MKR Beardies cook

I am pinning my hopes on the SA guys being the lone team who can actually cook. They’d better be able to, because I need to see food that hasn’t been massacred.

The boys start the day with bacon and eggs in what looks like a “real” house in the southern suburb of Happy Valley, which is mostly older family homes with lots of gum trees around. Then they’re off to Gulf Seafoods in leafy Malvern, which is nearly a half-hour drive (if it’s not peak hour) and then on to the Unley shops, which is another 2 minutes or so – and 5 mins’ drive from my place. The butcher shop there, Feat Fine Foods, is excellent and they sell a lot of cuts or proteins you don’t get in the supermarket. Bet they don’t go into the Coles there because it’s a small one and not fancied up like some of them are.
Brown Beard (ok, his name is Kyle) and Red Beard (Tim) remind us they are bartenders and ad sales reps, respectively. And Tim’s dad was a chef, so that bodes well.
They describe their food as “modern Australian hunter gatherers”, so I’m expecting big hunks of meat.

Entree is tuna ceviche with puffed wild rice and avo puree. (Smart, because no cooking is involved, and if they know how to handle the fish it will be a quick prep.)
Main is spiced roo with beetroot and walnut puree and weed salad. (Well, SA is debating whether it should embrace the medical marijuana industry now all the automotive manufacturers have pulled out).
Suddenly they materialise at a fruit shop and I think it’s the O’Halloran Hill Fruit Mart, which would be on their way home. It’s a great fruit shop. They are paying $40.99 a kilo (the same price as the tun – drain the Channel 7 coffers dry, boys. After all, Damo and Caz have already had a crack at it with their truffle but let’s hope the Beardies have tested their recipe) for a native green called ice plant, which Google tells me goes well with seafood.
Suddenly, they are at Goodies & Grains health food shop, which is near the Central Market way back in the city, so the edit is jumping around a bit. A great place, as you can see, for buying dry ingredients by the scoopful. Finally they are at a Coles but they only show the interior so I can’t pick it – narrow aisles, though.
Ok, enough of the SA geography lesson. The boys arrive home just as the clock has started ticking and I’m pleased to see the correctly placed apostrophe in their sign The Boys’ Backyard.
By the time they get in the kitchen half an hour has gone by and we’re reminded Tim has quit his job, so has to do well. Kyle can pronounce jus, at least, so he’s one up on half of last year’s contestants. Tim is focusing on ice cream and they have a little ditty to help them remember the ingredients. They get the beetroot in the oven but there’s no song – where’s Casey Donovan when they need her?
They’re using bought biscuits for the base of their key lime pie – hey, it worked for Mrs Duck Nutter last year.

THE GUESTS ARRIVE
The producers have made Flirty Vet go first in case she spontaneously pashes brown beard. They’re going to be sooo disappointed in her.
In the kitchen Brown Beard taste the avo puree and immediately illustrates why beards and cooking don’t mix, with a dribble of puree stuck in his whiskers.
The judges arrive and – yay – wardrobe has held on to Manu’s blue tablecloth blazer from last year. Pete is in a snappy mid-blue suit yet again. The background music is, I think, Welcome to the Jungle. And even if it’s not, here it is because, well, Guns N’ Roses are touring.

The menu is explained and most of the guests can’t pronounce ceviche. David and Tyson at least know what it is. I’m really hoping Tyson turns out to be a killer cook because I would love to see the look on everyone’s faces.
Tyson is ruffling feathers by saying food has been average and people get upset because he’s judging them. Sheesh – it’s not like they are in a cooking competition.
The boys seem to be working efficiently and have a good production line going so the citrus does not “cook” the tuna too much. They certainly have the most modern plating style of any of the teams so far, with their cucumber curls and radish disc and puffed rice for texture. Very MasterCheffy.

ENTREE IS SERVED
“Is this the best you can do,” asks Pete, then they cut to the ads. But we’re on to you, Pete – it’s a total fakeout. It’s going to be great. “Brilliant,” says Pete. “You’re going to go far in this competition.” Hallelujah – someone who can cook! Onya, SA,
Manu agrees: “I could have seen this in a restaurant.”


Everyone loves it but the Hashtaggers would like bigger tuna chunks and more citrus. They must be worried about being in the bottom two with the WA girls and a twist looming.

Back in the kitchen the Beardies are marinating the roo in coffee, sumac, cumin and smoked paprika – yum! Roo is hard to cook but we already know from the ad they nail it. That jus looks amazing.
Betty Hashtag tries to convince everyone that teams who haven’t cooked yet have an advantage because they’ve had the benefit of tips from the other teams. Yeah, that’s why the WA girls got the lowest score in MKR history. Tyson is over it, and I have to agree with him.

MAIN IS SERVED
The main looks lovely with the colour of the beetroot and the sprinkling of macadamias. Manu puts a swimming pool’s worth of soz on his plate. Pete: “I called your entree perfect. This is better. It actually went to another level.” Manu holds the soz jug aloft: “This is the best soz we’ve ever had on My Kitchen Rules – ever…. this is the dog’s bollocks of the sozes.”
Everyone else is intimidated by the perfection but the Hashtags reckon the roo is stinky.

Back in the kitchen the key lime pies are done and looking good, but you just know Kyle is going to burn those coconut flakes in the oven. Just do them in a frypan, guys, so you can see what’s happening. At least they have plenty more. The Beardies candidly state dessert is their weak are. They are worried their ice cream is a bit icy but serve it anyway. Even if it is a miss, at least the rest of the dessert is a million times better thand last night’s dodgy profiterole or the Hashtags’ green tea disaster.

DESSERT IS SERVED
Pete says the pie is “95 per cent there” but there is a bit too much salt in the base and the ice cream wasn’t perfect. Manu says the pie was “fun-tastic”.
So it won’t be three 10s but they’ve done bloody well.


Hashtag David says he can make a better key lime pie and that people who “peak too early” in the competition never win. Yes, I remember Tasia and Gracia came third last year, but Sammy and Bella won their instant restaurant round. Leigh and Jennifer came second in the IR round. Dan and Steph sucked. Bree and Jess won. And Will and Steve won. And Veronica and Shadi won in season one. So, apart from Dan and Steph, the eventual winners have all started strong.

SCORES

Teams
Tassie: 9
WA Flirt Plus One: 9
Midwives: 9
Tyson and Sis 9
Hashtags: 8 (although Betty pitches for a 9)
Total 44/50 (they’ve already beaten WA)
Judges
Entree: Let’s just type this before they even talk – two 10s
Main: See above (Pete calls the weed salad “genius”. He wishes he could give the dish 11.)
Dessert: Manu 8; Pete 8
Total: 100. Woo hoo – this is what we want to see, people on a cooking show who can cook. “And that is, the highest score ever in My Kitchen Rules history,” says Pete.

TOMORROW NIGHT
It’s crunch time for Tyson and Amy. Please can the judges arrive in an Uber ride? The ads are making it out to be a disaster but they did the same with Zana last year, just because she was manic in the kitchen but could in fact cook. I really want Tyson to be great.



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26 Comments

  1. It would be lovely if, at some point on this cooking competition, we had a team who could actually cook. Wouldn’t that be refreshing?

  2. Holy crap. The boys can cook.

    In fact, they’re outstanding cooks. It’s about time.

    But yeesh, I want to punt the Team Hashtag out onto their heads.

    • And I’m not gonna like, but Kyle’s even more attractive to me, right now, for some reason.

      I loved how Ash told Bek, “Marry him! So I can come around and visit whenever he cooks for you.”

  3. Wow, 100 out of 110. That’s pretty amazing. I’m really impressed with the boys, because I didn’t see that coming (and if they’d just gotten the ice-cream right. Man. Has anybody ever gotten ice-cream right in the IR rounds?).

    Kyle’s habit of touching everything notwithstanding, the actual dishes looked pretty amazing. Like Juz said, competitors on a cooking show who can actually cook, it’s about damn time. Good work boys. Wear those beards proudly.

  4. You would think no team can get less than 26 out of 110. Also wonder what the twist will be? Could be only the judges scores will be counted to eliminate the team with the lowest score.

  5. Great that the guys could cook although some of the techniques were not all that hygenic.
    The twist…bottom 2 teams eliminated or going into a cook off? Wouldn’t mind 2 teams leaving because that would move the show along faster.
    Amy and Tyson are actors/fakes???

  6. Perhaps the producers will exhume Komback Kitschen. We won’t be able to sleep until we know what the elimination twist is.

  7. Hashtaggers are still scared shitless of being in bottom two and that accounts for constant negative comments. If only they knew how absolutely ridiculous they sound and such bad sports. I hope they stay there.
    I thought they were half ok at the start but now my opinion of them has deteriorated enormously.
    Good on the guys.

    • Agree – originally I was quite onboard with hashtaggers (well, aside from the actual Hashtagging which is super annoying) until they became completely obsessed by the scores. And to make it worse, they do it such a completely obvious and transparent way that they insult whatever intelligence I have left after watching MKR.

      • Speaking of insults to intelligence, how uber long is the first ad break on MKR? Some records being broken there for certain.

  8. Last year they promoted a twist and, if memory serves, it was just that were extra teams, which was exactly the same “twist” as the previous year (minus Rachel Khoo).

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