Gordon Ramsay is a true super-star chef. You don’t get to three Michelin stars and almost twenty restaurants by chance alone! But there’s something Ramsay is as well, and that is one incredible entertainer. The British chef managed to harness his fame as an amazing cook to also become a reality television star. Aside from his impressive string of TV shows, he’s also made several appearances on fan-favorite series.
Perhaps one of the most prolific series Ramsay’s ever created is Kitchen Nightmares. What started as a British show soon had its extra-dramatic American debut. The latter ran for seven seasons, and it made every single person tunning in to watch another episode wonder if it was a good idea to ever eat in a restaurant again. Yet, as popular as Kitchen Nightmares was, no show is without fault. Let’s take a look at the ten worst episodes according to IMDb.
Fleming - 6.8/10
We kick off this list with the eleventh episode of the third season. This time around, chef Gordon Ramsay visited the restaurant Fleming in Miami, Florida. The restaurant had been around for thirty years, always being passed out between family. Yet, what was once a favorite amongst the region, always packed to the brim, was now seldom visited by anyone.
From the Danish food poorly cooked by a Cuban chef to bland and poorly cooked meals, everything was a mess. Even though Gordon worked his magic, the owners soon returned to their old ways. An overall unenthusiastic episode, it’s no wonder that the restaurant eventually closed in 2010.
Mama Maria’s - 6.7/10
Brooklyn’s Mama Maria’s didn’t seem to sit well with fans, at least when it comes to ratings. Accumulating only 6.7 out of 10, this is perhaps due to the intense disgust one might feel upon seeing what is supposed to be a typical Italian restaurant in New York so horribly managed and serving moldy food.
John, the manager, appears to have seen the error of his ways in the time that has passed since the episode aired. He was incredibly stubborn and resistant to change in the beginning, but there is no doubt Gordon Ramsay turned it around. Unlike Fleming, Mama Maria’s kept things running smooth and is back to its original glory. Too bad the episode wasn’t glorious to begin with.
Revisited #6 - 6.7/10
There’s something about revisited episodes that doesn’t seem to sit well with audiences. Even when some good news seems to make their way to the screens, they simply fail in portraying the tension and drama that the regular episodes of Kitchen Nightmares are known and beloved for.
This season five episode marked the sixth time in the run of the show that Gordon Ramsay ventured to visit restaurants he had helped in the past. And, this time around, he revisited season four’s Classic American, Davide, and DownCity. Perhaps the fans’ reaction to this episode was nothing but an omen, considering that, despite Gordon’s help, all three restaurants ended up closing.
Kati Allo - 6.7/10
Kati Allo was the third restaurant to be featured on the last season of the show. No one needs to be an expert in business to know that buying into an industry you know nothing about is probably a very bad idea, but that’s exactly what Manny did when he bought Kati Allo, a Greek restaurant in New York that now serves overcooked meat.
The intense focus on Manny’s relationship with his wife and daughter took away from what could’ve been a pretty good episode overall. Even though it seems both made the decision to try and save both the marriage and the restaurant, Kati Allo closed only a few days after the episode aired.
Levanti’s Italian Restaurant - 6.7/10
When they say you shouldn’t mix business with pleasure, they’re probably right. And, in the case of Levianti’s Italian Restaurant from the show’s sixth season, you shouldn’t mix restaurants with family. The episode tells us the tale of Dino, who had the dream of owning his own restaurant, and his sister Tina, who runs it more than Dino does.
It’s hard to say whether it was the two-month-old tiramisu they served Ramsay or the exhaustive arguments that the siblings had that turned off the audience so much. Either way, Gordon’s attempts to turn the failing restaurant into an American bistro fell flat, and Levianti’s closed down a few months after the episode aired.
Zayna Flaming Grill: Part 2 - 6.6/10
Zayna Flaming Grill was such a flaming mess that the show even dedicated two episodes to the restaurant. Both parts were lackluster in the opinion of the audiences, but the second one really takes the cake for being completely obtuse. The arguments between the five family members running the restaurant were probably the biggest cause.
On a positive note, the bad reviews the episode got didn’t seem to affect the future of the restaurant. Even though two members of the family ended up leaving, the restaurant remained open and is doing quite well. Of course, a lot of credit should be given to Ramsay and the spectacular advertising work he did in the name of Zayna Flaming Grill.
Revisited #7 - 6.6/10
We warned you about revisited episodes, and how fans simply don’t seem to be rolling with it… at all. Perhaps revisited number seven annoyed audiences so much because it aired almost immediately after revisited number six. If we’re tuning in to watch Kitchen Nightmares, we want to watch people screaming at other, dammit!
This time around, our favorite British chef revisited three other restaurants that had appeared in season four, Spanish Pavillion, Kingston Café and La Frite. Even though all of them seemed to thrive for a while, Spanish Pavillion is the only restaurant among the four that remains open to this day. At the time they filmed the episode, they all seemed to be thriving—maybe the lack of serious drama soiled the ratings?
Revisited #8 - 6.5/10
No, we are not done with episodes where Ramsay revisits previous restaurants. It’s quite shocking that the producers didn’t decide to simply stop doing these episodes after the ratings got so bad. That’s why we have the Internet, so we can check the Yelp reviews for the god-awful restaurants featured on the show.
Either way, this season six episode saw Gordon Ramsay revisiting some of the most problematic restaurants: Cafe Hon, Chiarella’s Restaurant, and Leones. On a surprising twist, the only one who closed is Chiarella’s Restaurant, with the other two remaining open and thriving to this day.
Bella Luna - 6.5/10
Bella Luna was the last restaurant ever taken over by Gordon Ramsay on Kitchen Nightmares. Perhaps the fans were said the show was about to end and threw a fit in the form of bad IMDb ratings? Or perhaps it was the incredibly annoying denial that mother Rosario displayed throughout most of the episode? That’s what you get when you think your kids are perfect.
Despite Gordon’s best efforts, the restaurant closed a few months after the episode aired. It was disclosed that the lease hadn’t been paid and that alcohol was being sold with an expired license. Yikes! When you think about it, the name of the show really isn’t that far off from what Gordon encounters.
Revisited - 6.4/10
And, of course, we close this list with the worst episode of the entire show, the very last edition of revisited. This episode marked the definitive end of the show, and fans were probably quite sad, both because it was time for closure and because they chose to do a revisited as the last episode ever.
Gordon revisited La Galleria 33 in Boston, the Olde Hitching Post, and Prohibition Gastropub. As of 2019, the only one who managed to survive was the Olde Hitching Post, with the other two closing a few years after their original run on the show. We start to believe that maybe appearing on revisited episodes is more of a curse than a blessing.
