- The venue for tonight's first programme is La Lanterna in Letchworth, Hertfordshire. Twenty-eight-year-old owner and head chef Alex offers modern Italian cuisine, a taste of Little Italy in England's first garden city, and the restaurant is run by his best mate maitre d' Gavin, helped by his ex-air hostess girlfriend Emily. But Alex has no customers, cookers that don't work and an expensive menu that's about as authentically Italian as a spag bol. He re-mortgaged his house to buy the business, it's losing £1,000 a week, he hasn't slept for months but still runs round town in a flash car (number plate: A1CHEF) that's worth more than the restaurant. Running out of money, inspiration and energy, Alex is on the verge of losing everything. Gordon rolls up his sleeves and sets to work on the encrusted kitchen cookers and hapless front-of-house staff. Can a strict diet of brutal honesty, radical food surgery and undiluted energy turn things round, or is it only a matter of time before the lights go out at La Lanterna for good?—Anonymous
- Welcome to La Lanterna, chef de Cuisine and owner Alex thinks of himself as a really good chef of Italian cuisine but Gordons makes him realise that not only he is a "little bit of a dirty f**ker" he doesn't understand the basics of Italian cooking.
Gordon also interviews Alex's mentor to the Italian kitchen and finds out that he is (now) a taxi driver and realises again that Alex doesn't have a clue.
His mate Gavin who is front of house needs a kick up the backside and become more assertive... Gordon uses an interesting way of learning Gavin how to get respect...
Although chef Alex has a restaurant that is going under fast he nevertheless thought it was a good idea to buy a brand new BMW with personalised plates "A1CHEF" .
In an attempt to raise hard-needed cash Gordon tries to sell the plates to his chef friends who are A1 chefs but it becomes clear that not even they would be caught dead having this stuck to their car..
Enjoy!
-KJG
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