My Kitchen Rules Recap: INFAMY!
I’m angry. I’m so goddamn angry.
If you’ve already watched this episode, you’ll be angry too. If you haven’t, let me explain why I’m angry. By the end of this recap you too will be swelling with rage like a furious red balloon.
For on this night, in the MKR dining room, infamy was done. Outrage was perpetrated. Atrocity was not only committed, but permitted. And the My Kitchen Rules producers struck perhaps their most savage ever blow in a long line of savage blows against their viewers’ trust.
OK, so let’s go back to the beginning. As we know, Anne and Jennifer will be cooking off against Mick and Jodie-Anne in a sudden-death elimination because neither of these teams is good at cooking. As we also know, there is tension between Group One and Group Two, because Group Two have been shown what immense fucksticks Josh and Austin are, and because Group One has inexplicably forgotten what immense fucksticks Josh and Austin are and declared unbreakable Group One solidarity because they think this is Survivor and loyalty to your Group is a thing. It’s not a thing. Group One is a bunch of knobs. As is Group Two, but right now Group One is fractionally knobbier. Or more than fractionally, because of Josh and Austin, but still.
So they all gather in the MKR “restaurant”: all the teams (except Stacy and Ash who are having a sick day), Manu and Pete who will be judging, and Colin Fassnidge who will be loitering around the kitchen occasionally shouting but mostly just leaning against the wall having a smoke.
In fact, the terrible climax to this episode really overshadowed how pointless Colin is in the kitchen. He is absolutely no help to anyone, and while I’m not saying he has faked his credentials, I’ve yet to see any evidence he’s actually worked in the food industry at all.
The two teams get moving. Mick explains to Jodie-Anne that his blue cheese ice-cream is a bit different to usual ice-cream, because usually ice-cream is something people like to eat. “We know this works,” Mick says, even though they don’t.
Colin looks worried about something. He remains silent because he’s afraid people will be on to him if he admits he doesn’t know what a stove is.
The guests arrive. Amanda is excited to see Group One and Group Two dining together, because she has never experienced any actual excitement in her life. Josh and Austin declare it a battle between “heart and soul and witchcraft and heresy”, having been told they will be kicked off the show if they don’t maintain a solid level of dickishness.
“Being surrounded by all these people…not my favourite thing,” says Bianca, so we can tick off item eight thousand, four hundred and ninety six on the “things that are not Bianca’s favourite thing” list.
Due to their victory in the previous challenge, Ibby and Romel and Victor and G get to score individually rather than as a team, giving them twice the points to award. THIS WILL BE IMPORTANT. “We’re going to score fairly,” says Romel. THIS IS FORESHADOWING.
“Our strength is we know flavours,” says Jennifer as they prepare entree. She is wrong: their strength is the ability to seduce young men and the ability to trick idiots into believing you’re a psychic. Flavours don’t come into it.
Jodie-Anne notes that her plum and pepperberry sauce can’t be too sweet. So naturally she’s put jam in it. Jam isn’t sweet, right? Colin drops in to call Jodie-Anne a moron and then leaves. Jodie-Anne puts vinegar into the sauce to compensate for being a moron.
At the dining table Romel starts talking smack about Group Two. One of the cricket guys whose name I can’t remember — and don’t care about — says he doesn’t like that Group One called Group Two arrogant. This is a bit unfair because it was only Josh who called them arrogant, but also the rest of Group One has suddenly acquired a bizarre loyalty to Josh, so I guess it’s on. The cricket guy is very angry. Tempers are getting heated. Josh is being a shithead.
There’s one hour to go before entree is served, and three and a half before this episode is over. Mick wants people to know there’s blue cheese in his ice-cream, because he is not ashamed of his sickness and wishes to flaunt it publicly.
In the dining room, the guests read the menus. “I’m such a foodie, and I’ve never had a blue cheese ice-cream!” Andy exclaims. You’re not such a foodie, Andy. You’re just a blogger. Anyone can be a fucking blogger.
Group One talks about how great Mick and Jodie-Anne are for pushing the boundaries and trying interesting new things that they aren’t any good at. Josh says he thinks the competition is about being creative and new ideas, like the new idea he and Austin had for serving inedible bullshit to everyone.
In the kitchen, Anne gushes about how much she loves Colin, the freaking weirdo.
Josh thinks that because Group Two hate taking risks, he and Austin will beat all seven teams. It’s hard to tell whether Josh is just stirring the pot here, or whether he is genuinely suffering brain damage. Especially because both he and Austin always kind of look like they’re suffering brain damage.
Back in the kitchen, Mick and Jodie-Anne’s lamb is raw in the middle and Mick is trying to do maths, which has always been a sign of disaster.
Suddenly, Anne has a brainwave. “I’m going to come in with a ratatouille idea!” she cries. Apparently this means that she’s going to spray the calamari with canola oil. This has nothing to do with ratatouille. Anne doesn’t know what ratatouille is. I don’t know what word she thought she was saying.
Also Jennifer says “lemon cheek”. What is wrong with these women?
Entree is served. Christ it feels like it’s been ages.
Group One thinks Group Two’s entree sucks. Group Two thinks Group One’s entree sucks. Nobody makes even the slightest attempt to be anything but transparent about it.
Bianca says Mick and Jodie-Anne’s lamb was overcooked because she liked it. Bianca is a bit of a cooked unit, to be honest.
Back in the kitchen, Jodie-Anne is making sriracha butter. Or at least what she claims is sriracha butter: it looks like the stool of a dog who’s been eating Play-Doh.
Meanwhile Anne and Jennifer are making meatloaf and wondering how to turn things on. Anne lets on the secret of cooking meatloaf: it has to be in the oven.
In the dining room Romel bitches like a bitch about meatloaf, which is apparently “retro”. “I’m surprised they didn’t serve prawn cocktail,” he smirks. John tells him that they served seafood cocktail in their instant restaurant and got tens from both judges. Romel has no answer to that, because he can’t stand the heat. Andy says meatloaf is boring. Lisa says meatloaf is interesting. It’s like the Sharks and the Jets in here.
In the kitchen, Mick’s ice-cream is not as thick as he’d like it: something nobody has ever said about Mick. “This is bullshit,” he says, about the liquid slop he had planned to call ice-cream. He decides to pour the slop into bowls and put the bowls in the freezer, in the hope that ice-cream is something that happens by magic rather than by the process traditionally known as “making ice-cream”.
The ice-cream is not Mick and Jodie-Anne’s only problem: there’s also Jodie-Anne’s hair. Oh and also their steak is raw. Throw them on the char-grill, that’s the stuff! They throw their dishes together, praying that nobody minds that the plates are dirty and the food looks like shit, or at least that they recognise that looking like shit is an aesthetic choice for them.
The sriracha butter still looks like faeces.
The meatloaf looks pretty dodgy too.
Main is served. Group One thinks Group Two’s food sucks. Group Two thinks Group One’s food sucks. Hold back your screams of surprise.
Bianca is so horrified at how undercooked the steak is that she chokes and gags and acts like she’s about to cough it up again, as if she’s a three-year-old being forced to eat sprouts. Amanda finds her display rather unedifying. Amanda says it’s weird how she disagrees completely with Group Two. Bianca responds by picking up her steak and waggling it at her. Amanda tells her not to. Bianca doesn’t understand these humans and their mores.
It’s time to prepare dessert, and you know what that means: boring kitchen footage! But in the dining room Groups One and Two are continuing to cast aspersions on each other’s cooking.
Mick and Jodie-Anne’s cunning plan to pretend that their frozen blue cheese sugar-milk is ice-cream is going swimmingly. Also, Anne and Jennifer’s sorbet isn’t really a sorbet. So it’s a good night for mutant desserts. Meanwhile Colin, who has been napping for the last few hours, starts shouting numbers.
Dessert is served. The judges break open the lava cake. It oozes as I believe is the intention. Hooray for Anne and Jennifer! They might even win, if someone doesn’t pull an incredibly shitty cheating move on them in the scoring.
WHAT.
Anyway, dessert. Group One thinks…Group Two thinks…etc. Ibby says Anne and Jennifer’s lava cake is good, but then goes on a rant about how they don’t deserve extra points just for oozing. Josh then says, apropos of nothing, that “Anne and Jennifer’s menu is a children’s menu, and for the people who liked it, that speaks volumes”. He then looks around the table with the kind of smile that gets you banned from coming within fifty metres of a school zone.
“Well, we don’t see as many children’s menus as you, brah,” says…Victor? Someone, anyway. The important thing is, it shuts Josh right up and hopefully there’ll be a lot more abuse aimed at him in the future.
It is time for the scoring, which means it’s time for the COMPLETE FUCKING BASTARDRY. This is what the whole episode has been leading up to. This is the gold-plated bullshit that has sown in me the seed of a hatred that already is flowering into a great shrubbery of anger.
Obviously Group One’s teams preferred Mick and Jodie-Anne’s meal, while Group Two’s teams preferred Anne and Jennifer’s. They score accordingly, but the scores are basically within the bounds of reason.
EXCEPT…
When it comes to the teams who get the double-scoring opportunities…
Victor and G give Anne and Jennifer eights, and Mick and Jodie-Anne sevens.
And then Ibby and Romel…
Ibby and Romel…
Ibby and FUCKING ROMEL…
Well Ibby says, “Regardless of the food, we have to vote smart.” Romel agrees. They both give Mick and Jodie-Anne TEN OUT OF TEN. They both give Anne and Jennifer ONE OUT OF TEN.
In the end, Anne and Jennifer score 42 from the judges and 72 from the teams, for 114. Mick and Jodie-Anne score 40 from the judges and a frankly absurd 85 from the teams, for 125. So they win, BECAUSE OF IBBY AND ROMEL’S BASTARDRY EVEN THOUGH THEIR LAMB WAS CRAP AND THEIR SAUCE WAS MADE FROM JAM AND THEIR ICE-CREAM WASN’T FUCKING ICE-CREAM. Note that this means that the judges gave Anne and Jennifer a score slightly higher than Mick and Jodie-Anne’s, but the teams gave Mick and Jodie-Anne a score MUCH higher than Anne and Jennifer’s, which could not possibly have happened without Ibby and Romel’s scumbaggery.
Ibby and Romel have completely destroyed any semblance of fairness the scoring could possibly have had. Everyone at the table knows something is wrong. Group Two call bullshit, in response to which Romel talks bullshit.
But the producers know they did that, it was on camera, they admitted they weren’t scoring in good faith, so OBVIOUSLY they will be pulled up on it and told to resubmit some genuine scores. I mean you can’t have a competition where elimination can be so easily manipulated by dishonest actors. It is basically cheating, and there’s no way the show will allow it to go on.
Right?
Nup! Actually Anne and Jennifer get kicked out on the strength of the bastardry, and absolutely nothing is done to the team that fucked the show up for us all.
My Kitchen Rules, you are a disgrace. Hang your heads in shame, Manu and Pete. The chance to do the right thing arrived, and you turned your back on it. J’accuse!
Tune in next time, unless you decide to never watch this stinking show again, in which decision you would be frankly justified.
LINKS! You want ’em, I got ’em. If you’d like to buy my books, here you go. If you would care to support my recapping and other projects via Patreon, here you go. And finally, why not come to my new show in the Melbourne Comedy Festival? Here you go.
