Last week, things just fell apart for the blue team, and Melissa was quickly ejected.  Now, with half a dozen competitors left, it's back to men vs. women...

Confidence up

Heading back to the dorms, the red team was stunned, not because Melissa was gone, but because of how quickly she was sent out.  Bonnie compares it to the main character of a movie dying in the first 5 minutes.  Meanwhile, the guys know that Melissa just crumbled, and now, with her gone, it's once again game time.  But the ladies also seem confident, since they feel that they're underdogs, but they've done better that night.  This could get really competitive now...

Fun with leftovers

It's the start of a new day, and in the dining room, Ramsay reminds them that only 6 are left, and he needs them all to take it to the next level.  With that, it's time for the next challenge; a standard challenge that Ramsay gives to every potential chef that steps into his kitchen.  Basically, they have to create dishes from leftovers; 1 appetizer and 2 entrées.  And they have 30 minutes to do it.

Once the challenge starts, the teams get to see what they have to work with; white wine, spaghetti, vegetable stock, beef, chicken, and others.  Each team has an identical tray of this stuff.  The men manage to figure out what they want to do soon enough, and with just over 20 minutes left, they are on their way with their dishes.  But the women, with less than 20 minutes to go, are still trying to decide what to do.  Ramsay tells them to use their time wisely, but that's proving to be hard for them to do at this moment.  With about 10 minutes left, the blue team is busy cooking and staying organized, while the red team is still trying to decide.  Suddenly, Bonnie comes up with the idea of steak and eggs, and Julia goes with that.  Looks like the ladies have finally decided on what to cook, but will they have enough time to make them as good as they can be?  We'll see...

Time runs out, and the dishes are done and ready for judging.  Brad and Bonnie are the first to step forward.  Brad presents Curried Bass with a crustacean tomato pasta.  Bonnie seemed worried after seeing that.  Apparently, she had a rustic chicken stew.  But it turns out that Ramsay liked both of those dishes equally, so it's 1-1.  Next up are Jen and Josh.  Jen presents steak and eggs.  Ramsay was expecting more from her, saying that he would have expected that from Julia's menu (since she's a short order cook).  Josh presents a chicken leg and some pea tendril, with some of the tendril stuffed in the chicken.  Ramsay also expected more from him, saying that the chicken wasn't completely cooked and the sauce was disgusting.  So, the score remains tied at 1-1.

Now it's down to Julia and Rock.  Rock presents Surf and Turf, with a petite rib eye and pan-seared bass.  Ramsay says it's delicious.  Julia presents... fish and chips.  Um, yeah.  The fish is a deep-fried sea bass.  Ramsay says that it's nice, but it was just fish and chips, and they're supposed to be dealing with fine dining.  With that, the men are declared the winners, 2-1.  For the punishment, the ladies will have a lot of dull, tedious, and boring work to do (that's what Ramsay called it), because it's spring cleaning time.  Plus, they'll have to unload all the deliveries that will be made that day.  As for the guys, they have a rare opportunity; a chance to get back at the man that has been in their face all season.  Yep, they have a shot at revenge against Ramsay!

Hunting down mistakes, and hunting down a chef

With the men getting changed and ready to head out and see how exactly they'll be doing that, the ladies begin cleaning.  But Julia immediately spills something.  Oops.  Later, the guys arrive at the Hollywood Sports Park, where Ramsay lets them know what they're doing; it's paintball time!  It'll be 3-on-1, with Rock, Brad, and Josh teaming up against Ramsay.  They can shoot him as much as they want, but if any of the 3 is hit once, that person is out.  But they could use some practice first, so the guys get to warm up by firing at some targets.  And wouldn't you know it, 4 of the targets have some familiar faces on them.  The faces are of Ramsay, Bonnie, Jen, and Julia!  Needless to say, they have no problem practicing with those targets!

Back at Hell's Kitchen, the first delivery truck has arrived, and the ladies start carrying in boxes of fish.  But they also have to make sure the orders are correct, and Bonnie has the checklist.  Once the packages are in, they start checking the fish, but Julia pulls out what has turned out to be the skeleton of a turbot!  Looks like someone screwed up!  The fingers are pointing at Bonnie, who had the checklist.  So, with Mary Ann's help, they go over the list to figure out what else went wrong.

Back at Hollywood Sports Park, the men are ready to go after Ramsay.  But he gets the first few shots, popping out from behind a car to surprise them!  The men scramble to hide, and luckily, none of them are hit.  They do manage to turn the tables a bit and nail Ramsay a few times, but soon enough, Brad is the first one eliminated with a shot under the knee.  Meanwhile, Mary Ann and Scott are both getting ticked at how the ladies screwed up so much with the delivery.  Over at the paintball, with Ramsay eliminating Josh, it's down to Rock.  But Ramsay is proving to be very good at this, ambushing him and nailing him to end the game.  The men are still happy, though, as Josh says that was one of the best rewards!

At 9:05PM, while the red team is dealing with another delivery (and hopefully making sure they get it right this time), the blue team arrive.  Julia asks them for some help, but they just walk right by and into the building.  Inside, JP asks them if it would be nice for them to give the ladies a hand.  Brad's response: "It would be!"  JP says he would help, but he has some back pain.  Rock says he has the same problem, before the guys head to the dorms.  Well, on one hand, that was kinda rude of the guys to not bother helping, but on the other hand, the deliveries were part of the ladies' punishment for losing...

Custom menus

The next day, it's time to prepare for the next dinner service, but before they start, Ramsay has something to say.  It's going to get really serious tonight, because for this service, each team will create their own menus!  They'll each have to decide on 3 appetizers, 3 entrées, and 3 desserts, and the guests will be ordering from those menus!  Ramsay says that he wants to see creativity and excitement, and he wants to see teamwork from them.  They have 1 hour to come up with these menus, as they run back to the dorms.

The ladies start coming up with ideas, though there is some worry when it comes to Julia, who had to ask what an ahi tuna is.  The guys, well... Brad was taking control, putting up his own ideas and shutting down others.  Rock wants to serve macaroni and cheese, but done in a fancy way.  Brad wants to call it a cassoulet.  Hmm.  Julia wants to try putting a New York strip steak on the menu, but Bonnie apparently sees it as a cop out.  Bonnie then suggests cooking rabbit, if they can figure out how.  Jen questions if that could be considered classy.

Afterwards, as the teams walk out to begin prep, Bonnie and Jen are bickering.  "Hell's B****es", indeed.  Once in the kitchen, Ramsay looks over their menus, starting with the red team.  He asks Julia which of the 9 dishes were her ideas, and she says none.  She says she wanted steak and shrimp in there, and Ramsay says that if they want to replace one of the dishes in their menu with that, they can.  So they do just that.  Over with the blue team, Ramsay sees that they're being a bit ambitious with their menu.  He asks them if they can pull it off, and Brad says they can.  Well, he was in control of this one, so he'd better be right.  Later, during prep, Bonnie asks for help with some bacon, but no one is answering her.  This worries her, and Mary Ann reminds the team that this is supposed to be a team effort.  Jen says that she's here to compete.  If this is foreshadowing, then we're in for a long night.

The difference between coming up with a dish and making it

The restaurant opens at 7PM, and we see that each customer will choose which menu they order from.  We also get to see some dishes from each menu.  The red menu has a classic theme, and includes Julia's New York strip steak (added at the last minute), Jen's seared ahi tuna, and Bonnie's bacon-wrapped leg of rabbit.  The blue menu has a sophisticated theme, and includes Brad's turbot and mushroom consommé, Brad's lamb chop with herbed gnocchi, and Brad's sautéed chicken breast with truffle cassoulet.  Somehow, this kinda reminds me of a similar situation from Season 1, and remembering how that turned out, I'd say the ladies have an advantage here.

The red team gets the first ticket, and they get going.  They also get the next few tickets, leaving the blue team with pretty much nothing to do for a bit.  Of course, the ladies still have to cook the dishes right, but Julia needs about 5 minutes for the rabbit dish.  Ramsay asks who came up with it.  We know that it's Bonnie's idea, but she says it was a collaboration.  I'm guessing she doesn't want to be the only one to blame if that dish goes wrong.  As it is, they don't know how it's supposed to be cooked; Jen says that Bonnie thought it would be like a chicken drumstick!  Ramsay reminds them that though it is their menu, it's still his standards.

At 7:32PM, the blue team finally gets their first few orders!  They get going quickly enough, and with Brad handling the ravioli dish, they're getting appetizers out at a good pace!  Maybe a bit too fast, though; JP returns one from a customer, saying the ravioli is cold, and that the customer wants a shrimp salad instead.  Ramsay yells at Brad about this.  In an aside, Brad says that he does know how to cook pasta perfectly, but his nerves got to him.  Meanwhile, Julia finally has a rabbit dish ready, and it gets served!  Soon enough, the red team gets their appetizers out, and are on to entrées.  And as the orders for the entrées are read out to them, there seems to be a lot of popularity for the New York strip steak!  They'd better hope they have enough supply for all of this demand!

Now, the men are also on to entrées.  Rock notices that a pan that Josh is using isn't hot enough.  But when he mentions this, Josh says it's hot.  Hmm.  Brad says to not start arguing, but Rock says he isn't, and that he just wants to make sure nothing gets sent back.  Back in the red kitchen, Julia has some steaks ready, and Ramsay sends them out, before complimenting her on how good they look!  Not bad for a last minute entry, eh?  Back in the blue kitchen, Josh is busy with the lamb, and Ramsay is asking how long it'll be.  No answer.  Ramsay yells for a time, and Josh says they're on the way.  He brings up some lamb, but Ramsay says that while one was nicely cooked, another was boiled.  So, he'll have to restart them, as Ramsay says something in Josh's ear: "You can't cook!"

At 9PM, after we find out that 52 orders were for red and 48 for blue, Josh is still struggling with the lamb, with Ramsay pointing out that a number of them look boiled.  Rock noticed that Josh was freaking out, and tried to get things reorganized.  Meanwhile, in the dining room, we see how various dining experiences are going.  One table in particular is seeing the gentleman served before the lady, and the lady is feeling offended.  Looking at the table, the gentleman ordered from the red menu, and the lady ordered from the blue menu.  I guess that explains that.  JP brings this up to Ramsay, and he, in turn, yells at Josh about it, since the lady was supposed to get some lamb.  Josh brings up some more lamb, but Ramsay yells that it's rare.  Looks like the lady will have to wait a little longer.  Ramsay asks Rock and Brad to help Josh, but Rock didn't move, seeing that Brad was closer to Josh and figuring that he would provide the help.  Brad isn't exactly helping, either; he's just staying at his station.  Oh, geez...

In the red kitchen, Ramsay calls out an order and starts wondering where Jen went.  She apparently went to clean something up.  Ramsay tells her to get on service, before making fun of the way she walks around with one arm up in a certain way.  In an aside, she says she doesn't walk around like that.  But a flashback shows otherwise.  You be the judge.  In the blue kitchen, Josh is trying again with the lamb, and this time, he gets it right!  Thankfully, he manages to keep it up, and the blue team gets more entrées out!  They've even overtaken the red team now, and Ramsay mentions this to the ladies.  He then notices a problem with how Bonnie's cooking is going.  The gas isn't on.  Ouch.  Bonnie then admits that she doesn't know what she's doing.  Yeah, like Ramsay says, turning the gas on would help.

At 9:37PM, nearly all of the entrées from the blue team have been served.  But some dishes are being returned, with the same complaint: bland.  Ramsay calls Brad over and asks him to taste it.  And of course, Brad is then told to start again.  Back in the red kitchen, Julia has a steak ready, but Bonnie says she burnt the garnish and has to start it again.  And with no one in the red team talking, things are falling apart here, and Ramsay is rather ticked off, kicking a bin in frustration.  It's 10:08PM, and after some more yelling from Ramsay, the ladies finally get talking again, and in turn, they get moving.  They complete their entrées, and in the meantime, the guys complete their service by getting their desserts out.  But in the red kitchen, the communication breakdown returns, but in a different form: Bonnie and Jen are bickering again.  Oh, dear.  But despite this, the service does get completed.  As the teams are cleaning up, Josh says that he feels he's going home.  The way things are gone, that is possible.

Who to target... 

With the customers gone and the teams lined up, Ramsay starts by mentioning that the ladies' last 4 tables were embarrassing, showing that they didn't have stamina, and that the men weren't a team, and Josh was a disaster.  But Ramsay is really concerned with how neither Rock nor Brad tried to help Josh when he was struggling.  With that, Ramsay says that there's no winning team this time.  He then says that the one person that impressed him the most was Julia, because of how well she did with the steaks.  So, she'll have to nominate one teammate for elimination.  In the meantime, the guys will have to decide as a team which one of them is also being nominated.

Back in the dorms, Julia is asking the other ladies what they think, and Bonnie figures that she'll be chosen.  But she also says that her creativity is better than what she does in the kitchen.  I can't really argue with that.  In an aside, Bonnie says that if she is nominated, she'd have the best chance of staying if Josh is also nominated.  Speaking of whom, Josh tells the other guys that he's tired of being the "whipping boy" when it comes to nominations.  Brad says the obvious, that none of them want to go.  Soon enough, Rock has to go and take care of something, and while he's gone, Brad asks Josh if he's bitter about Rock nominating him as much as he did.  Hmm.  Apparently, Brad feels that the reason Josh feels like the "whipping boy" is because of Rock.  But they still have to come up with a collective decision...

A shocking elimination?

Both teams are now lined up in the dining room, ready for the elimination process to begin.  Ramsay asks for Julia's nominee, and Julia chooses Bonnie because she has a problem with getting the food out.  Ramsay then asks Brad for the blue team's nominee, and he says that they have chosen... well, him.  Brad says that he was chosen because they thought he took too much control of the menu.  Rock says that this wasn't completely the case, and they voted on it, but Brad did try to take the leadership reins, and it caused them to be unsuccessful.

So, Brad and Bonnie step forward, and have to convince Ramsay to let them stay.  Brad says that he is remotely good at what he does, and he could run a restaurant correctly.  Bonnie says that she is creative, and she just needs more time to work on improving her cooking.  After some flashbacks of Brad screwing up the ravioli and Bonnie trying to cook without the gas on, Ramsay says that Bonnie... should wake up, and Brad is leaving.  Whoa.  I did not see that one coming.  And apparently, by the looks of it, neither did Bonnie!  Afterwards, Ramsay tells the teams that they need to be successful as teammates before they can be successful as individuals, then sends them back to the dorms.

Next week, the teams merge, they'll have to impress some VIPs, Jen and Rock butt heads at the dinner service, Josh apparently pushes Ramsay's buttons, Julia melts down, and someone won't even make it through the service!