The One With the Cooking Class

Thursday, 2 May 2002

Monica confronts the critic who panned her restaurant and ends up proving herself in a beginners' cooking class, Rachel admits she is jealous of Ross's new date, and Chandler wrecks a job interview after it ends.

What happens

• Ross buys up every copy of the Post in the neighborhood to keep a savage review of Monica's restaurant from her, but she reads it in the coffee house anyway.
• Rachel wakes Ross in a panic because her due date is a week away and they own none of the big baby furniture, and he promises to take her shopping the next day.
• At the furniture store the cashier flirts with Ross over his paleontology work and his gym, while Rachel stands at the register and watches.
• Phoebe tells Chandler he makes a poor first impression because his constant joking reads as needy, which alarms him an hour before his interview.
• Monica tracks the critic down at the New School and makes him taste her bouillabaisse again, and he dismisses it a second time.
• Monica and Joey stay for the beginners' cooking class starting in the room, and Monica answers the teacher's opening question and is sent to the head of the class.
• The cashier, Katie, delivers a forgotten blanket to the apartment and asks Ross out, and he accepts while Rachel fumes with two stuffed dinosaurs.
• Joey earns an A for his cookies, Monica admits to the class that she is a professional chef, and the teacher tells her she loves Alessandro's food, which convinces Monica she is good at her job.
• Chandler suppresses his jokes through the interview and is told he fits in, then explains his own nerves in the hallway and ruins the impression.
• Rachel confesses she is jealous and wants Ross available to her at all times, and Ross agrees to stop dating.