Kitchen Nightmares

1Bonapartes Restaurant

2The Glass House

3The Walnut Tree

4Moore Place

1La Lanterna

Welcome to La Lanterna, chef de Cuisine and owner Alex thinks of himself as a really good chef of Italian cuisine but Gordons makes him realise that not only he is a "little bit of a dirty f**ker" he doesn't understand the basics of Italian cooking.Gordon also interviews Alex's mentor to the Italian kitchen and finds out that he is (now) a taxi driver and realises again that Alex doesn't have a clue.His mate Gavin who is front of house needs a kick up the backside and become more assertive... Gordon uses an interesting way of learning Gavin how to get respect...Although chef Alex has a restaurant that is going under fast he nevertheless thought it was a good idea to buy a brand new BMW with personalised plates "A1CHEF" .In an attempt to raise hard-needed cash Gordon tries to sell the plates to his chef friends who are A1 chefs but it becomes clear that not even they would be caught dead having this stuck to their car..Enjoy!-KJG

2D-Place

Welcome to D-Place Cafe & Bar in Essex is in " D-SH*t" as Gordon puts it in his opening narrative and he could not be closer to the truth...The owner a hard working Mexican called Israel had a place that was packed and had a great turnover, a couple of years down the line however things have gone from bad to worse...Executive chef Phillipe Blaze is a frenchy that thinks he's the bees knees when it comes to cooking... Gordon however makes him painfully aware of his incompetence and arrogance... he is even caught in a huge lie...The constant fighting with front-of-house Dave Bone is not helping the situation...A restaurant that is nearly empty on valentines day is a terrible omen...-KJG

3Momma Cherri's Soul Food Shack

Welcome to Momma Cherri's in Brighton. Charita Jones is a hard working "momma" with a chef that isn't allowed to take charge of his kitchen... This is the first time Gordon returns his plate EMPTY!!According to Gordon this is one of his biggest successes, and we now know that Charita has a book about "Soul in a bowl" which seems rather succesfull... The concept is simple, pay for the table not for the food, turn over your tables two or three times and everything should be smooth.. Freshly made food that gets frozen is also banned from now.This episode is not as much about ignorant and not caring staff, this is more of well-meaning people who where in dire need of a mentor to lay down the rules and reinsert the passion for food & cooking... Charita also learns to trust her head chef and let him do the work while she does what she is best at; being the host. A quick insight from Gordon reminds them of the fact that what customers spend on food they also spend on alcohol...Enjoy!-KJG

4La Riviera

Welcome to La Riviera in Inverness. Multi-Millionaire Barry Larson has established a fine dining restaurant in hope of getting the Scots to convert from their deep-fried mars bar to fancy french cuisine... but alas...Gordon had a restaurant in his home town in Scotland that he was forced to close not too long ago, he therefore tries to help Barry in avoiding to make some of the same mistakes that he once did...This restaurant has pretentious food, no marked research on what the local really want, steep prices, in other words head chef Loic Lefebre is french, well trained, young, extremely stubborn and arrogant and does not compromise...The kitchen is stocked with the finest produce, meat & poultry...Gordon tries to teach Loic a lesson; after numerous attempts to make him realise that what he's doing is wrong, he invites a food scout to come incognito to test Loic's food compared to Gordon's...Not surprisingly the critic says the exact same thing as Gordon has the last half hour... Loic is NOT happy and feels set up...Gordon has a plan for change ...Enjoy!

5The Glass House Revisited

6The Walnut Tree Inn Revisited

7Moore Place Revisited

8Bonaparte's Restaurant Revisited

1Oscar's

Welcome to Oscar's in Nantwich, named after Irish writer Oscar Wilde. Maura Dooris started this quaint irish styled restaurant 12 months ago and put £65 000,- in the place. This is supposed to be her pensionplan.. at present time Maura is losing £2 000,- a week.Maura therefore cannot afford a head chef so her son Lennon heads up the kitchen. Lennon used to be a pub chef and offcourse has picked up some bad habbits... When asked the question "what style of food does Oscar's serve?" Unfortunately as always the answer is "A bit of everything..."A good restaurant does one style of food brilliantly, a bad restaurant does 50 styles badly... after getting served his entree after 20 minutes, which is a dish that stinks and naturally does not get eaten by Gordon, He does what every other customer does at Oscar's; wait for the next course... the waiting is unbearable for most customers and therefore some of them insist in a complementary bottle of wine.As Gordon points out correctly; first time customers will never come back with a service this poor...After an hour-and-a-half his main course is served, a carbonara that has a vinigar taste to it...It becomes apparent that new rules need to be implemented, a cooperation with the butcher downstairs, a new menue, help in the kitchen, a new image all together.Lennon however after day three crashes in the kitchen during service and is driven to hospital by ambulance... It turns out that he has been drinking for years and his body cant take it any more.. the help in the kitchen now has to become the new head chef...Gordon makes a new rule (a swear box) that ends up costing him quite some pounds more then he expected...Enjoy!-KJG

2The Sandgate Hotel

Welcome to the Sandgate Hotel on the coast of Kent, 24 miles from France. When Gordon enters the hotel the receptionist seems not be bothered with expediting Gordon who easily could be a customer...Three years ago Peter and Louise Hamilton-Slade who used their life savings when they bought the hotel. Currently the hotel is losing £ 2 000,- a week so Peter had to keep his engineering job, while Louise runs the restaurant. Neither of them has any experience running a restaurant of hotel...There are four restaurants inside the hotel that all have one thing in common ; no customers...Head chef Stuart, 38 from Northcumberland, has his first head chef job and is in way over his head. One thing that is really quickly obvious is that there are 3 managers; food and beverage, restaurant and the general manager ... all this for four customers... Gordon wittingly makes a correct comparison with Faulty Towers...Because Gordon cannot seem to figure out who is actually in charge he takes the staff to the beach for a little test to find out who they think is in charge of what.. the conclusion is that everyone is running it but nobody is controlling it..So far the hotel has lost £33 000,- so the time has come for change..quickly!The Japanese restaurant gets closed down inmediately because there are no customers and the geordi chef is not comfortable cooking japanese food.. Jean Baptiste comes to help out front-of-house and automatically bans the loud and irritating intercom system. Souschef Johnny is in over his head two days a week when he is in charge of the kitchen when Stuart is off. The bar upstairs takes inn about £2 000,- /month from the staff that uses it after hours for their own leisure. Gordon bans the use of the bar for the staff but also explains why it is not acceptable for them to use it.Gordon organises an annual oyster eating competition with the nabouring town in France of Sangate.Finally Gordon gets fedd up with Louise's lack of balls and ensures that she knows how to tell her staff off..Finally it looks like everything is under controll...Enjoy!-KJG

3Clubway 41

Welcome to Blackpool, and it's restaurant of the year... really THIS IS Blackpools restaurant of the year... This is also how NOT to run a restaurant.46 years old Dave Jackson and 33 year old partner Dawn Brinley have put all their savings (...where have I heard this before I wonder..?) in the restaurant to offer Blackpool a "unique oasis of home-cooked cuisine"18 months later they are barely breaking even with a turnover of £500,- a week, it is only the ground-floor greasy spoon that is saving them from going under. Dawn is front-of-house and comes up with the menu ideas while Dave russels them up in the 3rd floor kitchen.When presented with a menu that includes tomato in cointreau or flaked salmon with strawberries there is no question on where Gordon needs to start first. Gordon orders the salmon but is ofcourse disgusted with the dish. Medaillions of pork that have been battered to death are not lifting Gordons's spirits either. The verdict: "I did not expect it to be THIS bad".. Dave & Dawn do not take this message lightly...Gordon explains the rules: #1 Just because you won an award don't expect people to know who you are & where you are.. ofcourse after a quick check no one knows about the place.. (the award is genuine however :)The day after Gordon needs to test Dave in order to see how he works and where help is needed the most. Gordon therefor invites 20 people to lunch ( which is only a half full restaurant) and explains that all the covers need to be done within an hour and a half. When told this Dave ofcourse is already sh*tting himself by the thought alone..Downstairs Nigel May is the short order cook that runs the greasy spoon. He is a hard working chef that knows his way around a kitchen.Rule #2: NEVER appoint yourself as head chef when you can't cook...Working with several orders at the same time is standard practice in a kitchen but within seconds of receiving the first bunch Dave is flapping around like a headless chicken..Rule # 3: If you lose all powers of communication under pressure you shouldn't even be in a kitchen. The customers have been in for over 25 minutes but still haven't seen a sniff of grubb.Its the end of the season in Blackpool, tomorrow the illumination will get switched off and the turists will go home... in order for Clubway 41 to survive to the next season a miracle has to happen. Gordons suggestions as always are to simplify the menu, food and preperation but first he needs to give Dave a wake-up call..Rule # 4: If your chefs cannot distinguish the differance between heavenly and hellish food combinations your customers wont be comming back for more. Pork, brie & nectarine, is Dave's signature dish but even Gordon's six-year old would be able to tell that such a combination is a culinairy no-no. When blind testing food combinations dave can't even tell the differance between the taste of an olive and a tomato.Dawn is kindly told of by Gordon to stop creating food combinations and to just stop comming with menu ideas all together. Rule # 5: dont call your establishment something that sounds like a strip-joint. Gordon' s famous broccoli soup recipe is revealed here for the first time :).. with all this work they now have to relaunch the restaurant with a new image, a name-change has to happen as well... Jackson's will be the new name..Rule #6 first floor establishments are notoriously difficult to fill.. The restaurant has therefor to be moved to where the greasy spoon is now..Rule # 7 : Dont attempt to cook eleborate food if you have not mastered the basics. Gordon devises a training for Dave in a circus to learn him what communication and thinking ahead means.opening night is just around the corner and things are looking bright.. now if they can only keep this up after Gordon leaves as well..Enjoy!-KJG

4La Gondola

1La Parra de Burriana

2The Fenwick Arms

3Rococo

4Morgans

5La Riviera Revisited

6Momma Cherris Soul Food Shack Revisited

1Ruby Tates

2Piccolo Teatro

3The Fenwick Arms Revisited

4La Parra de Burriana Revisited

5The Priory

6The Fish and Anchor

7Curry Lounge

8The Granary