Local Hell's Kitchen contestant shows leadership chops

WOLFEBORO — While local contestant Nikki Hanna saw herself tested and doubted during the initial episodes of the competitive cooking show Hell’s Kitchen, she settled into a groove by the fifth and sixth episodes.

“At that point, I was hitting my stride,” said Hanna during a phone interview on Friday, the day after the sixth episode aired. Hanna, a Kingswood graduate, was one of the least experienced contestants, having only two years of cooking under her belt when the season was filmed.

Hanna’s team, the Red Team, got off to a good start in the sixth episode by winning a surf-and-turf challenge. That win meant that they spent the afternoon at a rooftop surfing park, while the Blue Team members had to shuck the meat out of cases and cases of crabs.

The roles flipped during the dinner service that night at the Hell’s Kitchen restaurant in Las Vegas, where the two teams, each working in their own kitchen, handle the orders as they’re placed by guests. The Blue Team which had been dysfunctional earlier in the season, turned in what celebrity chef and host of the show, Gordon Ramsay, called one of the best services in the history of the show.

With the Red Team, though, Ramsay wasn’t as pleased. Beef was sent out overcooked, fries were soggy, salmon still raw in the middle. He sent the Red Team out of the kitchen and instructed them to come back with two of their own to nominate for elimination. They responded with Syann, who had been cooking fish, and Kori, whose poor communication had been part of the team’s problems.

“I’ve asked you to be accountable, and what you’ve given me is (bleeped),” Ramsay said, rejecting Kori’s nomination and instead asking Jordan, who had been working alongside Hanna at the grill, to join Syann at the chopping block. The episode concluded with Ramsay telling Syann to turn in her chef’s jacket and leave the competition.

On the show, the camera caught Hanna wiping tears out of her eyes as Syann, who had developed into a friend and ally of hers, walked off the set. She said on Friday that she wasn’t the only one who wanted to see Syann stick around longer.

“I love her so freaking much. She’s amazing, she was this uplifting, great energy to have around, she brought the Red Team together in such a special way, she is such a wonderful person and a talented chef, it was sad to see her go,” Hanna said. “But she definitely made an impression.”

The camera also captured a different side of Hanna than what was displayed earlier in the season. In earlier episodes it sometimes seemed as though she might not be up to the pressure of the moment. Instead, by the fifth and sixth episodes, Hanna was not only holding her own, but was acting as a leader in the kitchen, helping team members who were struggling at their stations and expediting orders to ensure that the various components of a dish would be completed at the same time.

On Friday, Hanna said that it was the early version of her that was the aberration, and that the confident, take-charge version was her truer self.

“I was feeling more comfortable with my teammates, more comfortable with the competition, my mind was comfortable,” Hanna said. “I was comfortable, finally, which was evident in those episodes.”

Though her resume contained only a two-year period as line cook at a tavern in Wolfeboro, she asserted in a previous episode that she was more than that. In fact, she often traveled to other restaurants owned by the same company that employed her, and when she was in her regular kitchen, she was expected to lead the crew, she said.

“I can’t help myself. Contrary to what you see in the first few episodes, I do tend to have a more domineering attitude in the kitchen, kind of take the reins and lead the team,” she said. “What you are seeing now is what I was talking about. When it comes to experience, it’s quality over quantity. And I was lucky to have some really good experience.”

Hanna is currently working at a New Jersey hotel restaurant, a job she got because of Amber, another contestant who was one of Hanna’s early critics. In any other season, the two would capitalize on their television fame by doing special tasting nights or other events to entice fans of the show. She said she and the other contestants are hoping that the vaccine rollout will make it possible for them to do those things soon. Specifically, she said some of her Wolfeboro acquaintances are opening a new restaurant, and she’d like to do a kitchen takeover when it’s open.

Until then, though, the show has offered her the chance for escape and entertainment – and to reconnect with people she lost touch with.

“I got a message last night from someone that I haven’t talked to in a couple of years,” Hanna said. “Everybody thinks it’s really weird to see me on TV, especially people in Wolfeboro are like, ‘I’m really proud of you.’ It’s the craziest thing that has happened in a while in my hometown.”

Hell’s Kitchen airs on FOX on Thursday nights at 8, and past episodes can be streamed via Hulu.