Accepted under the mentorship of your idol and the world's hottest chef Gordon Ramsay, you must prove your skill and determination through competing in Hell's Kitchen- A month long cooking contest versus fifteen other fierce contestants and difficul...
On the ride back, Bella finally seems to have found some of her previous spunk. She goes through her ingredients and shows them to Kalyani, who nods. I can't tell if she's feigning interest or if she truly is interested in the items. Red sits at my side and her small shoulder bumps into my arm as we take a sharp corner heading towards the giant steel trident marking the entrance to Hell's Kitchen.
We pull up to the entrance. Jean-Philippe is quick to open our door and help us out of the tall SUV. Each of us takes our bag of ingredients and rush into the building, intent on getting a head start on prepping our meals. Gordon follows us and shouts out to us as we begin prepping our food.
"You'll have forty-five minutes to prepare something delicious! Make sure it looks beautiful too, presentation is very important in determining the value of food. You can have the most delectable meal ever but if it looks like shit, no one will ever want to buy it!" He reminds us.
I nod to myself, remembering what Gordon had told me on my first day here. I won't give him anything but the best!
The first step of my dish is to soak and scrub the clams. Five minutes of cleaning should be good enough, considering these are store-bought and they likely cleaned them already. Still, better to be safe than sorry. I don't want Ramsay getting a mouthful of dirt, he wouldn't appreciate it as much as that vegan chef De Souza might have. I snicker to myself as I scrub the outer shells of the clams.
Gordon walks through the kitchens with his hands clasped behind his back.
"Thirty minutes, Chefs!" he calls out.
I consider how long my dish is going to take to cook. I don't want it to be dead on the plate by the time anyone eats it. Cooking should only take about ten minutes. So I have twenty minutes to spare... doing what? I look around the kitchen and see everyone else working at a station.
How can I spend this time to elevate my dish?
Chewing on my lower lip, I grab my green onion and try to visualize something beautiful being made from it.
Most people would chop the green onion and leave it at that. I think I have time to do something better. I'll only have one shot at it though, since I could only afford to purchase a single green onion.
I take my knife and carefully cut the long, thin leaves of the top of the onion off. I stack the leaves, then cut them lengthwise rather than across. The extra thin leaves are straight, but I know just what will give them an elegant curl.
Taking a small bowl, I fill it with ice and water. Then, I drop my chopped green onion strips and push them down into the water, under the ice.
"Twenty minutes to go, everyone!" Gordon reminds us.
I set a wok on the stove and turn it to high. After it's hot, I pour in eight teaspoons of the Mirin sake and two teaspoons of rice vinegar. Once that starts to bubble, I place my freshly washed clams into the wok and cover it with a lid.
After five minutes, I lift the lid and check on my clams. Thankfully, all of them have opened, which means I won't have to throw any out.
Using a spoon, I scoop off the murky film that bunches up around some of the clams. Then, I stir in three tablespoons of butter and one pack of soy sauce. Finally, I grab some of the now-curled green onion from the nearby chilled water bowl and toss them in. I baste the clams as the butter melts until the butter disappears completely.
"Five minutes, everyone, get to plating!" Gordon shouts.
I grab a rectangular plate and place my clams gently and deliberately in an eye-pleasing pattern of zig-zags across the plate. I drizzle some of the sauce over the top in wide arcs, making a rich dark brown trail of color across the clams. Finally, I place the rest of the green onion curls at the tips of each of the sauce's arcs. It looks beautiful. Hopefully Gordon agrees. I place my silver dome over the top.
"Time!" Chef Ramsay's voice signals the end of our challenge.
I line up with everyone else outside of the kitchens with my silver-domed plate directly behind me.
Gordon waits for us to look to him before he begins speaking.
"Well done, everyone. Now, as I explained earlier, myself and a pair of guest judges will be pricing your dishes according to how much we'd be willing to pay for it. Let's introduce our judges now, shall we?"
Gordon opens his arm towards the door. "Please join me in welcoming the owners of 'Bestia', voted one of the top ten best new restaurants of 2013. It is run by the husband and wife team, Chefs Ori Menashe and Genevieve Gergis!"
We clap as the two chefs make their entrance, hand in hand. My mind wanders to if Chef Ramsay and I would ever be like that couple, being invited to come try dishes out somewhere and arriving with our hands interlocked...
"Good to meet everyone! We're excited to have been invited to come try out your delectable dishes!" Ori greets us, tearing me from my reverie. His wife waves at us from his side.
I know I've tried my best with my dish, and now all I can hope for is that my team have done the same.
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