Replacing Chef Chico follows a lovestruck sous chef trying her best to save their Filipino fine dining restaurant from shutting down in the absence of the titular head chef, who has fallen into a coma. The series is currently streaming on Netflix.
Warning: This article contains heavy spoilers
Plot summary
Ella, a sous chef at the Hain fine dining restaurant has long loved her head chef Chico, who finally tells her that he loves her and will break up with his girlfriend soon.
Their restaurant is not doing great which Ella is trying to save. When Chico falls into a coma after an accident, the situation becomes more dire.
Ella’s the temporary new head chef and her shift starts with a disaster, with the new consultant named Raymond butting heads and later helping her navigate the challenges.
The two gel really well as time passes, and the chemistry between them becomes very obvious to all around them.
Ella faces challenges in the form of her staff, rivalries and discord in the kitchen, and tough customers. Upon learning Chico has a fianceé, she decides to properly focus on her career.
Ella and Raymond get close, as Hain makes a recovery as well as great numbers. Chico comes back and tries to rearrange things the way they were before.
Ella’s turn as the head chef receives a great review which enrages an insecure and jealous Chico, and he goes over the line which pushes Ella to leave Hain and ruminate over Raymond’s plans for the two of them.
However, she can’t leave Hain, which is her home and where she feels at home. Raymond realizes that and the two part ways as the bittersweet finale of Replacing Chef Chico concludes.
Replacing Chef Chico ending explained in detail:
Does Ella love Chico?
Yes, Ella is in love with her head chef Chico, whose parents own the Hain fine dining restaurant, an establishment that Chico has been desperately trying to make a success to prove himself to his parents.
At the beginning of Replacing Chef Chico, the titular chef is shown to reciprocate the love as well, even though he’s an insufferable and horribly toxic boss.
He tells her that he’s finally ready to break up with her girlfriend, confessing his love for Ella. This makes her happy but soon, he gets into an accident and falls into a coma.
Ella visits him and meets his girlfriend, who she learns is actually Chico’s fianceé. Ella is miffed and as Raymond enters her life, she’s finally disenchanted by the mostly one-sided romance and begins focusing on her career.
Does Ella go to Singapore?
Ella and Raymond fall for each other and when Ella’s efforts and talents seem to be a waste at Hain, Raymond tells her his plan.
After years of dealings, meetings, and back-and-forth with a woman who’s about to open a restaurant in Singapore, Raymond finally gets the job offer to manage the restaurant, and part of the deal is that he gets to choose his head chef.
He wants it to be Ella, someone he thinks deserves to head her own restaurant. The deciding factor for the approval for his position is Ella, who becomes one of Phillipines’ most promising new chefs after her turn at Hain and receives a glowing review from a critic working for Asia’s Best of the Best magazine.
Chico, unlike all others who are happy for Ella to have gotten such a great review, is enraged as his envy, insecurities, and failures all drive him to insult Ella and accuse her of sleeping her way to the position she is currently in.
That’s the last straw for Ella and she quits Hain, which starts struggling again in her absence. Raymond is excited about his future in Singapore with Ella, but she’s not exactly enthused, and he eventually catches on to it.
He gives her time to think this over and tell him the answer.
At the airport, Ella goes to meet him after having spent a night heading to the kitchen at Hain (at Chico’s request, who steps down and apologizes to her) and tells him she’s sorry because she’s not ready to go to Singapore with him.
Hain is her home and where she feels at home. So as Replacing Chef Chico rolls the credits, she is back to the kitchen at the fine dining restaurant as the head chef, working hard to reinstate its former glory.
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