MasterChef – Thurs, June 9 – lucky dip elimination

The losing team from the Chinese New Year challenge must now cook a dish determined by lucky dip. With 75 minutes on the clock, the contestant with the least impressive dish will be eliminated.
We start with an oh-so-natural conversation of the contestants lying in their grown-up bunk beds, chatting about the challenge ahead.


Elusive Elena is getting a talking head – does that mean she’s going? Or she’ll shine. It’s her first time “in black”. Also in the firing line are Intense Matt, Teeny Top Knot Harry, Mimi, Swishy Pony Tail Zoe, Ranger Miles and captain Chloe. But Chloe has an immunity pin and, after choking out a few tears, wisely decides to play it. So everyone has a one in six chance of going home tonight.
They all have to lucky dip for an ingredient and a cuisine.

Who gets what
Elena: Pork and Spanish. Just use chorizo, Elena, and you’ll be right.
Miles: Fish and Japanese. The former resident of Japan is in heaven. I hope he does well.
Harry: Shellfish and Indian
Zoe: Fruit and American. So it’ll be a dessert then, which is her wheelhouse.
Mimi: Lamb and Thai. She’s freaking out for some reason. Not sure why. Lamb may not be a traditional Thai meat but there’s no reason she can’t do a curry, larb or a stirfry.
Intense Matt: Beef and Lebanese. He’ll be fine with that combo.

What are they cooking?
Zoe is making a pumpkin pie. What? Fruit? It’s okay – Zoe studied science at uni and says pumpkin is a fruit because it has seeds. Fair enough. I sense an argument with the judges looming. She’s making a maple bacon icecream to go with it.
Intense Matt is making braised beef shin on eggplant yoghurt with flatbread – please let someone cook a decent on this show for once, instead of thick cardboard.
Miles is filleting a massive salmon but his usually good knife skills are failing him under the pressure of expectations. Of course, George comes over to stare at him spookily while he’s stuffing up his filleting. “Your filleting scares me,” says George. Well, George, your table manners scare us, yeah? Miles hopes to serve the fish three ways with miso soup, tempura veg and a dipping sauce. Miles says he’s only learnt how to pickle and cure food since being in to MC house. So, is Miles going home because we just learnt about his growth?
Uh oh – Elena is getting back story about her art teaching. She’s making Spanish pork and rice with three textures of pork.
Topknot is cooking Indian prawn curry and seems confident. Mimi is finding it hard to come up with an idea still, so Gaz has to pretty much tell her to make a Thai beef dish but just use lamb. She’s doing a vermicelli salad.
With 40 minutes to go, Zoe hasn’t started her oastry. Gaz calls up to Heather (apparently now a pastry guru) on the gantry to ask how long it takes to prep pastry: “Over 60 minutes.” She should just do a biscuit butter crust instead, or a deconstructed crumb thing. But she ploughs ahead anyway.
Someone had to pull out the smoking gun and tonight it’s IM. At least he’s using it for his eggplant dip, which makes sense.
With 20 minutes to go Mimi is finally getting her act together. She deep fries a rice paper sheet to make it look puffy and awesome but she’s not confident about some of her ingredients.
Elena’s pork is out of the pressure cooker and looks super tender. The judges are worried Miles is doing too many elements – Matt has told him to plate it up as George would. Do you have giant tweezers and flowers at the ready, Miles?
Zoe’s pumpkin filling isn’t quite right. I’m surprised she’s stirred whipped cream through her puree instead of mascarpone or something similar.
IM is happy his beef shin is “lush” and Harry is busily frying prawn shells for garnish.
Miles is having trouble with his plating up and Brett is rightly worried he doesn’t have enough fish on there. Grab one of the dark plates, Miles – they’re more Japanesey. He’s placed a flower bang on top of each piece of fish. Oh, Miles …
Mimi’s salad looks rather pedestrian – as Nicolette says, where are the peanuts or fried shallots? Miles could be safe.

The judges taste
harryprawncurry
Harry’s Indian prawn curry: The judges reckon it looks good. [Mr Juz says he’d rather have butter chicken, but he has the tastebuds of a six-year-old.] It tastes as good as it looks and, as Harry would have known, they can’t go past a crispy prawn head.
Mimi’s Thai lamb salad: “I looked at you halfway through and thought you’d just lot the plot,” Gaz says comfortingly. The judges look super serious and she knows she is in big trouble. The lamb is cooked perfectly and it’s clean and fresh. “The overall sense is wet,” says Matt.
IM’s Lebanese beef shin with smoked eggplant yoghurt and flatbread: “It’s easily something I could serve out of my food truck,” he tells the camera. Gaz says he believes the food truck will happen: “I’ll be the first guy in the queue.” Nice to see supportive Gary come out to play. The judges love the smoked eggplant yoghurt and the crisp fennel flatbread – in fact, everything.
Zoe’s pumpkin tart with maple bacon ice cream: George gives her his serious face. Matt hopes it’s not too sweet. The tart looks blond on the bottom and “it’s a little clumsy” says Gaz. They love the ice cream and the bacon praline crumble. But the pumpkin texture is off.
Elena’s Spanish pork and rice: “I’m really proud of it,” she tells the judges. She tears up but comes across as genuine. Good to see Elusive Elena getting camera time. “It looks brilliant,” says Gaz. Matt loves the colour combo. Cue the dreadful crescendoing hold music, almost drowning out Gaz’s “Oh God.That is an assault on the palate.” And he means that in a good way. “This is goinng to be something I’ll never forget,” says George, adding she could win. Matt says it’s one of the best MC dishes he’s every eaten. Go, Elena!
Miles’s salmon with tempura veg: “Shouldn’t you have just concentrated on bringing us a beautiful salmon plate,” Matt probes an already uneasy Miles. “He likes to make to hard for himself,” says George. They agree he’s nailed the Japanese aspect of the brief. They like the tempura and dipping sauce – but the salmon is not cured enough. “But, is it a tasty dish – yes,” Matt says.
Matt says Miles, Zoe and Mimi are all in danger.

The judges’ verdict

Those with the tastiest dishes are called out first: IM, Harry and Elena.


She starts crying when they say how much they loved her dish. Awww.
And Miles is going home. Mimi dodged a bullet there. Given I thought Miles was originally going home in week one, he’s done really well. He proved a great team captain in the Hellenic Club challenge and the show has probably given him the exposure he wanted.

Where is he now? Miles is developing a concept centred on the “Miles Pie Club”. He hopes to open a cafe in Clermont soon.
miles
And, according to TV Week, he just became engaged to someone he knew decades ago. Miles engaged story

The promo for next week shows it’s the power apron week. This has always been a bit of an anticlimax in the past. At least Luke Nguyen appears on one episode to make reveal “a secret ingredient”.

New MasterChef poll is up – don’t forget to vote!



Facebooktwitterredditmail

61 Comments

  1. Miles has no salmon fillet left from that HUGE fish. Supposedly the cuisine he knows the best, trying too hard!

  2. So, to recap …. Zoe is going against advice and wants. To prove the judges wrong.
    Audience collectively crossing their fingers hoping that’s not possible.
    Yep, in 45 minutes, that’s about it.

  3. Bob, loving the cat snap. Classic.

    Mikes says hero four times in one monologue- groans at TV. Miles trying to do too much.

    Zoe to go please.

    Also Mimi not being able to think of any Thai dishes, what about a Red Thai lamb curry?
    Love Thai food.

    • Mimi only had to cook lamb and vermicelli noodles, which just require soaking in hot water. That’s it!

  4. I know that pumpkin is technically a fruit but still …
    I hope that pastry is a shocker but the judges like Zoe, so they will forgive her.

  5. Asshats err sorry judges to Miles. Is there salmon in the soup is there salmon in the tempura. Um did they ask zoe if there was pumpkin in the ice cream? Ask matt if there was beef in the flatbreads?? Miles can’t win. If he simply brought up salmon they would bitch its not a meal. Dickheads. They never like the ‘older’ men do they. They prefer to be the alpha males. Ugh.

    • I liked the snippet we saw of her last night too when chloe and topknot were butting heads whether to do a hot or cold dish. Elena popped up, said make it cold with a better sauce, done. Lol.

  6. And they say they can’t taste the salmon after the tempura. You mean, the curry and the chillis and the spices they ate in the previous dishes didn’t effect their taste buds?
    That is so wrong. They have been trying to get rid of Miles since week 2.

  7. Zoe should have gone with her white undercooked pastry and mashed pumpkin in a pie with the wrong texture.

  8. So if it is going to be a male winner, it will come from these 4:

    Matt
    Harry
    Brett
    Trent

    They cant eliminate the guys or else we will be less with none.

    Common MC, let start getting rid of the annoying females.

  9. Oh, that sucks. And what bullshit – he ‘heroed’ the ‘hero’ ingredient more than that stinking pumpkin not-a-fruit pie did, or that limp lamb salad.

  10. Banana is a fruit. No seeds, Zoe.

    Cometh the hour, cometh the massive Ma$terchef Power Apron. Yawn.

    • Actually, wild bananas do have seeds. That being said the pumpkin tart was just a pumpkin puree mush inside of a partially cooked pastry shell. Zoe should have been eliminated. If she brought that to an American Thanksgiving dinner she probably would have been uninvited the next time Thanksgiving rolled around or asked to go down to a local pie shop to get a REAL pumpkin pie.

      • Yeah I read somewhere that bananas are berries but I refuse to believe it. I HATE bananas & love berries. I don’t want my yummy berries corrupted by yukky bananas. Stay away from my berries bananas. You don’t belong there.

  11. Thanks for the great recap Juz.
    I don’t eat Thai food, so do they not use lamb? That is very strange. All she needed to do was just use lamb the same way she would have with beef or chicken.
    That pork dish Elena made looked really yummy. I love Spanish & Mexican food. So that was the dish they were raving about in the promo. I was trying to guess which one it was while they were cooking.
    I didn’t think Miles should have gone. That pumpkin pie had a funny texture & the pastry wasn’t cooked properly. Why the hell didn’t she do it first?

  12. Ok so Zoe gets away with pumpkin on a botanical technicality, as opposed to common usage. So I’ll include it in my next fruit salad, which will be a hit, I’m sure.
    Miles may not have done the best with his whole salmon (and notice, he whacked some flowers on in an act of desperation), but how did Zoe beat him with undercooked pastry and poorly textured vegetable … er, fruit?
    This was a travesty. But i guess Miles didn’t have a ponytail and a whiny voice.

    Very happy for Elena, but I’m worried they’ve just ‘thrown her a bone’ so they have something to recap when/if she’s eliminated.
    It was also great tonight that we didn’t hear a peep from the ever-so-earnest Chloe.

    Note to future contestants: give the three gargoyles crispy prawn heads and bacon and you’re home and hosed.

    • Don’t forget to add tomato too to that ‘fruit salad’. I know pumpkin pie is a big thing in the US at Thanksgiving, but I’ve never had it. I like my pumpkin baked or mashed not in a pie.

      • I’ve had pumpkin pie and not a big fan of it although I do like pumpkin cookies, pumpkin scones and pumpkin cheesecake.

      • My mother makes a fabulous pumpkin pie. It needs to be smooth and creamy (are you listening judges?) and honey/golden syrup, and enough spices so it is not too sweet. If it’s too sweet, it’s chunderous.

  13. What a scrumptious dish from Elena. Not that I can remember anything else she’s cooked!
    Oh no I liked ‘Miley’.! I think the pumpkin should’ve gone home. Or the boring lamb.

  14. Miles was so ripped off. I’d definitely rather eat a complete tasty Japanese meal than undercooked pastry with not-fruit in it. The last time I saw something like that pumpkin it was in a nappy.

  15. Even if Mimi cooked the lamb nicely, she made a dressing, soaked noodles in water and chopped up fruit and veg. At least Miles did tempura veg the judges said was delicious.

  16. That little sad performance from Chloe was such a farce. She kept wiping her right eye pretending to cry even though there were no tears.

    Plus, how old is she exactly? Every time the judges speak to her , she’s doing a twisty thing with her body like a toddler.

  17. Why are Zoe and Mimi still there? Their dishes were not worthy of staying in the competition (but then how many dishes are worthy?). Miles did not supposedly hero the salmon but he made great tempura. Zoe made faux pumpkin pie (mush in a par baked shell) and Mimi couldn’t even come up with a lamb Thai dish when there were so many choices. Instead she cooks some lamb and throws it into a salad.

    Power Apron….NO! Not again.

  18. So fricken rigged…. Mimi should of been gone as plain as daylight… nothing nothing exciting about her dish or technique. Miles tempura should of been enough to show he did more than she did… pathetic! He had Salmon two ways, tempura, a sauce and soup…. didn’t see the chefs choke or complain about texture.. only question was about the the amount of pickling time and presentation (but when it suits them it’s all about taste).

    Full of it!

    And Zoe, why pumpkin? Apple Pie! Cherry Pie! Blackcurrent! Blueberry! Banana cream…. you had the world at your feet and you chose baby poop pie!

    • I think he only did the salmon one way; sashimi.
      But he did lots of things, which required effort and didn’t stuff anything up.
      They just decided that one of the over 40s had to be culled.

  19. “Hero” is a word that doesn’t have much meaning today.

    It has even less now that Ma$terchef has wiped it’s arse all over it.

    Fail.

    Things are coming to a shrunken head on this show. Zoe should have gone. Or Mimi. Go home.

  20. Geez what a shock result. Chloe comes across as disingenuous and Miles was gonski from the onset.

    The problem with this challenge, it’s apparent randomness is designed to get rid of contestants who the judges don’t like before the overseas trip without it been too obvious.

    Why were we repeatedly told that Metal Snot had won the pin ‘fair and square’. Repeating it often does not make it true. Just give the power apron to Chloe and save the hassle, snot and tears.

    • Same reason we were repeatedly reminded how Danni Venn won her pin “fair and square”, ” I earned it” etc.

      It’s all vanity under the Ma$terchef Sun.

  21. There’s nothing more annoying than an annoying contestant winning the Power Apron – and if Chloe or Zoe get it, I will eat my laptop.

  22. Last season the power apron didn’t even benefit anyone – no one had it for two consecutive episodes. It went from Jessie to Reynold to Billie to Ashleigh (the shy wannabe pastry chef).

    • I think the annoying Tracy was the first one to get the Power Apron – and her ‘power’ seemed to go on and on for ages. It was ridiculous.
      No wonder they changed it.

      • I didn’t mind Tracy but she was definitely more a home-style cook than a cook who could do the fancy pants plating a la George.

  23. Yummy, Intense Matt’s and Elena’s dishes looked absolutely delicious. Neither a beef or pork fan, but I would both dishes. Also thought Miles’ dish looked good.
    Zoe’s tart was… who on earth told her that pumpkin might be the right choice? :S I love pumpkin pie and made some before but if I could choose from soooo many options and have the fruit for free, I would have picked blueberries or maybe cherries (YUMMY!!!!).

  24. PS: Did I mention that Elena looks really stunning? So there it goes, I add her to the 3 guys I enjoy watching (Trent, Karmen, Brett). But she’s too similar to Billy plus female, they won’t have her as a winner.

  25. Just when you thought the P word wouldn’t make an appearance, along came a cricket, crying out for P.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *