History Fridge / KitchenNightmares

!!Fridge Brilliance:

!!Fridge Horror:

* In her reddit AMA, waitress Katie from the infamous Amy's Baking Company-episode was asked why she isn't suing Samy and Amy for her tips. She answers she only worked for them for a couple of weeks and this tiny amount of money isn't worth the hassle. This is the answer why Samy and Amy were never sued by past employees. Everybody worked for them so short of a time, they figured it is easier to just move on and write the abuse and stolen money off.

* Chef Ramsay's angry admonishments may seem like abuse to the casual eye, but when you think about it, he's really trying to get them to adopt his mindset that these kind of things should be absolutely intolerable to all of them.
** More brilliance when you realize that most of these restaurants are in trouble because the owners/chefs are in serious denial about the true problems. Customers will "vote with their feet" rather than face an ugly scene in public, and staff tends to stay quiet out of fear of losing jobs, which only allows the problems to fester in silence. By his anger and F-bombs, Gordon brings the dirt out into the open where it can't hide anymore, forcing them to confront it. The first step to healing is admitting the problem...
** Gordon is also quite pointedly never loud and angry with people unless they deserve it; he's more often than not calm, complimentary and caring toward servers and kitchen staff - who are not terribly likely to have a lot of say in how poorly the restaurants are run. He justifiably calls out managers, owners and chefs who are often the root of their problems or at the very least not helping matters.

* [[LiteralMinded Some of the restaurants have truly horrifying fridges]] - not merely the dirt, but it's a miracle they weren't causing all of their customers severe food poisoning.

* Any restaurant that's almost a million dollars in debt will probably not stay open long no matter how much Gordon turns the business around.

* The owner of Sam's Mediterranean Kabob Room not only forced all of his children to work at the restaurant without pay, but he'd told them multiple times when they were younger that they would work for him and not have lives of their own. It makes it seem as if he only had children so he could have free slave labor later in life.

* At Oceana, Chef Damon's epic dressing-down in the kitchen, when he tries to shift blame once too often. Ramsay calmly asks who is the executive chef, which Damon admits that he is. Ramsay then casually shows half a dozen food sanitation violations (all literally at arms' length), addressing Damon as "chef" at the end of each. Each "chef" is more and more harsh and damning. It's more brutal than any kind of f-bomb tirade Ramsay ever did on this show.

** And then [[http://www.tmz.com/2014/09/28/kitchen-nightmares-amys-baking-company-threatens-guy-with-knife/ she]] [[AxCrazy did]]; Samy literally chased down a drunk man with a knife in his hand while Amy was shouting, "Let me!"

** The downplayed version of this is actually TruthInTelevision--many people (particularly in Asia) have kids mostly "to take care of them when they're older," and the parents get anywhere from confused to ''angry'' if they find out the kids don't want to do that, or want to work in a field that [[MyBelovedSmother the parent didn't pick for them.]]

** The downplayed version of this is actually TruthInTelevision--many people (particularly in Asia) have kids mostly "to take care of them when they're older," and the parents get anywhere from confused to ''angry'' if they find out the kids don't want to do that.

* The owner of Sam's Mediterranean Kabob Room not only forced all of his children to work at the restaurant without pay, but he'd told them multiple times when they were younger that they would work for him and no have lives of their own. It makes it seem as if he only had children so he could have free slave labor later in life.

* Some of the restaurants have truly horrifying fridges - not merely the dirt, but it's a miracle they weren't causing all of their customers severe food poisoning.

* The owner of Sam's Mediterranean Kebab Room not only forced all of his children to work at the restaurant without pay, but he'd told them multiple times when they were younger that they would work for him and no have lives of their own. It makes it seem as if he only had children so he could have free slave labor later in life.

Fridge Brilliance:
** While only around 1/3 of the restaurants on the show remained open, if it hadn't been for Chef Ramsay's intervention, it's safe to say that all of them would have gone under within months.
** The format of the show invariably starts with Ramsay sampling the food, before he looks at the kitchen. Almost always, we see the food is subpar (to say the least). So before any of the kitchen issues are even explored, we see the end result.
** Chef Ramsay's angry admonishments may seem like abuse to the casual eye, but when you think about it, he's really trying to get them to adopt his mindset that these kind of things should be absolutely intolerable to all of them.
** At Oceana, Chef Damon's epic dressing-down in the kitchen, when he tries to shift blame once too often. Ramsay calmly asks who is the executive chef, which Damon admits that he is. Ramsay then casually shows half a dozen food sanitation violations (all literally at arms length), addressing Damon as "chef" at the end of each. Each "chef" is more and more harsh and damning. It's more brutal than any kind of f-bomb tirade Ramsay ever did on this show.

Fridge Horror:
** Some of the restaurants have truly horrifying fridges- not merely the dirt, but it's a miracle they weren't causing all of their customers severe food poisoning.
*** To this day, even on the current season of Hotel Hell, kitchens are still shown to have rotten foods in their fridges. This means that, despite multiple years of Gordon doing this and exposing such things on national television, US health inspectors are STILL failing to do their jobs and inspect kitchens properly.
** Any restaurant that's almost a million dollars in debt will probably not stay open long no matter how much Gordon turns the business around.
** Just the fact some of these restaurants have gotten that far into debt to start with. One would think the owners would've had sense to close down and sell when the business first began to tank.
** The turnover at Amy's Baking Company, by Samy's own admission, was over 100 staff in a year. That's about an employee EVERY THREE DAYS. Which means even ''one week'' without a firing was probably rare.
** The sheer number of unseemly, acrimonious arguments at Amy's Baking Company... all just during this episode's filming over two days... makes one wonder how many ugly scenes happened before, and how they may have been even worse.
*** Amy Bouzaglo could have well been a tragedy just waiting to happen. This woman is obviously not well, and she has shown she sees nothing wrong with physically harming somebody for criticizing her food. It's not a stretch at all that she may have grabbed one of those butcher knives and gone after a patron. Not to mention that nobody can fire her for her erratic behavior -- she ''owns'' the place.
** The owner of Sam's Mediterranean Kabob Room not only forced all of his children to work at the restaurant without pay, but he'd told them multiple times when they were younger that they would work for him and no have lives of their own. It makes it seem as if he only had children so he could have free slave labor later in life.

*** Amy Bouzaglo could have well been a tragedy just waiting to happen. This woman is obviously not well, and she has shown she sees nothing wrong with physically harming somebody for criticizing her food. It's not a stretch at all that she may have grabbed one of those butcher knives and gone after a patron. Not to mention that nobody can fire her for her erratic behavior -- she ''owns'' the place.

** The sheer number of unseemly, acrimonious arguments at Amy's Baking Company... all just during this episode's filming over two days... makes one wonder how many ugly scenes happened before, and how they may have been even worse.

** Chef Ramsay's angry admonishments may seem like abuse to the casual eye, but when you think about it, he's really trying to get them to adopt his mindset that these kind of things should be absolutely intolerable to them.

** Damon's dressing-down in the kitchen, when he tries to shift blame once too often. Ramsay calmly asks who is the executive chef, which Damon admits that he is. Ramsay then casually shows half a dozen food sanitation violations (all literally at arms length), addressing Damon as "chef" at the end of each. Each "chef" is more and more harsh and damning. It's more brutal than any kind of f-bomb tirade Ramsay ever did on this show.

** The turnover at Amy's Baking Company, by Samy's own admission, was over 100 staff in a year. That's about an employee EVERY THREE DAYS. Which means even ''one week'' without a firing was probably rare.

Fridge Brilliance: While only around 1/3 of the restaurants on the show remained open, if it hadn't been for Chef Ramsay's intervention, it's safe to say that all of them would have gone under within months.

** Just the fact some of these restaurants have gotten that far into debt to start with. One would think the owners would've had sense to close down and sell when the business first began to tank.

Fridge Horror: Some of the restaurants have truly horrifying fridges.

Fridge Brilliance: While only around 1/3 of the restaurants on the show remained open, if it hadn't been for Chef Ramsay's intervention, it's safe to say that all of them would have gone under within months.