

Danielle presents a “very alcoholic” trifle to Marco, and he makes approving sounds over Ade’s mess, too. He likes them all, but it’s between Danielle and Ade (so, not “all”, really) and it goes to Danielle. She now has to make ten. Ten? Marco asks Danielle what she wants to call it. “Oooh, I dunno. I don’t even like trifle.” “Well, why don’t you call it ‘I don’t even like trifle’ prepared by Danielle whatever-her-surname-is” suggests Marco as he stalks off. She cracks the shits and we see her out the back, telling Ade about the exchange that has her so riled. His reaction? “That’s unkind”. He puts Marco’s rudeness down to being a straight-talkin’ Yorkshireman. Well, it gives him an excuse to bust out a Yorkshire accent, anyway.

It’s time for the celebs’ party politicals and we start with Danielle. Claudia points out that getting on her high horse about Marco’s ignorance of her surname was odd, given that he doesn’t even know her first name. He calls her “Daniel”. Anyway, she wants to stay.

Ade also wants to stay, and I see a clip that must have come from an episode I missed. Ade, in charge of the pass, calls out an order and adds “and it’s for Jim Davidson, so you can fuck it up if you want”. He should stay just for that. He describes himself as the “fish bitch” and does a rather good “Linda, Linda, Linda I want my CRAB!” Marco impression.

Linda really wants to win as she’s a hard worker. She cries that she’ll still be grateful, even if she doesn’t win.

Claudia introduces another clip package, this one is on the theme of “knackered”. Scintillating viewing, watching exhausted people lurch around a kitchen, yawning and drinking coffee. Marco notes that when Linda is tired, she’s still working hard. Ade prepares the same table twice and then Marco calls some more orders and I’m not surprised that people screw up. Marco’s description of Danielle as “lacklustre” is apt. Linda tries to fire her up by burning her, but it really doesn’t seem to work.

An eccentric looking couple – one of whom is apparently Lord Bath – approach the pass. Marco tells them he has gulls eggs for them. At least, he tells his lordship about the eggs, but the old guy seems to be as deaf as a post and his companion has to bellow it in his ear. He smiles and nods vacantly.

What were some of the dining celebs’ highlights? Marco winding Jean-Christophe Novelli up about Linda’s age; Marco eating from his knife; the celebs all confronting Jody; Marco giving Jody a second chance (and Jody wasting it); Bruce Grobelaar quitting for his wife; Nick falling over; the diner complaining that he was given too much asparagus… ah, good times!

Gorillaz signals the end of service and a post-mortem of the Danielle dummy spit. Marco is laughing at her for sulking about her name and she tells him that it was his manner, not his ignorance of her name, that pissed her off. As Marco seems about to brush that off, Ade steps in to clarify that Danielle felt “belittled”.

Nick comes in with comments from the diners. Boring – it’s all “comments of support”. Danielle’s desserts scored 8/10 as did the starters and mains. Marco notes that they are getting better: “too many cooks spoil the broth”.

It’s vote time. “One of you two will have to leave,” announces Claudia. “One of you three?” Ade corrects. “One of you three will have to leave,” announces Claudia. The first person who is safe is… Linda! Facing Linda in the final will be… Ade!

Is Danielle gutted not making it through? “Not really… I’m just chuffed to get to this point.” Highlights package: squealing at eels, cuddling lambs, waiting tables, jumping every time Marco spoke… The biggest thing she’ll take away is all the stuff she’s learned about herself. She tips Linda for the win and we’ll find out what sort of tipster she is next week!

If you are reading this article on TV.com please come across and join the discussion and check out my blog on www.realityravings.com

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Welcome to the final four. The music has changed, the opening sequence is cheesier, and the celebs are wearing bandanas, just like Marco! Naturally, they all look pretty bloody silly. One of them will only have to bear looking like this for this episode, though, as the public will be voting one of them out.

Who will it be? Who has earned the public’s loyalty and who will be cast aside?

Let’s find out, after not only the jump, but some interminable challenges and montages…

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So, I’ve missed a couple of episodes! What’s happened? Well, thank god Claudia’s here to tell us. “Three have left Hell’s Kitchen (shots of Jody, Grant and Bruce). Tonight, Marco picks his final four!” At this early stage, I’m going to predict that he gets rid of one of the women, just to balance things out, but I’m still keen to know what Grant and Bruce did to get the arse.

Our contestants get up to find that the backyard has been converted into a petting zoo. Ade is the first to discover them, when he investigates the source of some bleating. Naturally, precedent leads him to speculate that they will have to “slaughter them in cold blood”, a suspicion shared by Niomi. Actually, the mission is not to slaughter them, but to bottle feed them. Linda and Danielle get the lambs up on their laps and Linda even gives hers a kiss. I hesitate to point this out, but do the celebs think that because they got to feed, rather than kill, the lambs it means the lambs are – ahem – off the hook? Perhaps they really will be sent to a lovely farm to frolic and… well, you know the rest.

Are the lambs safe?  Find out, after the jump.

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Claudia greets us with the news that there has finally been a sacking in Hell’s Kitchen. “It was cold, it was bloody, and it took longer than expected, just like the meals”. I choose to take this as a tip that it was Jody and that Marco had to get over the idea that he was participating in some sort of strange self-annihilation before he was able to boot his “young self”. Of course, I could be wrong, in which case I will most assuredly be devastated.

Of course, in the confusing Hell’s Kitchen universe, first we have to go back to “yesterday” before we can catch up on the sacking action. Let’s go back in time, after the jump…

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Ok, so tonight we are going to say goodbye to one of our celebrities. Who will Marco choose? On what basis will he make the decision?

Claudia strolls across the restaurant in a badly hemmed nightdress, telling us that it has been “mad” in the kitchen today. That bodes well. The kitchen has, apparently, been “split down the middle. On one side Bruce, Grant, Anthea, Danielle, Niomi, Adrian and Linda. On the other side, Jody”. Before we rush headlong into the seething morass of anger behind the scenes, we are treated to a clip package of Marco’s sayings:

• Cooking is a philosophy, not a recipe… unless it’s pastry
• Self control is true power
• Mother nature is, without doubt, the true artist
• A clear conscience is true strength
• Never allow the obvious to blind you
• Your friends and family is true wealth

This segment is beautifully edited, with some gorgeously confused reactions from our celebrities interspersed into the montage. Any one of them could stand in for the master of “wildly perplexed stares”, Michel Roux Jr, in an episode of Masterchef – The Professionals. We now get some insight into how the celebrities react to Marco’s famous stares. Anthea finds them almost hypnotising, Linda can’t read them at all and Danielle finds him intimidating. Grant posits that he occupies a space very close to the centre of that “fine line that separates genius from madman”. Bruce likens Marco’s aesthetic sensibility to Van Gogh, which seems to provide a fresh perspective on Bruce… until he finishes the thought with “and Van Gogh’s the one that chopped his own ear off”. So, more about the madness than the art.

Out in the dining room, Claudia is seeking some tips on Marco-wrangling from Jean-Christophe Novelli. He laughs a tad nervously before advising that acknowledging the “privilege” of working for Marco would be a sensible starting position. Forelock tugging optional, but recommended. He goes on a bit, which is awkward, as Claudia loses the ability to tune into his accent and has to cut him off so we can go back to the good bits: Marco. Today’s challenge, she tells us, was for the celebs to cook something that “reflected Marco’s true personality… I’m guessing something nutty, with just a hint of cheese”. Zing!

What will our celebrities come up with?  Let’s find out, after the jump…

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It’s been a while since I saw the last episode of Hell’s Kitchen, due to some technical issues (i.e. failure to read a TV program correctly) this end. As far as I remember, Marco hasn’t sacked anybody yet, and nor has anyone walked out in tears. Tonight, though, Claudia is promising that Marco will be asking somebody to leave.

Our celebrities get up to find that Marco has thoughtfully provided them with half a pair of support hose each. Before they have to make that decision we are all dreading – which leg for the varicose veins? – Niomi thinks to read the letter on the bench. Anthea’s initial thought, that they would have to strain something through the sock, is not even half right. Our celebs are to take their “net” and use it to catch an eel. As she completes the instructions (“take them to the kitchen where they’ll be dispatched. You must catch your own eel”) Danielle is retching with horror.

Niomi interviews that she didn’t know that “dispatched” meant finger-across-throat. I’m guessing she figured she was going to attach an address label and courier it to a larger waterway, where it could live out the rest of its life in peace.

To an ominous soundtrack, Marco tells us that “in this day and age, there’s too many people who don’t know where ingredients come from”. I get what he’s saying (we’ve been on this trip many times before, thanks to Hugh F-W, Jamie, Gordon… god, probably even Ainsley) but I think most people would know that eel comes from, well, eel. He mentions the neatly sliced, packaged products in the supermarket, and I’m reminded of the Great British Feast episode a couple of weeks ago where he was absolutely delighting in the discoveries of the wondrous markets-of-superness.

Anyway, back to this show, with no further expectation of narrative consistency…

The eels are in a glass tank in the courtyard and Danielle (bravely? probably because she wants to get it over with) goes first. Bruce makes the obvious observation that they are going to get wet. As Danielle starts to dip her hands into the water, she’s screaming and doing the little retchy thing at the same time. Linda tells her not to scare the eels and she eventually catches one. All the excitement is too much for Niomi, who takes off indoors. Today’s episode must be brought to us by Stating the Bleeding Obvious^TM, because Ade’s first comment of the day is that “the eels are slippery”. They’re all having a lot of fun, but it looks a little less lighthearted for the eels. Particularly Grant’s, which looks as though it narrowly escapes being strangled before it even makes it to the kitchen for dispatching.

Jody approaches the task with a gung ho attitude. Ade comments on his approach as being “enthusiastic”, but Danielle sees it as bloodthirstiness and Grant merely observes: “Jody, Jody, Jody. He’s slightly different to the rest of us”. Niomi reappears to tick Jody off for catching “her” eel.

All eels are stockinged up… what could possibly be in store for them? Let’s find out, after the jump…

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Tonight our celebs are getting some cooking lessons from Mario Batali, described by Marco as the “gastronomic king of America”. (Bill Buford’s book Heat gives further insight into Mario Batali and even his frightfully dull Spanish road-trip with Gwynnie hasn’t blemished the impression I got from reading that book.)  Mario is demonstrating pasta making in his masterclass and the contestants are having a few problems. Grant feels that Mario made it look too simple. Danielle can’t listen and watch at the same time.  I’m anticipating that I’ll have problems typing Mario and Marco correctly after a couple more minutes.

Find out how the contestants managed their own pasta making, after the jump…
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