‘Below Deck’: Chef Ben and Kate Chastain’s Memorable Season 4 Smackdowns – Guests Say ‘Mommy and Daddy Need to Stop Fighting’

Chef Ben Robinson and chief stew Kate Chastain from Below Deck left the series with a friendship intact, but they had some pretty epic fights in the galley kitchen, especially during his final season of the show.

Robinson and Chastain had at least one blowup each season, but the fights became more frequent during season 4. After a season of fighting like siblings, they both agreed they were better off as friends than coworkers. So what was behind the arguments and how bad did they get during season 4?

Chef Ben and Kate Chastain had their own version of ‘Lord of the Flies’

Most of Chastain and Robinson’s arguments focused on when and how meals would be served to the guests. In one instance, the crew prepares a beach picnic clambake, but uninvited guests (flies) decide to take over the meal. The charter guests also decide to push dinner back to a later time, which sets off Robinson and he takes it out on Chastain.

“But whoever mentioned dinner?” he asked Chastain. He suggested that she refer to the clambake as an “early dinner.” However, she was stuck between the guests’ requests and Robinson’s demands.

“There are three things you’ll encounter in life,” Chastain said in a confessional. “Death, taxes, and Ben getting angry when asked to cook food.” That’s when the two bicker with Robinson adding, “‘Yes chef’ is not part of her vocabulary.”

‘Mommy and daddy need to stop fighting,’ guests say about Chef Ben and Kate Chastain

Robinson and Chastain had another big blowout during the same season, again over when to serve a meal to the guests. But this time everyone, including Captain Lee Rosbach and the guests hear the altercation.

Chastain said in a confessional that Robinson is getting overly dramatic (again) about when to serve meals. But as their argument began to reach a fever pitch, Rosbach had to tell them to pipe down. “Kate, Ben can you guys hold it down,” Rosbach is heard over the radio. “I can hear you up in the bridge. If I can hear you somebody else probably can as well.” The guests sat nearby looking uncomfortable and awkward.

“This is so embarrassing,” Chastain said in a confessional. Meanwhile, the guests start gossiping about the fight. “I’ve never had that happen in my life.”

One guest then says to the other, “Mommy and daddy need to stop fighting.” Robinson then emerged from the kitchen to apologize to the guests.

Kate Chastain and Chef Ben decide they are better off as friends than coworkers (but fight about it)

Chastain and Robinson had one last combative encounter at the end of the season. “I don’t like working with you anymore,” Robinson said to Chastain. “We’re better off as friends.”

While she agreed, Chastain seemed taken aback by his blunt approach. “I don’t like working with you that much either,” she said. “I don’t care how you feel.” He said he doesn’t either. But Chastain thinks the fact they’d been drinking, they were being too harsh to each other.

“I think the booze is talking,” she said in a confessional. “I think Ben’s talking, and I’m tired of hearing all of it.” One complication that season was that Robinson’s girlfriend Emily Warburton-Adams was often confused about his dynamic with Chastain. Robinson and Chastain hooked up in the past but were no longer romantically involved.

“Ben is so self-destructive, it’s embarrassing,” Chastain said in a confessional.