One thing I love even more than watching UFC events is food. Better yet, put a UFC fighter on a cooking show and it’s gold jerry, gold.

This past week’s Hell’s Kitchen US (s10e08) hosted by Gordon Ramsay delivered such a show as they invited former UFC light heavyweight champion of the world, Tito Ortiz on to sit at one of the chef’s tables during their dinner service competition.

If you haven’t seen the show, the almost-pro soccer player, restauranteur, and now celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay berates the chefs competing to tears on a weekly basis with harsh and expletive-riddled criticisms. A Jose Aldo leg kick to the groin is more desirable than making a mistake in front of Ramsay. Chefs compete to be the top chef with one of them getting eliminated every week based on how poorly they perform during competitions and a real dinner service.

Along with that, at least once per season celebrities are invited to sit at the chef’s table in the kitchen during one of these real dinner services. It’s fun to see celebrities dining I guess and it’s also added pressure to the already-frantic contestants.

This year, the two celebrities invited in were Ortiz and 6-time world champion and boxing legend, Sugar Ray Leonard. Ramsay is always barking at the chefs about how they need to “fight” for it so it seems logical he would bring in two legendary fighters.

On to the dinner service competition, Tito arrived with his Frodo-like companion wearing a dark suit and pink tie.

Sugar Ray arrived shortly after with his wife:

Tito is then asked if he would like a drink before dinner. Tito is in training so it was interesting to see if he would order alcohol. He didn’t. Whether it was training, being politically correct, or maybe he just doesn’t drink alcohol, Tito ordered an “Arnold Palmer”.

What? A former MMA champion who goes by the nickname of the “Huntington Beach Bad Boy” just ordered an Arnold Palmer? I had to rewind to make sure. Yup, an Arnold Palmer. Half Iced Tead and Half Lemonade (Arnold Palmer Wikipedia page).

Frodo wasn’t surprised by the order but the look on the blue team chef’s face is probably a bit more telling:

Before I go on, I just want to say that I’m not a big Tito Ortiz fan. I’ve seen most of his matches, a bunch of interviews, his TUF season when he was coach against Chuck Liddell, and even his appearance on Donald Trump’s Apprentice. I don’t like him. It could be that I’m jealous of him being with Jenna Jameson, but I think it’s more than that, and when he ordered that Arnold Palmer it confirmed to me that it definitely was more than that.

Anyway, on purpose or by accident the show’s editors captured and kept a classic “Tito Moment”, so we should all be grateful for that.

Back to the competition, Tito and Frodo were sitting at the blue team’s table and Sugar Ray and wife at the red team’s. The blue team started out by messing up the risotto headed for Tito’s table. Gordon ripped into the blue team chef and Tito’s reaction was captured (photo on the right).

The blue team chef that messed up then came over to Tito’s table to apologize. Tito said the revised Risotto was amazing and not too worry because we all make mistakes. The chef then did some weird shadow kickboxing dance:

which baffled Tito:

Tito went on to enjoy his risotta and Arnold Palmer:

The blue team then melted down on their main courses and suffered the wrath of Ramsay ending with a “##^%^% idiots” from Ramsay. Tito’s reaction:

Ramsay, completely fed up with blue team mistakes, then tossed the whole blue team out of the kitchen. What did Tito do?

I looked for this picture on his Twitter account but didn’t find it. I did see a whole bunch of food pics that he’s tweeted over time. Yummy. Okay, one on the positive side for Tito.

Ramsay then remarked to Tito, “As you can see, your team’s changed color”, as the red team chefs, all female, took over to finish the dinner service for the expelled blue team.

Tito replied, “The women took over”:

They then panned to Tito enjoying his dinner from the red team remarking “Ahhhh. Wait til you taste that. That’s good!”. No reaction captured from Frodo though.

Overall, a good appearance I must say from Ortiz. The soon-to-be Hall of Famer has a knack for making the most of his MMA celebrity. Let’s see though if he can deliver an equally successful appearance in his final Octagon appearance this weekend against Forrest Griffin at UFC 148. He just better not blame the blue team’s risotto if he loses.