Kitchen Nightmares, Season 2, Episode 10: Sante La Brea

Welcome to the tenth episode in the second season of Kitchen Nightmares. This is the show where professional chef and entertainer Gordon Ramsay drops in on various failing restaurants across the United States and shows them how to shape up and fix all of their problems. He leaves them with a high class menu, better cooks, and hopefully a legacy of success.

Tonight we find ourselves in Los Angeles, California. This would seem to be the perfect place to run a health-food restaurant. Here we find Sante La Brea, a place that is so healthy that the sign above it says, “Tastlthy!” I am assuming that is a combination of “Tasty” and “Healthy.”

For some reason the place isn’t doing so well. We first meet Dean, the owner, and his two sons Arthur and Sammy. They have owned the restaurant for ten years, and in that time it has been in a slow decline. Now there are almost no customers.

Dean seems to be a jack of all trades, but a master of none. He fixes the plumbing, cooks the food, cleans the place, and manages the restaurant. He does it all. But he is spread so thin that he really can’t do an excellent job at anything.

Sammy says that the restaurant doesn’t really have a leader. Very often Dean fails at managing the place. Dean, however, hired his sons because he needed strong assistants who would help him. They didn’t step up, so he hired Mark to run the dining room.

Mark describes himself as, “The hostess with the mostess,” and then skips into the next room. This is Hollywood, you know.

Dean, Sammy, and Arthur seem confused as to what Mark is doing for the restaurant, and look at him as a kind of interior decorator. That, as it turns out, is not really a gay slur because Mark himself says that he delights in constantly redecorating the restaurant. We see footage of him moving stuff around and putting everything in just the perfect place.

Mark is probably not the problem with the restaurant – the lack of customers is. Dean says that he is in debt to everybody, and probably owes more than $200,000. Of course, compared to other restaurants on Ramsay’s show, that is a very minor problem.

Meanwhile, everyone pitches in and tries to fix the place up for Ramsay’s impending visit. Mark leads the effort and shows them all how to place the decorations properly.

Just before Ramsay does arrive, Dean gets some bad news – his head chef Arilio has failed to show up and does not answer his phone. Chaos is impending.

Sammy sums it all up by saying that he can’t wait for Chef Ramsay to arrive because no one here knows what the hell they are doing.

Ramsay does arrive soon enough and steps inside. The first thing he objects to is the décor. He notices trays of grass growing on a shelf above the bar and asks about it. Dean pulls one down and eats a handful. Apparently it is some kind of herb or garnish that they serve with meals.

Dean explains to Ramsay that they are not actually a vegetarian restaurant, as they do serve chicken and fish. But any meal can be made vegan or non-vegan. Ramsay shakes his head and asks how many chefs they have to do all that, and Dean admits that they don’t have any chefs any more.

He also explains that Mark is one of the restaurant’s problems. Mark has invested money in the restaurant, but then he spends lots of money on products that they don’t need. Hmm. Personally, I think that spending like that may hasten the downfall of the restaurant, but that it is not really the root cause of the downfall.

Ramsay speaks to Mark and asks him about his vision. Mark says that he wanted to make this place into something that no one else has ever seen before. Ramsay pauses for a long time and says, “You’ve definitely done that.” Mark, not sensing the sarcasm, thanks Ramsay.

Ramsay sits down at a table and orders some food off the menu. He orders a turkey patty melt, stir-fry veggies, and salmon.

The turkey arrives first, and Ramsay picks it apart. It doesn’t look healthy at all, as the cheese has seeped into the bread and the potatoes are dry. He pushes it away. Mark says that he is looking at it like they served him dog food. In fact, Ramsay then does start feeding the turkey to a nearby dog (the dog is sitting quietly with his owner). Mark comments to Sammy that at least the dog ate the patty.

The stir-fry arrives next, and Ramsay looks at it and just laughs. He picks at it a bit and calls the rice shockingly bad. He can’t stop laughing. He keeps looking over at the dog for some reason. But we never see the dog again, so we don’t know what is going on.

The salmon is last and that doesn’t go over very well either. It is dry and tastes fishy, as if it is old and wasn’t properly refrigerated.

Ramsay gathers the staff and tells them that the food was awful. The presentation looked like a dog’s dinner, and the food tasted like crap. He explains that health food doesn’t have to look and taste bad.

Ramsay runs back into the kitchen and asks about their food storage. Dean says that everything is fresh. Ramsay opens a freezer and pulls out a frozen chicken and drops it on the floor with a thud. He wants to know why Dean is lying to him.

Dean says that that must be leftover chicken that they saved. Ramsay moves on and finds a lot of old and rotten vegetables in the cooler. Ramsay asks why he lets this happen. Dean is suitably embarrassed and says that he never realized it was this bad, and that his chef (who bailed on him) was responsible for keeping the food.