MasterChef – Thurs, July 7 – auction elimination

The four members of the losing teams from the service challenge now face elimination.
(Sorry, gice – hope to catch up on last night’s service challenge recap at the weekend.)


Poor Intense Matt looks tired but maybe that’s because they are still forcing him to sleep in a bunk bed. We get IM back story about his recent marriage and his food dream. And more footage of Chloe’s beardo hubby and her farm restaurant food dream.
Glowing Elena looks extra glowy today. No back story as yet for her or Mimi. Have we ever seen Mimi back story?
They walk into the MasterChef kitchen and realise it’s the dreaded auction challenge, where they bid minutes of their 120 minutes total cooking time for ingredients: proteins, veg and miscellaneous (sauces, spices etc). They’re not allowed to use the MC herb garden, which will make it harder for whoever misses out on the herbs or spices.
In the past there’s always been one person who plays strategically, bidding on something they don’t want to inflate the price, but it often comes back to bite them.
Thanks to reader Liberty, who recapped all the bids:
Proteins
Mimi bids 25 minutes for beef
IM bids 35 minutes for duck (after a bidding war with Elena)
Chloe bids 15 minutes for eggs (she wants to do a dessert – shock, horror)
GE gets red mullet for free

Fruit & Veg
Mimi bids 20 minutes root veg
GE bids 20 minutes nightshades
IM bids 5 minutes for alliums (which is stuff like onions, leek, garlic and chives)
Chloe gets citrus for free (oh, dear – are we heading for another lemon curd bombe Alaska?)

Accompaniments
GE bids 20 minutes for herbs (outbidding IM)
IM bids 5 minutes for sauces
Chloe bids 5 minutes for spreads
Mimi gets spices for free (she’s done well with beef, root veg and spices and no doubt will go for the beetroot)

Cooking times
Chloe 100 minutes
GE 80 minutes
Mimi 75 minutes
IM 75 minutes

And they’re off
Chloe is off and grabs the honey, citrus, blackberry jam and eggs and there’s a close up of the black heart tatt on her finger as she uses the whisk to create a mousse, even though she doesn’t have a setting agent. Everyone else thinks it’s a risky move. But Chloe has her “I’m ignoring the warnings of experienced chefs” noise-cancelling headphones on and ploughs ahead.
Elena is taking care with her filleting of the delicate fish – it’s her first time using red mullet.
Mimi is doing eye fillet with roasted beetroot, pickled radishes and some jews. She’s using a fennel and mustard rub on her beef.
IM is doing crispy skinned duck breast and braised duck leg with a Chinese-style soz.
It’s a worry GE still doesn’t know what her dish will be, even though she had 20 minutes of watching Chloe cook.
IM has had to use a jar of bought soz to simmer with his duck bones, but he’s happy with the taste… until Other Matt comes over. “You might want to have a little back-up plan,” OM says. Uh oh. Don’t panic, IM – you can do it. Hell, without you being in the challenge tonight I wouldn’t have bothered to Google what “allium” met
How will IM save his soz? Smoke it? Freeze it into a parfait in the red moulds of death? Add it to liquid nitrogen?
After 35 minutes Elena has finished her filleting and creates a charred nightshade soz with chilli, eggplant and tomatoes.
Chloe is getting a lot of talking head time about how flustered she is and how things aren’t working.
Mimi is making charred beetroot leaf butter by blitzing burnt leaves with a butter sauce. When did burning everything get so cool? I’ve been on trend for years without even realising.
IM decides the solution to his soz dilemma is butter – genius!
Oh god – George is doing his “yes, George” thing. Urgh (it’s the same reaction I had upon learning Pauline was back in the Senate).
Another talking head from Chloe about her iffy mousse. The judges head to the fridge for a taste and point out it’s very soft. If only there was some kind of freezing device nearby.
Mimi gives her beef a little squeeze. “How does it feel?” Brett the Protein Man asks her from the gantry.
Elena is deepfrying her red mullet wings and panfrying the fillets in butter – you can see how delicate they are. Her plate looks gorgeous.
Mimi is taking her time to make her beef dish look fancy, topping it with some leftover burnt beetroot leaves. Chloe is having curd dramas and then discovers her mousse has set too much.

THE JUDGES TASTE


IM’s duck two ways with onions and a char sui jus: This whole soz bizzo better be a misdirect. If IM goes and Chloe stays there will be rioting in the streets. Gaz loves the look of the dish. As George dishes up I notice he’s wearing the same bead bracelet as Chloe – do Swisse make healing bracelets?


The judges love the perfectly cooked duck but aren’t keen on the sweet yet salty sauce. OM says IM should have left the soz off.


GE’s red mullet fillets with nightshade sauce and salad: She looks confident. OM says it looks spectacular. Here comes the swelling music of triumph. “Can’t fault it,” says Gaz. “Incredible,” says George. OM says she could win the comp.


Mimi’s eye filet with roast beetroot: She explains the dish as George stick his schnozz in the soz bottle. Her use of beet leaves is on trend. Gaz says the leaves are a bit like a nori sheet. They like it.
Chloe’s honey mousse with orange curd, butter wafer and blackberry sauce: “Is that a mousse, is that an ice cream or is that a parfait?” asks OM, brow furrowing at the rapidly melting quenelle on the plate. “I think it’s a mousse,” says a worried-looking Chloe. Apart from the wafer, they could do with a straw for this dessert. “What a shame,” says Gaz. “That mousse is an absolute disaster.” It froze and then collapsed. And the curd was undercooked.

The judges decide
Elena gets the standout dish award. Gaz says they knew straight away which dish would send its maker home … and Chloe’s gone. George says he’s loved watching her “po-gress” and then does his “yes, George” again. Stop it, already!

Where is she now?
Chloe is launching Bowles Family Sauces, starting with her favourite – butterscotch. She also has plans to open her own bistro.

The announcement
Enough with the teasing … George lifts a cloche and reveals s Sydney tourist trinket and says they are going on a trip. But then OM tops it with his own cloche with a souvenir of the San Francisco Golden Gate Bridge. Trent and Elise get to go bizzo class because they won yesterday. Fair enough – Trent needs to the extra elbow room to fit his shoulders in.



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60 Comments

  1. California, here I come
    Right back where I started from
    Where bowers are flowers bloom in the spring
    Each morning at dawning
    Birdies sing and everything
    A sun kissed miss said “Don’t be late!”
    That’s why I can hardly plate,
    Open up that Golden Gate!
    California, here I come!

    Al Jowl$on.

  2. Proteins
    Mimi bids 25 minutes for beef
    Matt bids 35 minutes for duck
    Chloe bids 15 minutes for eggs
    Elena gets red mullet for free

    Fruit & Veg
    Mimi bids 20 minutes Root Vegs
    Elena bids 20 minutes Nightshades
    Matt bids 5 minutes for Alliums
    Chloe gets citrus for free

    Accompaniments
    Elena bids 20 minutes for herbs
    Matt bids 5 minutes for sauces
    Chloe bids 5 minutes for spreads
    Mimi gets spices for free

    Chloe 100 minutes cook time
    Elena 80 minutes cook time
    Mimi 75 minutes cook time
    Matt 75 minutes cook time

  3. When you can only cook with what you bid, Matt P is whingeing about the balance from bottle sauces. What else can you do when that are all you have??

    • Yeah, when Matt asked him if it tasted like a sauce made on MasterChef I thought no because it’s from a bottle as that is part of the challenge. Duh

  4. “I can’t believe this is happening to me!” Says Chloe who had more time to cook than the others, got the citrus she wanted for nothing and decided to make a dessert. Clearly it’s someone else’s fault 😉
    I thought mousse would set without gelatin if you used egg whites and cream?

  5. I feel sorry for whoever goes tonight. It would be so hard to come so close to the trip and just miss out.

    • Chloe’s going to America in August with her b/f and she’ll be spared what I imagine is a gruelling Ma$terchef shooting schedule. It’s probably not all gloom and doom for her.

  6. Chloe may go.
    One mousse/ parfait/dessert too many
    She has had a lot of airtime this episode.
    Surely Matt will be safe.

  7. So Chloe doesn’t know what her dessert is anymore. Let’s just go for pannacotta. Why change the habit of a mediocre season and i guarantee none of this lot would know the difference.

  8. I’m a half hour behind and things aren’t looking great for Chloe. I’ve just had ~“I can’t believe this is happening to me!”. Yeah? There’s going to be a heartache tonight.

    It’s your parfait and you better cry if you want to……. go to California.

  9. Well what a difference 100 minutes makes.
    At the start, Chloe looked so pleased with herself, with her basket and extra time … she could smell success.
    Then tears and disbelief. Don’t they recognise genius?
    Oh well, back to the cows and tattoo parlours.

    So glad that Matt survived following those scurrilous accusations about his sauce. He said it tasted good, and that’s fine with me.
    Preston & Co were just looking to find fault, seeing they were practically prostrating themselves over a piece of fish.

    A portrait of George has won the Archibald’s Packing Room prize.
    He looks like a murderous butcher.

  10. Great end to the week, Theresa and Chloe both gone! It had been coming for Chloe, nobody cooked worse to save her this time. Looking forward to overseas week, they haven’t had one for awhile.

    • They make out it was some big surprise for them, but they would have been told when they got through to make sure they had a passport so they probably would have realised an overseas trip at some time.

      • Sometimes they have to reshoot some of the scenes just to get it right. I am sick of those pretend over excitement when they announced the arrival of guest chefs.

        With the passports, it is a requirement that you have a valid passport when applying.

  11. Chloe’s failure was her own. Judges gave her advice and she didn’t listen BUT Heston did make a mousse with only 2 ingredients and no setting agent, didn’t he? Obvious she was going to be eliminated by the looks of the dish. Nothing interesting about the dish to begin with.
    Why did George stick his nose in Mimi’s jus? That was gross.
    Anyone know if they get to take in the sights when they travel? Perhaps go to some of the California attractions instead of just cooking.
    The girls should just throw in the towel since this is the year of a male winner but maybe they will surprise us this year and Elena, Mimi or Elise will be MC 2016. The probability of that is VERY low but then I didn’t think Chloe would be eliminated and it was a pleasant surprise that she is gone.

      • Didn’t she have sugar and cream available? She could have made a simple modified mousse with whipped cream and sugar although I do realize she was creating a honey mousse. Also she would have needed more refrigeration time to do it this way. There were other things she could have made instead of going with the same old curd & mousse thing.

        • I honestly have no idea how she failed at that. She had eggs. So egg yolks are a perfect thickening agent… I did so many mousses using egg yolks and it was never runny.

  12. Great, now Chloe’s gone Mimi can make all the not quite right desserts, and the smug faces.

    Thank God Intense Matt stayed. I was ready to belt Elena every time she pushed the price of something up and then gave it up anyway, and then screwed another person the same way two more times. Grrr. And why give them a basket of sauces and then complain when they use them – they didn’t expect Chloe to go out and find her own hive for her honey. (Irrational rage!)

      • Well, der! But she claimed in all her talking heads that she was after that ingredient, but sadly lost out each time.

  13. Thanks for the great recap Juz.
    Well finally she is gone. I would have called bullshit if she had stayed & Matt had gone home because of his stupid bloody sauce.
    The stupid judges forget their own rules. They commented that maybe he should have left his sauce off. They had to use at least 1 ingredient from each category so he couldn’t have left his sauce off or they would have penalised him for ‘not meeting the brief’. But that duck did look yummy.
    Chloe stubbonly insists on making her mousse even though she had no setting agent. Surely there were other desserts she could have made? Then she stuffed her curd up. And that blackberry sauce looked very thin & runny too. The only thing that seemed to have worked out was her wafer.
    Good on Elena for getting dish of the day.

    • When the judges raved over Chloe’s wafer I was afraid that they would say that even though her mousse and curd were not set they were delicious and everything was balanced as opposed to Matt’s supposedly bad tasting sauce and therefore Chloe would be safe and IM would be gone. Glad that did not happen.

    • The judges gave me the impression that they were disappointed that Mimi’s dish had nothing wrong with it.
      Hard to muck up a dish with fresh herbs (good on GE).
      And it seemed to me that Chloe was too focussed on the time rather than the ingredients, so I suppose the outcome became inevitable.

  14. I have an update on the beads both Chloe and George were wearing. Chloe tweeted me to say George gave them to her as encouragement to keep on cooking. So I guess he wasn’t surly George that day.

    • “Gaz says they knew straight away which dish would send its maker home …”

      It was kind of you to correct Gaz’s grammar there, Juz. He actually gibbered “send their maker home” Cringe.

  15. Now that Theresa and Chloe are gone the next episodes in California should be worth watching. So glad the two above missed out on the trip!

  16. Whilst the survivors head to California, Theresa could take Chloe to Canada and show her what a moose is.

    • Yeah I noticed that they said see you in California not see you at the airport. Let’s hope it’s not like last time when they went to Dubai & George or Gary got food poisoning. Can’t remember which one.

  17. Finally Chloe is gone. I didn’t really think she was that good. She was just lucky that things went well and the judges always thought she is so out of the box.
    Thanks to Reynold last year (who certainly was amazing!) all the people think doing desserts only is enough. It’s getting really repetitive. I mean other seasons had their fair share of dessert queens but I cannot anyone of them being as pretentious as some of the girls this season were.

    I don’t think this season is the worst as many of you guys claim. Clearly you forgot (thankfully…) season 5. With the mumbling fringe being the winner (thanks BDD for that expression!).

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