Christina Machamer
| Christina Machamer | |
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March 13, 1982 St. Louis, Missouri, U.S. |
| Education | The Culinary Institute of America (2008) |
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Christina Machamer (born March 13, 1982) is an American chef who won the fourth season of Fox Network's reality cooking show Hell's Kitchen. She was awarded the position of "Senior Sous Chef" (not the Executive Chef position as promised) at Gordon Ramsay's new London West Hollywood restaurant where she earned a $250,000 yearly salary.
Machamer, the daughter of Rick and Leasa Machamer, was born and raised in St. Louis, and began working in restaurants at age 16. She graduated from Lafayette High School in 2000 and after some time in college, she dropped out of pre-law and decided that cooking was her calling in life. After an apprenticeship with chef Larry Forgione at An American Place, she began her formal training at Forest Park Community College in 2003. She moved on to The Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, in the spring of 2006 and graduated on February 29, 2008.
At the Culinary Institute, she graduated at the top of her class.
Machamer decided to apply to Hell's Kitchen after watching season 3. She went to the open audition in Manhattan and was called back for a screen test. The casting director thought she was "hilarious".
As a culinary student, Machamer was the contestant with the least cooking experience and was nominated for elimination five times (including one from Ramsay), mostly because of what her peers saw as infantile behavior (a good example being at the start of the third episode where Jen was unable to calm her down over her nomination & angrily scolded Corey for nominating her) and a threatening intellect. Despite this, she broke the standing record for the number of challenges won with 9 wins and finished as the final competitor, defeating the season's runner-up, Louis Petrozza. What most impressed Ramsay was her special potential, something he did not see nearly enough of in any of the other contestants. After winning, Machamer had the choice of accepting her $250,000 prize money at once or earning it as a paycheck for working a year at Gordon Ramsay's restaurant.
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Wikipedia