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Get ready for a culinary showdown like no other in MasterChef UK Season 22, Episode 6! The heat is on as talented home cooks face their most daunting challenges yet. Will their creativity and skill be enough to impress the judges and advance in this prestigious competition?
This episode delves deep into the intense pressure of the MasterChef kitchen. Contestants will need to push their boundaries, experimenting with daring flavor combinations and sophisticated plating techniques. The competition is fierce, and only the most remarkable dishes will survive.
Prepare for breathtaking cookery and nail-biting eliminations. Witness extraordinary culinary journeys unfold as the aspiring chefs navigate unexpected twists and turns. Who will rise to the occasion and who will fall in the ultimate test of gastronomic talent?
#MasterChefUK #CookingCompetition #Foodie
This episode delves deep into the intense pressure of the MasterChef kitchen. Contestants will need to push their boundaries, experimenting with daring flavor combinations and sophisticated plating techniques. The competition is fierce, and only the most remarkable dishes will survive.
Prepare for breathtaking cookery and nail-biting eliminations. Witness extraordinary culinary journeys unfold as the aspiring chefs navigate unexpected twists and turns. Who will rise to the occasion and who will fall in the ultimate test of gastronomic talent?
#MasterChefUK #CookingCompetition #Foodie
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Short filmTranscript
00:02It's the MasterChef quarter-final, and this week six best cooks are back.
00:10However far I go in the competition, just getting this far, I'm really amazed.
00:14On the back.
00:16It's been terrifying, but probably the best thing I've ever done at the same time.
00:21Tonight, they face two demanding challenges designed to test them even further.
00:28Very big day. Enormous day.
00:32First, they will have to invent an exceptional dish from scratch, inspired by the seasons.
00:39Spring is in the air, and a little touch of autumn too, I can smell.
00:44I'm feeling the stress again. What are they going to make us try to cook, and will I be able
00:48to do it?
00:49Not knowing what I'm going to be walking into does make me nervous.
00:53The pressure's there, but that's how I deal with it now.
00:58Then they'll have to cook a dish to a brief set by renowned restaurant critic, William Sitwell.
01:05I mean, I want to eat that every day of my life.
01:08I feel like I haven't done my homework, and I'm heading into an exam where I haven't done enough revision.
01:13As long as I don't go out, I'm great. I want to keep attending the party.
01:19Six fabulous cooks. This is going to be one heck of a fight.
01:25I'm really expecting to have my socks blown off me today.
01:48These are all looking very bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.
01:51What?
01:52Feeling the positivity coming off yous?
01:55Welcome to your quarter-final.
01:59Now you've impressed us a great deal so far, but this is when the pressure really cranks up.
02:08You are now cooking for a place in knockout week.
02:13So your first test is an invention test, but it's an invention test with a theme.
02:20This is all about thinking on your feet.
02:24We want you to create a dish that embodies either spring or autumn.
02:28So when it comes to spring, you're thinking of something that is refreshing and vibrant.
02:34When it comes to autumn, we want an earthy complexity.
02:37Choose one season and celebrate it through flavour, texture and presentation.
02:44Now, you're going to need ingredients.
02:46So luckily, we're going to let you enter into the MasterChef Market.
02:57Your dish can be sweet or savoury.
02:59It just needs to embody spring or autumn.
03:0310 minutes to choose your ingredients and then 80 minutes to cook your socks off.
03:09Come up and select your ingredients.
03:16They have so many things to choose from.
03:20They've got fish, meat, vegetables, nuts, seeds.
03:26There's so much choice, there's nearly too much choice.
03:30Spring and autumn, my brain's frantically trying to figure out what's in season.
03:35I want the lightness and the freshness and the newness of spring,
03:39but if they choose autumn, I want something hearty to feel loved and warm.
03:46This is a bit of a challenge. It's uncomfortable.
03:48I think I'm going to go down to my Bangladeshi roots.
03:51Have they got the knowledge to create a dish under this pressure?
03:55It's really going to test them.
03:58As soon as I start venison, the dishes start coming into my head.
04:05Obviously not having prepared, I hope I will relax a bit once I start cooking.
04:1280 minutes to create us some spring or autumn magic.
04:17Let's go.
04:26Tony loves classic flavours, but he never plays it safe.
04:30He pours love and passion into it and somehow transforms his dishes into something quite incredible.
04:37He really does throw everything at it.
04:40Tony, that's pork six ways.
04:44I feel like I'm celebrating a new national holiday, pork mass.
04:48The faster chef has become my life.
04:52I've almost moved into the kitchen at home.
04:55Awake, asleep, it's just a constant thought in my mind.
05:03Tony, which are you cooking? Spring or autumn?
05:06Autumn.
05:06I'm quite relieved when I went in there, venison jumped straight out at me.
05:11So it's going to be roast venison loin, celeriac fondant, some cavalo nero.
05:16And then to go with it is a Madeira and cherry sauce.
05:19Oh, and some parsnip crisps.
05:20I do cook quite a lot with venison because my daddy's a keen hunter.
05:24So I butcher a lot of it, which my son finds absolutely fascinating.
05:29My girlfriend, not so much.
05:34Tony's dish sounds like it's going to have the feeling of autumn.
05:38Celeriac very autumnal, same with the cavalo nero.
05:42But venison loin is a very lean meat, so it's really unforgiving if you overcook it.
05:49And I need to see balance in this sauce.
05:52Madeira's very sweet. It's going to add cherries to it.
05:54They're going to be very sweet.
05:57Celeriac can be a bitter, troublesome vegetable.
06:01He's got a fondant here.
06:03Needs to be succulent, sweet and cooked right through.
06:11Kristin has shown us that she passionately loves Thai flavours.
06:15Dishes bursting with complexity.
06:18That ceviche with coconut milk and the granita showed us some really great skill.
06:24I am absolutely blown away.
06:28There is a confidence in her that has come from her travels.
06:33I love to cook Indian, I love to cook Thai, Japanese.
06:36My husband's American, so we tend to have a lot of Mexican as well.
06:39And so I feel like I've got a lot to draw on when it comes to the flavours that I
06:43use in my food.
06:46Kristin, this is a whopper of trout.
06:49Huge.
06:49Are you confident about handling this?
06:51Yeah.
06:52We've got some beautiful fish in Australia that I would have grown up cooking.
06:55And there's no fish sauce or soy sauce in the pantry.
06:58So I'm trying my luck with a bit of European.
07:00What are you cooking?
07:01I'm going to take you from winter into spring with pan seared trout.
07:06We lentils with some lovely onions and carrots and celery flavours.
07:10And then I'm going to do a nice herby salsa verde, I want to say, green sauce.
07:14There you go.
07:14Maybe it's the first time you've sat outside for your dinner or your lunch or something.
07:18So I think you've still got some of the crunchy leaves on the ground.
07:21And so the warmth of the lentils paired with the fresh seafood and the herbs,
07:25I hope will give you that sense of transition.
07:30It's really exciting to see that Kristin is going to Europe this time.
07:36Pan seared trout.
07:38They expect lovely, crispy skin, nicely seasoned, pink in the centre.
07:42I love free lentils.
07:44You can get lots of flavour into them.
07:48But if she cooks them too much, they will turn to mush.
07:52The salsa verde is the taste of springtime.
07:57But it needs to be full of herbs, lots of acidity in there just to lift this dish.
08:0430 minutes gone.
08:0650 minutes left.
08:10I love Anisha's cooking style.
08:13Bengali flavours, Turkish flavours, melded together.
08:16I'm combining both of our cultures in this dish.
08:19What's your husband called?
08:20His name's Jehan, yeah.
08:21She's really brave when it comes to creating dishes and flavour combinations.
08:26I would love to eat her food every day.
08:30To be a MasterChef quarter-finalist is absolutely nuts.
08:36I feel like I'm just ready to do, like, a million star jumps.
08:41I don't know.
08:41Like, I'm just so excited.
08:42I've got so much energy.
08:44But, honestly, it's just really motivated me more to kind of up my game and bring more skills to the
08:51table.
08:55So, I'm taking you to autumn.
08:58You know, at the end of summer, you get excited about the comforting meals, the meals that warm up your
09:02belly.
09:03So, I'm going for a chicken and red pepper curry with a red split lentil dal, which will be topped
09:12off with a garlic butter toka,
09:14which is garlic roasted in the butter and then it's poured over the lentil soup after.
09:18This is where it started for me when I first moved to uni.
09:22The first thing I made was a red split lentil dal and a chicken curry.
09:26Did you cook for people in your flat or in your hall of residence?
09:29In a Bengali home, you never cook for one person. You cook for, like, ten.
09:33So, all my flatmates loved it.
09:36We've eaten Anisha's curries before and they are nothing short of delicious.
09:42I want a delicate balance of silky and smooth and sweet and hot.
09:48All the different herbs and spices coming.
09:52With curries, you know, you cook the sauce for quite a while.
09:54So, it's going to be the very last thing I take off.
09:57She's comparing this to student food.
09:59So, I hope Anisha's not playing it safe with her dish.
10:02I really want to see her push the boat out when it comes to the flavours and the presentation.
10:13Matt has shown us that he has precision. He has skills. He's got an incredible palate.
10:18He brings his Japanese heritage, layering flavours with umami and sweetness.
10:25I would pay good money for this in a restaurant.
10:29Matt is giving us autumn on a plate. He's cooking rump of lamb.
10:33I would like that lamb really nicely caramelised on the outside.
10:37And then the centre, medium to medium rare.
10:40He's stuffing cabbage leaves with walnuts and morel mushrooms.
10:44And then adding mascarpone cheese to it.
10:47Not going to lie. Sounds delicious.
10:52He's also going to do roasted butternut squash puree and a masala sauce.
10:58Matt, Matt, Matt.
11:00It's a lot of work.
11:02I was a maths teacher for nine years.
11:04The only thing that sort of compares to the pressure of the MasterChef kitchen
11:08is giving an assembly to the whole school.
11:10All on you to deliver.
11:12But still not quite as daunting.
11:16Matt, we asked you for autumn or spring, but your shirt is giving us, well, summer in Hawaii.
11:21That's a confident man. Are you feeling confident today?
11:24Don't judge a book by its cover. I don't really know what I'm doing.
11:27I don't believe you, Matt.
11:29But it made me feel good. I feel good about myself.
11:31So you haven't leaned into your Japanese flavours this time?
11:34When I was in the market, this is just kind of what made sense to me.
11:36And there weren't that many Japanese ingredients for me to lean on.
11:38Hopefully I can pull off.
11:43That's 15 minutes remaining.
11:45Come on, let's get cracking.
11:48Spring is in the air and a little touch of autumn too, I can smell.
11:53Rebecca so far has showed us flashes of creativity and that she is versatile in the type of food that
11:59she likes to cook.
12:01Neptune's and cod does sound a little bit weird. I love a weird combination, so I'm totally here for it.
12:05She's an inventive cook and that's what we need for this round.
12:10I'm going for spring.
12:11I saw the courgette and I was like, I used to grow them myself.
12:16It's just a perfect ingredient.
12:16So I'm going to make fresh pasta spaghetti with courgette and there's going to be parmesan in there.
12:22When I've done this before, I usually just grate the parmesan, but I'm going to try and do a parmesan
12:28sauce.
12:28Are you an accomplished pasta maker?
12:31Yay! Well, no.
12:33I've usually just cut it by hands, but it might be quicker on the machine.
12:37It might be a little bit more refined from a presentation point of view, but if it all goes away,
12:42then I will do it myself.
12:47I really hope that she absolutely nails the pasta.
12:51She just needs to get it nice and thin.
12:53If it's too thick, it's going to be kind of claggy and heavy.
12:56I want lovely, long strands.
12:59I do like creating dishes on the spot, but I am a little slapdash.
13:04Oh, yeah.
13:05A little chaotic like a mad scribble on a page.
13:09Yeah.
13:10Bit of a disaster on the pasta maker.
13:12I've just got to take some deep breaths, believe in myself and step up.
13:19It got stuck in the machine.
13:22I've abandoned the machine. I've gone for the knife.
13:32Adam's heart and soul is delivering us the tastes of Northern Ireland.
13:36How much whisky's in this syllabub?
13:38There's a lot of whisky in the jazz.
13:40Buckets of skill.
13:41It's just top, top quality. You don't get much better, really.
13:44Classic dishes, but presented in quite a slick and modern way.
13:49It's a great honour to cook for the judges, but it's nerve-wracking as well.
13:53You have to, you know, really push yourself and try and elevate your dishes,
13:57but not push yourself too much. You give yourself too much to do and you can't get it done the
14:01time.
14:01So it's a, it's a happy medium.
14:07I'm going to go with spring.
14:09So I'm doing strawberries, meringue and cream.
14:13Strawberries is something we would have quite, quite often at home.
14:15If there's nothing left for Sunday lunch, for dessert, you have strawberries and cream.
14:19I'm going to try and make it quite refined on the plate and bring it in some different flavours with
14:23a black pepper meringue.
14:24I've got chards and wee meringue kisses, a vanilla bean cream, a raspberry coulis and glazed raspberries.
14:31And I might try and do Italian meringue as well.
14:33You're going to do a French meringue and an Italian meringue?
14:35Yeah. So one will be baked crispy and the other one will be left soft.
14:39Excited for the wee meringue kisses.
14:41Hopefully we'll be giving you chef kisses when we try it.
14:44I hope so.
14:49He's the only person making a dessert.
14:51I've got the raspberry coulis made. It's in the fridge. The black pepper meringue is good to go.
14:56Never had a black pepper meringue before.
14:59I hope that I get peppery bitterness and sweet, crisp sugar.
15:03Do these two things go together?
15:05I'm going to find out.
15:09There's a lot of processes here.
15:11Adam's first Italian meringue didn't work out, so now he's on to his second one.
15:15For the first batch, just took my eye off the sugar.
15:18Looking better.
15:19I hope he doesn't mess this one up.
15:21Fingers crossed this one's going to be fine.
15:25Okay guys, five minutes left. You need to be plating your dishes.
15:41That's kind of how I want it. It looks nice and pink, not overdone.
15:48Lovely crust on the outside of it. But again, just that nice blush on the middle of it.
15:52That medium rare sort of consistency.
15:5560 seconds. You need to be adding your final touches.
15:59Definitely fine, Zoe.
16:09Pasta worms and courgette mush. I should be on children's MasterChef.
16:17So that's time up now. Move away from your benches.
16:23Hug each other if need be.
16:28Tony, come and talk to us.
16:32Dairy factory worker Tony chose to cook an autumnal dish of roasted loin of venison on braised cavallonero,
16:41celeriac fondant topped with a parsnip crisp, roasted asparagus, and a cherry and Madeira wine sauce.
16:56Your venison is beautifully cooked, caramelised on the outside, pink in the centre.
17:00But the star of the show for me is the sauce.
17:04Cherries and Madeira in the wrong hands could be very sweet.
17:08You just got that balance completely right.
17:09You are the sauce king. You are excellent at them.
17:14I'm a little bit let down by the celeriac fondant.
17:16Although you have got it cooked all the way through, you've got so much caramelisation on it,
17:21it is a little bit bitter on the plate.
17:23But that parsnip crisp is outstanding.
17:29Really earthy.
17:31It's heavenly.
17:33If you'd made me an entire plate of parsnip crisps with some Madeira dipping sauce,
17:38I would have been a happy woman.
17:40Autumn on a plate.
17:43Are you emotional, Tony?
17:45No.
17:46The Yorkshire men don't do that, do they?
17:48No.
17:49First time that I've done an invention test and I'm on cloud nine, to be honest.
17:53Feedback were brilliant.
17:56Showcasing the transition from winter to spring,
17:59Communications Director Kristen has cooked pan-seared trout,
18:03topped with crispy onions and capers,
18:05pui lentils flavoured with onions, carrots and celery, pickled radishes and a herby salsa verde.
18:14Very colourful and beautiful.
18:22I think your trout's great, love the skin, nicely cooked, it's soft, but your salsa verde, very acidic, tons of
18:32herbs, it's just ever so slightly overpowering.
18:36There is layers and layers of flavour here.
18:40Pickled vegetables, the sweet crispy onions, lentils are cooked really nicely, there's a really good zing to the dish.
18:47Spring has sprung.
18:49Maybe just a little heavy on the acidity.
18:54Even though the balance was a bit thrown on the sort of vinegary side of things.
18:59I thought it was really fun, it was such a good round.
19:01I mean, to get to go into the MasterChef pantry, I mean, whew, that's it, that's exciting.
19:08Digital engineer Anisha has served a chicken and red pepper curry with rice,
19:13and a red split lentil dal spiced with turmeric and chilli, finished with a roasted garlic butter.
19:26It's Friday night and I have come in from the cold and this beautiful plate of autumnal colours with a
19:35real heat is restoring me.
19:37Your curry, there's cardamom and green chilli to the sweetness of the red pepper, packed with flavour.
19:46This is definitely you cooking within your comfort zone.
19:48But is it wonderful? Yes.
19:51Your dal has got a real lovely creamy flavour to it, with red lentil, turmeric and butter.
19:58I think I'd like a bit more of the garlic.
20:00But your presentation is really quite pretty. Well done.
20:05Thank you so much.
20:09You want nothing more than your curry to be enjoyed and just the judges really enjoying the taste of my
20:15food.
20:15I think that means the most to me, more than anything, is honestly the best feeling.
20:21PhD math student Matt's autumnal inspired dish is roasted rump of lamb with cumin, clove and chilli spiced butternut squash
20:30puree,
20:30topped with mushrooms and radicchio, roasted squash, pan-seared cabbage leaf stuffed with mascarpone,
20:38braised walnuts and dried morels and a masala lamb sauce.
20:48A really attractive plate of food. I love your lamb. I think your lamb is delicious.
20:53Your squash puree is so fantastic, packed with cumin, clove, chilli and pepper.
20:59With the sauce and the lamb. It's an autumnal delight.
21:05The highlight for me of this dish is the cabbage leaf. I love the walnut, love the mascarpone.
21:12The earthiness of it. It's absolutely delicious.
21:15Cool. Thanks guys.
21:19I think I've shown that I can work well under pressure.
21:20I think I've shown that I can put a good plate together that reflects the brief.
21:24I was definitely happy with it.
21:27Executive assistant Rebecca has made grated courgette, lemon and basil spaghetti,
21:33topped with a parmesan cheese sauce, served with heritage tomatoes, marinated in salt and basil oil.
21:47Pasta, a disaster.
21:51Very chewy, very thick.
21:54Wormeletti, this is what I'm now calling it.
21:58Your courgettes, however, are very nice.
22:02I'm tasting that lemon zest and the basil oil.
22:06Tomatoes, well, these are just chopped tomatoes.
22:11I can't taste anything other than the tomatoes, but they're very pretty on the plate.
22:16The idea of this dish says spring,
22:20but the way you've kind of cooked it and presented it, it feels similar to autumn.
22:24It's heavy and it's rustic.
22:26The parmesan sauce for me has too much parmesan.
22:29It's just overpowering.
22:30I like where you were going, but I think along the way there was a few hiccups.
22:36That round was as tough as my pasta tasted.
22:41My food is usually a lot tastier and a lot lighter.
22:45Finally, it's business student Adam with his spring-themed dessert of macerated strawberries and glazed raspberries,
22:54with vanilla cream, black pepper French meringue kisses and shards,
23:00torched Italian meringue and a raspberry coulee.
23:02Your talent for plating up is quite extraordinary.
23:07This is like something I want to wear as a hat to a fancy wedding.
23:17I love your little black pepper meringue kisses.
23:22They've got a real punch.
23:24Not getting a lot of vanilla off the cream, but fruits done in sweet ways.
23:28This is spring, but we can certainly see summer on the horizon.
23:33You embarked on making an Italian meringue.
23:36That didn't work out, and you went back again and repeated it,
23:39and I'm very grateful you did that, that it's a beautiful Italian meringue.
23:43They've got the sweetness of the meringue, nice acidity of your berries,
23:48your lovely coulee, could have even sprinkled a bit of black pepper in with your strawberries.
23:52But all in all, I think a great dish showing skills.
23:59You're going into the unknown, you try to show something a bit technical,
24:02but I'm pretty happy with that.
24:05I think we should surprise them a little more often,
24:07and we had some really good food today.
24:09Those cooks hit the spring-autumn brief.
24:12I was transported into both of those seasons.
24:15The competition is stiff.
24:17There's still one more challenge that could turn it all around,
24:20and this is the toughest one yet.
24:51Harder and harder.
24:52We're going to ramp up the heat now.
24:57We've invited a very special guest,
25:00not just to set you a task,
25:03but to taste your food too.
25:05Please welcome the esteemed restaurant critic,
25:10the very opinionated William Sitwell.
25:16Oh, hello.
25:18Welcome.
25:19Nice to see you.
25:21Hi, everyone.
25:23Can you tell the cooks what your brief is?
25:26I want you to cook me some soup or broth
25:29with some well-executed protein
25:31or a fabulous star vegetable.
25:35Every single nation on this planet has a soup.
25:38That soup says so much about the country from which it comes.
25:42I want to see you using your skills
25:45to elevate this humble dish
25:47and take it to MasterChef levels.
25:50You have 90 minutes to cook the best dish you've ever cooked in your life.
25:55At the end of this, three of you will go through to knockout week
25:59and three of you will be going home.
26:03Start cooking.
26:12It sounds such a simple challenge,
26:14but actually, a good soup or broth can be something of amazing sophistication.
26:20Soup comes in so many different ways.
26:22A beautifully made consomme soup from Asia or a crisp piece of fish lying in a really flavourful broth.
26:32I want to have some texture as well, a bit of crunch.
26:35I have teeth and I'd like to use them.
26:37There are endless possibilities.
26:40I'm hoping for some magic, but as we know, sometimes tricks go wrong.
26:48Most home cooks should be able to make a good soup.
26:53But it's much more difficult to make a wonderful, inspiring, exciting soup.
27:01It's all about a delicious stock, layering flavour to create something that is complex, interesting.
27:12Very big day, enormous day, the biggest day.
27:17The level's gone up massively, even just in one round.
27:22I think it's a really cool brief, but William Sitwell is renowned for being very honest.
27:28I just really hope he likes what I cook.
27:31Seeing Mr Sitwell, I didn't think he'd get more surreal doing this competition.
27:34I mean, he's mostly nice.
27:36Well, it depends on the dish. If the dish is nice, I'm nice.
27:39What's cooking? Is this a soup or a broth?
27:43It's a consomme. I don't know which one of those you call it.
27:45But so I'm making a duck dashi, basically, that I'm going to clarify it.
27:50There's some duck necks, duck wings, a duck leg, some ginger, carrot, kombu.
27:54I'm going to serve that with duck breast, morel stuffed with a duck liver fast,
27:59and like a crispy yakki onigiri, which is like a toasted rice ball.
28:02What's the inspiration? Is this a family dish? Where's the idea from?
28:06One of my earlier food memories is making onigiri with my granddad.
28:09The combination of like toasty rice and some sort of dashi is to me like a very comforting thing.
28:15I've cooked a lot of Japanese ingredients so far in this competition,
28:18but I've not made any Japanese dishes. So I'd say this is my first Japanese dish.
28:21I think it's a winner, hopefully.
28:23Good luck. I'm excited by this, Matt. Thank you.
28:25Thank you, everyone.
28:28What's tricky about a consomme is once you've made your stock, you're going to clarify it.
28:34When you clarify a consomme, you whip up your egg whites and then you whisk them in cold.
28:40When the egg white floats to the top, it sits on top of your stock a little bit like a
28:44raft.
28:45So you must keep stirring the stock before the raft is formed. But if you stir it too late,
28:51you smash up the raft and you won't get a crystal clear consomme.
28:55A consomme, even though it's a clear broth, has got to be rich. There's got to be loads of flavor.
29:01So the essence of that stock has really got to pack a punch.
29:05Knitting the flavor on this and the seasoning is key for the whole dish.
29:12Smashing away through the prawns? Yeah.
29:20So I'm doing a prawn bisque, ham fried scallops, butter poached prawns, pickled apple and fennel,
29:27and on the side, a stout wheat and bread. Ooh, nice. So it's made with a stout and treacle,
29:33so it's quite sweet. A treat for us growing up was prawns and wheat and bread,
29:38and this dish brings it together in a very different way. In Northern Ireland,
29:41you can't have soup without bread. So you can sort of, as we would say at home,
29:45mop it all up and go round the ball. So you're baking that bread? Yeah. Amazing.
29:49Have you got some nice butter? I do indeed, yeah. Good. Salty butter? Salty butter, yeah. Good, good.
29:54Give the man what he wants.
30:00Adam is going traditional French classic. We've got a bisque, something that I would always order
30:07in a restaurant. I just love it. But to make a good bisque, you've got to have a good amount
30:13of time
30:13to really cook down the prawn shells. So you've got that lovely gutsy flavor of prawn that will be at
30:19the heart of it. And I think to have a bit of Irish bread with some classic French broth,
30:26that to me is a really lovely combination. Scallops, I want them golden brown on the top
30:33and a lovely, just delicate translucent center. And I love a prawn poached in butter. It brings out the
30:41creaminess in a prawn. The seafood in Northern Ireland is a bit unsung. I grew up in a small
30:48village called Killilay on the shores of Strangford Lock. We have some brilliant fish,
30:53brilliant shellfish. And I'm trying to, you know, do it proud today and do it justice.
31:0025 minutes have gone.
31:06So exciting to cook for William, as well as Grace and Anna again. What a special opportunity.
31:13I am cooking a South Indian rasam, which is that real tamarind sour broth. And it's going to have a
31:21piece of pan fried sea bass on top and a fondant potato made with turmeric and a coconut chutney on
31:28the side. On a Saturday after football, my boys and I go for a dosa and it has a rasam
31:35broth,
31:36usually as part of the dosa. So taking that rasam as the inspiration, I think it goes really nicely with
31:40sea bass. And I think adding that potato, which you get inside the dosa, which has got the turmeric and
31:45the onion to really kind of give you that unctuousness with the broth. This looks like a dish that would
31:49take someone about two days to cook. Do you think you've got enough time for this?
31:53Yeah, I think, I think we're good. I think we've got the tamarind and the fish in here.
31:56The broth is coming on. We've got some potatoes. They've got to go in. Got some chutney to make.
32:01I reckon I can do it.
32:06Kristin has a great wizard-like ability to extract flavour from everything she touches.
32:14She has lots of beautiful aromas going in here, like curry leaves and cumin
32:19ginger, some chilli. So I'm expecting that broth is going to have a real sour kind of kick of spice.
32:30Whole potato sitting in a bowl. I really like the idea of it, that it is quite brave.
32:35That fondant potato has got to be cooked properly. It's got to be crisp on the outside. It's got to
32:40be
32:40soft in the middle. It can't get all mushy in the soup. I really hope it works.
32:47I've never made fondant potatoes before. What I was trying to do was show that it's a classic
32:51technique that you can really apply Indian flavours to. And I think part of the challenge will also be
32:58to get the cook on the sea bass just right, so that when you pour in the broth, again, it
33:02doesn't make it all soggy and fall apart.
33:05Lots to get through.
33:12So I'm going to be making a tom yum soup. That's going to be served with a steamed cod loin,
33:18finished with a crispy prawn head and a prawn head oil.
33:23Whenever we go to a Thai restaurant, I can't help but get tom yum soup. But it's got to have
33:28a perfect
33:29balance of sweet, acidic and the heat with it as well.
33:35So tom yum soup. This is a very famous, very spicy soup from Thailand. I'm excited by these little
33:42bird's eye chillies. They're going to create some heat, yeah? Yes, it's going to have some kick to it.
33:48I've tried this dish out on a few people and the feedback that I've got is that it's better than
33:53what they have in the local Thai. Very good, very good. It's fighting talk. You're not going to be able
33:57to go back in there again, are you?
34:02Tony's face as he spoke about this soup, it really sparkled. There's something so passionate about
34:08Tony as a cook. He's got galangal in there, lime leaves, lemongrass, ginger, garlic, lots of big, bold flavours.
34:18Over the years, I've been promised spice and heat and sweats in the MasterChef kitchen. And the sweat
34:25comes from pressure rather than the chilli. I really want to have some heat in that tom yum soup that's
34:31going to really transport us to Thailand and give us a really authentic flavour. It's looking at me, Tony.
34:40Tony's got prawn heads in the deep fat fryer. They've still got their eyes on. They were glaring at me.
34:46Tony, I love his sense of adventure with this dish. Last thing you said, give them something they've not seen
34:51before.
34:52So that's what I'm proud to do. OK guys, you only have 35 minutes left.
35:00I'm a little bit behind, but I'm getting there.
35:06Consummate, it's not clarified as I want it to. So I'm hoping they'll give me enough time to give it
35:10another go.
35:10I'm feeling good about this challenge.
35:15I was really lucky recently to have a trip to Japan. I travelled there on my own and it was
35:20just such a wonder of a country and of a culture. And I had some of the best broths and
35:25soups while I
35:26was over there. So my soup today is a Japanese inspired mushroom soup with two different Japanese
35:33dishes. So I'm combining one with shiitake mushrooms and then one I'm using sea kelp and bonito flakes.
35:42She has lots of mushrooms going on here. She has shiitake mushrooms, king oyster mushrooms,
35:48hen of the forest, smidgee and chestnut. If she binds them all into the pot together,
35:53they will fight for the attention. How do you separate the flavours of the mushrooms? Because
36:01it's hard enough to get the flavour out of one. You've got one, two, three, four, five, at least six
36:08varieties.
36:09I'm doing some roasted mushrooms and then I'm going to pan fry some mushrooms for you as well.
36:15And there's some pickled mushrooms and hopefully it all come together in harmony. I've worked out the
36:19ratio for my palate. It tastes quite nice. Your palate? What about my palate? Well,
36:23I'm hoping that they're quite similar, though yours is a lot more superior.
36:32Sometimes mushroom soups like that, the mushroom can be balls of rubber
36:36floating around in some rather uninspiring water.
36:41She's really going to have to give us mushroomy flavour, of course, but distinct flavours and the texture
36:47of mushroom. That doesn't look like enough soup for three people.
36:54Okay, only 15 minutes left.
36:58It's got to be 15 minutes here, so it's tight for time, but I'm getting there.
37:03I think it's looking pretty good. I mean, it's looking clear, right?
37:09Yeah, but it's not there. It's not very much, but...
37:14At this point in the competition, I definitely feel really happy and really pleased with the feedback
37:20I've got so far. But I definitely want to ramp it up and show a lot more skill. So I'm
37:27going to work
37:28with different ingredients. We're taking the judges to a different part of the world.
37:38So a laksa is a Malaysian slash Singaporean noodle soup, flavoured with coconut and an array of different
37:47spices. So today I'm going to be making a laksa with shrimp balls, panseed sea bass, tofu puffs,
37:56some rice stick noodles. You've got about 35 ingredients in this dish. What are you hoping that I'm going to
38:02get from this? I want it to be a flavour bomb in your mouth. Anisha, laksa is one of my
38:07favourite
38:07comforting soups. I also love laksa. First time I had it was when I was working away and it reminded
38:15me of home because as a Bangladeshi person, we have a lot of dried shrimp in our food. That was
38:22the first
38:22time I tasted something and thought, hmm, this tastes like home and it smells like home. Working away from
38:26home, I'm doing what? So I'm an engineer, so I work in the nuclear plant industry. I'm a 3D mod
38:33lab.
38:34So you model nuclear reactors? Yeah, yeah, concrete slabs.
38:41I'm expecting this dish to really pack a punch. Not only has she got lots of kind of chilies and
38:46spice
38:46in her laksa. Anisha's going to blitz her prawns, shape them into little balls and then poach them
38:52in the laksa broth. Delicious. She's given herself an enormous amount of work. She's got to make sure
38:59her fish cookery is absolutely on point. But then we've got noodles. They cannot be sloppy. They've got
39:06to be sort of slightly al dente, not overcooked. There's a lot of technique there and there's quite
39:12a lot of things that could go wrong. But if it works, it'll be an absolutely beautiful dish.
39:17You're quite in control? Uh, I think so. Yeah? Maybe.
39:28Hope you're happy with that. That looks under that one, definitely. Yeah. I just put the prawns back
39:35just to make sure they're not under. Five minutes left. You should be plating your soups.
39:42I've got everything done that I want to get done. It's just about getting it on plate.
40:07And your potatoes, they're cooked. They are cooked. Yes.
40:1160 seconds.
40:18That broth looks pretty good.
40:23It's doing good. Are they just going in now? Uh, yeah, I might have to go without them.
40:30Make sure it's seasoned and it's worth going on the plate. Otherwise, lose it, yeah?
40:33Yeah, yeah. Fish is looking good. It's just how I like it.
40:39Okay, right. We are nearly there.
40:48Okay, time's up. Step away from your benches.
40:55Are you happy? Yeah.
40:57I got halfway through and I was like, I'm not going to get anything out at this rate.
41:05First up is Kristen, with a South Indian rasam broth, flavoured with tamarind, tomato,
41:12chilli and curry leaves, served with pan-fried sea bass,
41:17a turmeric fondant potato and a coconut chutney.
41:28You have repeatedly shown us you understand layers of flavour from Thailand to Europe
41:33and now you've stepped into India. Your broth, it's got a great balance of the sourness of the tamarind,
41:40the warmth of your spices, a little kick of heat. It's extremely confident and mature cooking.
41:48I think your sea bass is cooked beautifully and you're so good at getting fish skin crispy
41:56and seasoned. You've knocked it out of the park.
42:00I just love the fact there's a potato sitting at the bottom of this. It's nicely charred,
42:05soft in the middle and they've held their shape. The broth itself is an absolute triumph. You know,
42:10I asked for soup and you've produced this sort of extraordinary meal of fish, but chutney, tomatoes.
42:16This is exactly what I would hope for from a brief like this. I think that's a really memorable dish.
42:22I love it. Thank you.
42:26To hear William say all those positive things about my food. Oh my God, I have no words to describe
42:31it.
42:32I mean, I'm shaking and I feel like I might throw up, but underneath all of that, I feel absolutely
42:38amazing.
42:39Adam's twist on a French classic is pan fried scallop with butter poached prawns,
42:45pickled apple and fennel with samphire and a prawn bisque served with stout wheaten bread and salty butter.
42:55Adam, you know, it's a real gift to be able to dress a plate like this.
43:07Really tricky when it comes to shellfish and leaving something to the final minute.
43:11My prawns could be more cooked, but there's a nice sweetness to it. Your scallop is lovely.
43:17It's nicely caramelised on the outside. There's buckets of scale that has gone into this dish.
43:23I go to Nice in the south of France and I have bisque. For me, that is more beautiful.
43:29I can taste the white wine and the fennel. It's rich and comforting and impressive plate of food.
43:37It's hard to create a fish stock from your prawn shells in that limited time, but I think you've done
43:44a really, really good job.
43:45There's a lot of richness in that broth. This bread, I mean, that is unbelievable. I mean,
43:51I want to eat that every day of my life. It's an absolute classic with your salty butter.
43:57I mean, I didn't ask for this, but thank you very much. I mean, it's literally a gift from heaven.
44:01It's wonderful.
44:04I was disappointed by the prawns, but, you know, there was some good feedback there as well.
44:08The bread was a triumph.
44:12Matt's Japanese-themed dish is pan-fried duck breast with a yakki onigiri crispy fried rice ball
44:20topped with a morel mushroom stuffed with a duck liver pate and a duck dashi consomme.
44:35I know you had trouble with your broth, with your consomme, but I think this is absolutely perfect.
44:42It is a clear thing. You've got this wonderful mushroom stuffed with duck pate. Love the texture
44:49of that. This is a refined dish. It's different, original, and I think well executed. So well done.
44:55Thank you. Thank you. You've got this wonderful, perfectly judged piece of duck.
45:04It's pink, but it's beautifully cooked. Then there's the broth. It's got hints of duck fat,
45:11but then it's also got an umami underbelly. Your rice so perfectly cooked and seasoned with that crusty,
45:19crunchy top. Your consomme didn't work out the first time you clarified it,
45:23so you sacrificed the amount you had to go back again and clarify it. I think this is a beautiful
45:31plate of food. I can feel that you have poured every single ounce of yourself into this. Almost emotional
45:39to eat, if I'm really honest. This is you in a bowl, you know.
45:45I'm delighted. I'm so happy. It was everything I wanted them to taste and feel about me and about my
45:51food. You can't ask for any more than that. Anisha is serving her take on a Malaysian laxa noodle soup,
45:59and has cooked pan-seared sea bass topped with crispy kaffir lime leaves and chilli oil on rice noodles
46:07with deep-fried tofu puffs and battered prawn balls in a coconut, coriander, galangal and lemongrass laxa.
46:23The noodles have become a kind of big solid mass. You know, if you run out of concrete,
46:28you could use these to build the walls of your nuclear reactor. However, the laxa is so gorgeous.
46:34It's warm. It has a building spice and heat to it. And I just wish I had a bowl filled
46:39with it.
46:40You've just given me a sauce. Your noodles, they've actually ended up being under. They are
46:46really chewy, but I love your tofu puffs. And thank you for making chilli oil. You didn't have a lot
46:54of
46:54time. It's given another pleasant hit on top of the chilli that is in the laxa. Your fish is just
47:02cooked.
47:03The lime leaves on top of the fish are very nice, but the prawn balls don't do it for me.
47:08They're just a little bit stodgy. You gave yourself a huge amount of work to do here. I just wonder
47:14if
47:14you'd stripped back a little bit. We could be really having something that was perfect. Thank you.
47:22I'm feeling a little bit deflated. I've made all of these elements before and they've been
47:26perfectly fine. Inspired by her recent trip to Japan, Rebecca is showcasing king oyster,
47:34shiitake, and enoki mushrooms, with pickled radish and carrots, in a roasted shimeji, hen of the woods,
47:42and chestnut mushroom soup, flavoured with dried shiitake, salty seaweed, and a bonito dashi stock.
47:56I can get a mushroom flavour from the broth. It does taste of mushroom, but it's really lacking in
48:02seasoning. It doesn't have the complexity of two dashis going in there, plus bonito flakes, ginger,
48:09and garlic. So this should have had serious layers of flavour. It isn't there.
48:16I love your mushrooms. You've caramelised some. You've pickled others. I love the crunch of the
48:23radish. What is letting it down is your broth. I'm not tasting that umami sense that I need.
48:30If I need some mushrooms to be carved and sliced and presented beautifully, I know where to come.
48:37Sitting in there like these little eager beavers waiting for this amazing broth to be poured onto it,
48:42which ended up being like a sort of rather tasteless sort of pond water.
48:46You have some very immaculate knife skills. You need to work on your soup skills.
48:54Pond water. I thought the pond water was a little bit of a harsh critique.
49:01But I think my palate needs to improve slightly because my lack of seasoning is not up to standard
49:07at the moment, so not up to par. Tony has cooked cod topped with a freeze-dried tomato crust
49:16and a deep-fried prawn head with sautéed prawns and charred tomatoes.
49:22Finished with a Thai tom yum soup flavoured with chilli, lime, fish sauce and lemongrass.
49:31I really love your presentation. The colours are really exquisite.
49:41You have cooked that cod perfectly. It's soft, it's flaky. The soup itself is very refreshing.
49:48There's a bit of gentle heat, but this is not the hot and powerful taste that I think you wanted
49:55to
49:55deliver. But it's as pretty as a picture, and I think the component parts are very well cooked.
50:00Thank you. I really enjoyed the crispy prawn head, nicely seasoned, soft on the inside.
50:07I think it was a really brave addition to your dish. The tom yum itself, I know you've got lime
50:12in
50:12there, but I almost want you to push me over the edge with sourness a bit further. However, I love
50:18the
50:18freeze-dried tomato dust across the top. It's giving it sweetness, but a little bit of crunchiness.
50:24Wonderful. Thank you. It's the first time that I've cooked fish in this competition.
50:29They really like the fish, but I really wanted to produce a soup that blew their heads off,
50:35and I didn't deliver on that aspect.
50:39I've been coming here for over two decades, and I was so impressed today. There was new flavours,
50:46new dishes. It was a real adventure for me, and I know that you've all put your heart and soul
50:51into it,
50:51so thank you so much. You guys go and take a break. We have a very tough decision to make.
51:05Well done, everyone. I thought it was a one heck of a test.
51:09You got their minds kind of going into places you wouldn't expect.
51:12There's real talent here. I love seeing how differently everyone cooks. It's inspiring.
51:16You haven't just made it hard. You've made it almost impossible.
51:19Skip off and leave the hard work to us. Yeah, you've got to make the decision.
51:21William, thank you for coming. Thanks for having me. See you.
51:28We had soups today which wouldn't look out of place on a restaurant menu.
51:32It just makes it so difficult to send three of them home.
51:38Kristen delighted us with that wonderful tamarind broth, with the sea bass perfectly cooked,
51:45sitting on a turmeric fondant potato. She understands complex flavours.
51:51It was just fantastic. Another person who really nailed the brief today was Matt.
52:00His duck was beautifully cooked and his duck broth had really great dashy notes through it.
52:06So much knowledge and layers of flavour to that dish. So, are we agreed Matt and Kristen are going through?
52:15Yes. A good mushroom soup is a thing of beauty. But Rebecca had a tough time. It ended up being
52:25very weak, very watery. It tasted of mushroom, but it was under-seasoned. I could get no dashy notes
52:31off that mushroom broth. I think it's the end of the road for Rebecca.
52:36Anisha. I thought relaxa absolutely had a great flavour, but if you're going to give me a broth or a
52:43soup,
52:43I should be able to drink a bowl of it. It was like a sauce. Noodles were under and those
52:49prawn balls,
52:50they were too stodgy. We've seen some wonderful stuff from her, but today there were stronger dishes.
52:57Anisha and Rebecca are going home. That leaves us with Adam and Tony. I think we saw a different cook
53:05in Tony today. Tom Yum soup with a nice chunk of cod. And I think the stroke of genius was
53:12the deep-fried
53:12prawns head. But Tony promised us heat. It lacked a little bit of punch. Adam cooks with an astounding
53:22maturity. I love bisque. I order it whenever I'm in the south of France. I thought that he gave some
53:29of
53:29those chefs a real run for their money. He didn't manage to get those prawns fully poached, but there
53:37was a real sweetness from it. The scallop was really nicely cooked. And then, like that wasn't enough,
53:43he served it with homemade wheat and bread on the side. He's got a lot of skill.
53:49I would love to carry on. I really would. I really enjoyed the competition. I've loved every minute.
53:54It's a great honour. I feel like I'm growing as a cook and I just want to push it and
54:00push it.
54:01I don't want to go now. I'd love to make it into knockout week. I've got a lot more to
54:05achieve.
54:06Adam, Tony. Who are we going to go with? This is impossible.
54:22That was an incredible, unforgettable round. You took William's brief on board and you truly delighted us.
54:36There was two cooks that we thought really stood out today. Matt, Kristen. Congratulations,
54:44you're through to knockout week. There were also two cooks that we thought struggled today.
54:56Rebecca, Anisha, I'm sorry, you are leaving us. Thank you so much.
55:04And good luck, guys. All the best.
55:14I can't lie. I'm a little bit gutted to leave, but I'm not going to kick myself for it.
55:19I got to compete on MasterChef. That in itself is amazing. One of the biggest milestones that I've
55:25done in my life.
55:29I gave it my best shot and I'll look back incredibly fondly and I would advise anybody out there
55:37to give it a go. I feel very honoured and privileged to have been chosen to take part.
55:46Adam and Tony, this was really tough. Both of you have created two very interesting, delicious soups, not
55:58without error. But we have made our decision.
56:11Both of you are through to knockout week.
56:14Oh, my God. Oh, my God. I thought I was going there.
56:27It's unbelievable. This competition has lit a fire within me and all I want to do now is give it
56:34everything and leave nothing in the tank.
56:37I'm very, very shocked. Oh, it's unbelievable. It really is. The judges must see something in me,
56:42which is brilliant.
56:45The day I think is the proudest of me, but it's scary thinking about how
56:48good you're going to have to cook to stay in the competition.
56:51This is a wild ride. It feels really addictive and I can't wait to get back for knockout week and
56:58keep
57:03cooking. Next time, six more contestants compete for the right to wear a MasterChef apron.
57:13Oh, no. I've dropped it.
57:18Before battling for a place. You're giving me a heart attack.
57:21In the quarterfinal. I don't think they're ever going to have seen anything like this before.
57:42I don't think they're ever going to have seen anything like that.
57:44If you just don't want to take any of them, I have to take care of yourself.
57:44All right.
57:46Bye.
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