Cooks

They call themselves cooks? I am referring to the candidates aiming to own a restaurant in the new BBC show with Raymond Blanc. At one stage of the competition Blanc's sidekick, a woman who is herself a restaunteur, said to Blanc: "I wouldn't allow any one of those people into my kitchens." She was talking about three couples who were each attempting to cook one course of a three-course meal, a course that "should reflect their style". I too wouldn't allow any of them near my kitchen for the simple reason that they seemed to me to be a positive danger to health.
One couple, a woman and her daughter, were trying to prepare a dessert that consisted of a few bits and pieces and some coconut juice and grated coconut. Hence what was required was, of course, a coconut. But how does one slice open a coconut? With a carving knife of course. The mother pressed the point of the knife against the coconut's armadillo-like shell and proceeded to hammer the handle with a rolling pin. To my amazement she actually succeeded in making a hole in the shell but the daughter had to run for a bowl to catch the juice before they lost it all on the floor. Next came the opening of a tin of something or other.... A tin? Cooking from basic fo0odstuff? Might as well open a tin of Sainsbury's peaches and pour some cream over them. Anyway, they now had the problem of opening the tin. And once more they attempted this task with the aid of 'our trusty blade' - the kitchen knife. The daughter pressed the point of the long knife against the top of the tin and, as with the coconut before this, proceeded to bash the handle with the trusty old rolling pin - while - get this - holding the knife vertical with her hand firmly gripping the blade. Blanc showed them that there does exist such a thing as a tin opener.
As they'd say in The Daily Mail about MP's fiddling: "You can't make it up."
Needless to say Raymond Blanc sent them packing before the end of the programme.
What I simply cannot understand is (a) how that useless pair ever got to be candidates (b) how any of the couples qualified for the programme since none of them I would trust to cook a sausage and (c) what are the other 100 000 people like who applied to get on this show and failed?