Welcome back! Thanks for joining me as we dive into Gordon Ramsay’s Food Stars Season 2, Episode 4 recap. Last time, Gordon Ramsay’s team won the bar competition. And Kamal Grant from Lisa Vanderpump’s team was sent home.
This week’s episode, “Recipe Showdown,” challenges the teams to create a recipe along with a cook-a-long demo. Here’s everything you need to know about Gordon Ramsay Food Stars Season 2, Episode 4!
A flavorful challenge
The groups meet up at the Gordon Ramsay Academy. Team Ramsay and Team Vanderpump will work with their clients. And that client is Delish. So, no pressure!
Each team will create a recipe, instructions, and host a cook-a-long demonstration. It will be live-streamed across both the UK and the U.S.
So, what is the theme? The Fourth of July. The recipe is geared towards home cooks and must be able to be completed in 30 minutes. And a pair of experts will choose the winner. Some team members will work on the media team, while others will get cooking in the kitchen.
Team Vanderpump
Here are the members of Lisa’s team.
Erica Levin
Maria Laura Vacaflores
Roman Desmond
Nicholas Ducos
Peri Basel
Jess Druey
After losing last week’s challenge, Lisa doesn’t want to lose again. Peri tossed her hat in the ring as team leader. The response was lukewarm. Roman was concerned about Peri because she had business experience, but no culinary experience.
Peri has “running hundred-million-dollar companies.” So once she was the leader, she made some quick decisions. She wanted Erica on the cooking team, as well as Nicholas and Roman.
Team Ramsay
Here are the members of Gordon’s team.
Ali Schlichter
Kyson Clark
Andrew Whiting
Chuan Liu
Liz Aust
Rose Hankins
Kyson stepped up as team leader. Ali, Rose, and Andrew will be on the kitchen team. Liz, Chuan Liu, and Kyson will be on the media team.
Meet the experts
Two experts from Delish, Carissa Tozzi, who is the executive content editor, and Robert Seixas, the food director, will judge the live demos. So, what makes a recipe perfect for Delish? “Playfulness, some irreverence, and some wit,” Robert said. He noted that with such a crowded industry, Delish “needs to stand out.”
For Carissa, the recipe has to be easy enough that a home cook can follow it. Too many steps or ingredients can sink a recipe. Lisa noted that following the brief from Delish is imperative.
The challenge heats up
Each group has six hours until their publishing deadline. Yikes! And Team Vanderpump was struggling. The kitchen team couldn’t agree on a shrimp dish. Erica wanted a lobster roll, only with shrimp. While Nicholas wanted to make marinated shrimp skewers. They finally land on shrimp skewers with pineapple for their dish.
Team Ramsay discussed their culinary options. Ali suggested shrimp, while Andrew thought a bacon burger might be better. Finally, everyone decided that a burger screamed Fourth of July.
Meanwhile, each team had only a couple of hours to write out their recipe instructions and list of ingredients. Once submitted, they can’t be changed. On Team Ramsay, Ali and Rose were tasked with creating the recipe guidelines. Ali became frustrated with Rose chiming in and changing things as they went along.
Ali was moved to tears in her confessional. “I’m frustrated because I have a lot of pressure put on me with all the cuisine, but nobody listens to me when I try to explain that,” she said.
A tale of two teams
Peri bumped heads with Jess and Maria Laura while working on Team Vanderpump’s food images. Jess asked Peri to speak to the kitchen team to keep things moving. Peri refused, so Jess slipped into the kitchen and volunteered to help.
When she saw the team’s culinary creation, she wasn’t impressed. “It looks like a limp penis,” Jess said. After that starting first impression, the culinary team cut star shapes out of the pineapple and crafts a new dish. Thank heavens!
Meanwhile, Team Ramsay photographed the images for their recipe. Kyson led this part of the challenge, and everything ran smoothly.
Day 2
For Team Ramsay, Kyson picked Liz and Andrew to demo the recipe, encouraging them to showcase their personalities. Liz is used to live-streams, as she does it often for her freeze-dried candy business, The Candy Closet. Rose, Chuan Liu, and Kyson will work behind the scenes. And Ali will monitor comments from home cooks.
For Team Vanderpump, Peri decided that she, Roman, Jess, and Maria Laura would work in production. That left Erica and Nicholas for the demo. Then, Lisa checked in on her team. She was impressed by the recipe and asked her team to demo it for her.
Meanwhile, Gordon popped in to check on Team Ramsay’s progress. He looked at the recipe. Not only were burger buns missing, but so was the bacon. Oopsy! “Right now, my team looks like a bunch of idiots,” Gordon said in his confessional. Now, Liz and Andrew need to mention the missing ingredients during the demo – somehow.
First demo – Team Ramsay
It’s time for the demos! Home cooks were in the studio at individual stations, along with Gordon and Lisa. And the two Delish experts were posing as home cooks in the studio. When they went live, Rose directed Liz and Andrew as they hosted. Their burger was called The Firecracker.
Andrew mentioned off the top that some surprise ingredients were missing from the list. Namely the pretzel bun and bacon. The in-studio cooks were confused, as were the home cooks.
And Liz didn’t speak to the audience. She just smiled when she was alone on camera. Gordon sprinted up to the front and told Liz to speak. And time ran out before they finished.
Second Demo – Team Vanderpump
Peri decided that Roman would direct the team, while she watched the live feed and the comments. Then Erica and Nicholas went live to demo their Star-Spangled Shrimp Skewers. Nicholas discussed all the ingredients, which wasted valuable time.
Meanwhile, Gordon was throwing his juiced limes at Lisa. I love their dynamic. The team gave clear directions, which the home audience loved.
But their undoing was the pineapple stars. Everyone in the studio was struggling to cut them out. However, Lisa was concerned that Peri wasn’t leaving her post to help her team. And the at-home audience was angry because they couldn’t cut their pineapple into shapes.
When Nicholas gave instructions for the skewers, he went quickly, surprising the home cooks. They managed to finish before the clock ran out, but even Gordon and Lisa were racing to finish their dish.
Then the experts weighed in with Lisa and Gordon. Robert commented that he liked Team Vanderpump’s “playfulness.” Carissa noted that their demo was “entertaining” but she had difficulty completing the dish in time. Gordon added that there were a lot of steps to the recipe.
So, how did Team Ramsay fare? Robert felt that the recipe and the presentation didn’t align. Sometimes it seemed like the team was “riffing.” Carissa felt that the demo didn’t provide exact directions and was “loose.” Gordon trumpeted the final result as being surprised. But what about the missing ingredients?
Who won the challenge?
The teams gathered to hear the results. They were shocked that their client, Delish, had two undercover experts cooking along with them in the studio.
Gordon explained that Carissa and Robert had a difficult time deciding the winner because it was a close competition. Delish graded the recipes up to five stars. Team Ramsay received three stars, while Team Vanderpump received two stars.
Team Vanderpump was shocked. Honestly, I was, too. The experts told Lisa’s team that the recipe was too difficult for the home cook.
The Grilling
Lisa asked Peri, as the team leader, what went wrong. She called out Nicholas for creating the shrimp dish.
The restaurateur wondered why Nicholas didn’t realize that the recipe was too labor-intensive. He blamed the team members with no culinary experience for not pointing out the recipe was too difficult. Finally, Jess Nicholas asked to take accountability for his decisions. Then Erica chimed in, stating that she suggested a different shrimp dish.
But Lisa was angry that her team was arguing. “I can’t believe that you’re sitting there bickering when you have $250,000 at stake,” she said. Save that for Lisa’s other show, Vanderpump Rules.
When asked how Peri was as a leader, Jess said that “she allowed things to naturally unfold.” Oof. Nicholas dissed Peri for only coming to the kitchen one time, while Jess was there several times. Lisa remained focused on Nicholas for creating the recipe and Peri for not leading the team.
Who is leaving the competition?
Lisa told Peri that her lack of leadership led to the team’s loss. In her final confessional, Peri said, “I’m very surprised that I was sent home. It came down to the food. It came down to Nick taking responsibility for the dishes.”
Gordon Ramsay’s Food Stars airs on Wednesdays, 9:00-10:00 PM ET on FOX.
