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MasterChef Season 22 Episode 9
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00:01It's the MasterChef quarterfinal, and this week six best cooks are back.
00:10Getting to the quarterfinals was the dream, and now I'm here, I want to go all the way.
00:15Every round the stakes get higher, right?
00:19I feel absolutely excited. It's scary at the same time.
00:25Tonight, they face two tough challenges designed to test them even further.
00:32First, they will have to invent a dish from scratch around a weekend staple.
00:37That is an absolute winner. Gorgeous.
00:40Before cooking to a brief set by esteemed restaurant critic, Jimmy Famurewa.
00:46Whoa. Now I believe in myself a lot more. I want to go further in the competition, I want to
00:52win it.
00:53Everyone's up in their game, so I've got to pull something out of the hat.
00:58I feel absolutely ready. I'm ready to cook.
01:02They better buckle up, because we are about to kick into fifth gear.
01:06Sharpen the knives, it's quarterfinal time.
01:29Welcome to your MasterChef quarterfinal.
01:34You are now fighting for a place in knockout week.
01:38Three of you will go through, which means at the end of today, three of you will be going home.
01:45This is an invention test. We're asking you to use your imagination and really impress us.
01:53We want you to make us the best brunch ever.
01:59Now this is certainly no time for a soggy bacon sandwich.
02:04Brunch is a decadent once a week treat.
02:07To help you create this wonderful brunch dish, we'll be opening the MasterChef Market.
02:21You'll find all the ingredients in there to cook us something fabulous.
02:25Show us why we saw potential in you.
02:29You have 90 minutes to make the best brunch dish of your life.
02:34Come up and get your ingredients.
02:41Grace, I love brunch.
02:43This is a main course that you'd find on the lunch menu.
02:48It has to have breakfast vibes.
02:51It's kind of in my wheelhouse.
02:53I love messing around with brunch. I love entertaining, you know.
02:57Yeah, we don't really do much brunches in Brazil, so I'm trying to come up with something good.
03:04Definitely keen to impress. I think there's loads of options here.
03:07You definitely can do something special.
03:09I've got to ensure that this is really flavoursome.
03:12I'm trying to pack those flavours in. That's what I'm hoping for.
03:15It cannot just be some bangers and eggs and toast.
03:19We are not looking for safe. We are looking for a showstopper.
03:24It's going to be a really tough challenge, this invention test,
03:26so as soon as it was announced, I was kind of scared.
03:29I feel like I've got a dish that is good. Hopefully. Hopefully it should be good.
03:39Antosh has shown us classic Polish cuisine, but with a creative twist.
03:44What I like about Antosh's food is we get big, bold flavours and a general sense of surprise.
03:51Oh, my God, that's so sexy. The boy's got proper skill.
03:56This is the kind of competitor that we really welcome because you never know what you're going to get.
04:03The key to success is enjoyment and relaxation. The looser I am, the better I perform in general.
04:10So if I can go in there with confidence, I think that's where I'll perform best.
04:17Antosh, tell us, what's your brunch dish?
04:19So I'm going to make drunken beans for you.
04:21So it's kind of Mexican-inspired with a lot of cider, a lot of lime and a lot of spice.
04:27With a few kind of exciting bits, a carb of some sort.
04:30So it's still up in the air? Yeah, we'll get there.
04:36He's taking cannellini beans, he's putting cider into them.
04:40Cider can have a real kick, it can be quite tart when you reduce down the liquid.
04:45I don't want to only taste the cider, I really want to taste those beautiful Mexican flavours.
04:50Sweet paprika, some lime zest, lime juice and, you know, fresh herbs.
04:55But he's still piecing it together.
04:58I've been seeing these Mexican dishes cropping up on brunch menus more and more.
05:04So I think he's pretty on trend with this.
05:07But I really need those beans to make their mark.
05:12For me, in my regular day-to-day life, I like to come up with dishes on the day.
05:17So for me, that feels quite comfortable.
05:20Making it restaurant-worthy or MasterChef-worthy is a different thing.
05:27Giani has brought flavours of Brazil to the MasterChef kitchen.
05:32We got to try ingredients we'd never had before.
05:35This is my first experience of Amazonian food and I'm excited to see more.
05:41We're sure she knows her way round the flavours of the Amazon.
05:44But can she whip up a good brunch?
05:48I think I'm very good thinking on my feet in the kitchen.
05:52I'm a mum, so I cook under pressure all the time for my family.
05:58So I'm just going to enjoy it.
06:02Giani, you come from the Amazon and now you're in Essex.
06:05Do you eat brunch when you're in Britain?
06:08Not a lot.
06:09I go out for my girlfriends.
06:11Yeah, well, with the lunches.
06:13Yeah, lunches and dinners.
06:15What are you cooking us today?
06:17I'm going with the beef, with stuffed mushrooms, with cheese.
06:23This is brunch.
06:25It feels quite heavy.
06:27This is something that's really going to set you up for the day.
06:30I might have to go back to the store, maybe get some bread
06:34and then maybe change the beef.
06:37Time is ticking.
06:38You want to get back into that market.
06:42Giani started with one idea and then she's flipped around
06:46and she's gone with another.
06:49Yeah, brand new plan now.
06:51I'm going to go a little bit lighter.
06:54As you can see, I don't have much experience with brunches.
06:58But I am sure I'm going to have a lot of taste in a plate.
07:05Now we have asparagus wrapped in bacon on a tomato bruschetta.
07:10This to me sounds like a classic brunch dish.
07:13All I hope is that Giani nails getting that bacon properly crispy
07:18but it does not end up overcooking her asparagus.
07:21That tomato bruschetta, I want the tomatoes to be sweet and plumb,
07:26slightly acidic but also have bite.
07:30She's also given us a mushroom which has got stilton on it.
07:34That is a very pungent flavour.
07:37She needs to make sure that all of this balances.
07:41OK, guys, 30 minutes gone.
07:45Muckle is one of our quieter cooks in this kitchen
07:49but his food really makes noise.
07:53It is bursting with Indian charm, flavour and pizzazz.
07:59This is one of the best things I've eaten in this dining room.
08:01I can't guess what Muckle's going to do
08:04because he's so creative there's nothing predictable about him.
08:08I would like to believe I'm quite brave as a cook.
08:11I don't want to serve usual Indian food in the usual Indian way.
08:14I just want to do something differently
08:16and that's what I'm focusing on at the moment.
08:21I'm not that much of a brunch person
08:23but if we ever spoke about brunch,
08:26it will always be something unhealthy,
08:29either very sweet or very fatty.
08:31So I'm going to do a thing that my mum always cooked me
08:35since my childhood which is called halwa.
08:37Carrot halwa is one of my personal favourites.
08:40Muckle, I love it when you talk about your mother's cooking
08:42because you're completely different to anyone else.
08:44You always think you could do it better.
08:47Not at this time, no.
08:49Not with carrot halwa
08:51because my mum has cooked this probably a million times.
08:54I don't think I can do anything better than that.
08:57I'm just going to try and replicate what she did.
09:01Halwa is a really sweet Indian dessert
09:04made from sugar and carrots.
09:06He's going to grate his purple carrots
09:08and then he's going to put them in a pot
09:10with lots of green cardamom
09:11and cook that down
09:14because it needs to become very sticky
09:17so that it can bind together.
09:19Muckle is taking this halwa
09:20and making it a little bit more breakfasty
09:23with yoghurt and fruit and oats.
09:26This is a difficult thing to make look decadent.
09:30Difficult thing to give finesse
09:31and that is what brunch is about.
09:35We're at the halfway stage.
09:37We have 45 minutes remaining.
09:43There's no doubt about it.
09:45Daniel is a really brave cook.
09:47He is not afraid to put flavour combinations together
09:51that on paper haven't been done before.
09:54Whether he's bringing us ox tongue
09:56with chocolate and swede
10:00or duck liver and strawberries
10:02never eaten it before would do again.
10:04He's never boring, is he?
10:06I thrive under pressure, to be honest.
10:09That's why I gravitated towards working in theatre.
10:11That's why I love working with my hands.
10:13I love to be challenged.
10:14I know there's more in me, you know,
10:16like Michelangelo with David.
10:18Inside that stone somewhere is David
10:20and I want to be able to find it.
10:25Daniel, do you like brunch?
10:26I love brunch, I love cooking it,
10:28I love thinking about different ways I can serve it.
10:30So what are you going to do for us?
10:32I'm going to do an eggs Arnold Bennett souffle
10:35with comp de toast.
10:37It's based on a very special dish to me
10:39because my father didn't have a very broad palette
10:41but this is one of the dishes that he absolutely loved
10:43and he loved for me to cook it for him.
10:45So in a weird way I get to cook it for him again
10:47and I lost him a few years ago.
10:49So this is great.
10:54Eggs Arnold Bennett normally is in the form of an omelette
10:57and it's smoked haddock with hollandaise sauce on top.
11:00But Daniel wants to kick it up a gear
11:02and turn it into a souffle.
11:04He's going to poach smoked haddock in milk
11:08and it's going to have star anise in there
11:10and lots of other aromas to bring out as much flavour as possible.
11:13Essentially the fish is going to be the main base of his souffle.
11:18Daniel is making a bechamel on the side.
11:21I'm really glad he's doing sauce
11:23because otherwise the souffle and the posh cheese toast,
11:27well that could be quite dry.
11:29He's promised us a beautiful omelette in souffle form.
11:34We could just end up with scrambled eggs and overdone fish.
11:40Jamie's food is a love letter from Scottish cuisine straight to my heart.
11:45He delivers these wonderful big flavours.
11:48I just want to be alone for a moment with the chips.
11:51He wants to feed but he also wants to show finesse.
11:57I think I'm a pretty adaptable cook.
11:59Like I've cooked in hostels and mountain huts and campsites and beaches
12:03like all across Scotland.
12:05So in theory I should be okay today.
12:10When you said brunch I was not very happy.
12:13I love eating out for brunch but it's not something to really cook at home.
12:16So what are we getting today?
12:18For me like an ideal brunch would be smoked salmon bagel,
12:21capers, shallot, cream cheese.
12:24I don't have bagels so I'm going to use grilled sourdough instead
12:27and other accoutrements to go alongside.
12:29You don't normally make brunch but you enjoy eating it.
12:32Where do you go?
12:32There's some glorious spots for brunch round about Glasgow.
12:35Glasgow is quite a brunch type of city though.
12:38People do like to go out and spoil themselves.
12:41Yeah, people do like to go out and spoil themselves in Glasgow.
12:44And sometimes need it after spoiling themselves too much
12:46on a Friday or Saturday night.
12:50Jamie's inspired by smoked salmon bagel but he's certainly given himself a lot more work.
12:55He's going to serve pan-roasted smoked salmon on toasted sourdough with pickled shallots,
13:02pickled fennel, homemade mayonnaise and cream cheese.
13:06He's going to have capers in his dish as well so there's a lot of bold flavours going on.
13:10There needs to be a good ratio to sauce, to bread, to fish, to cream cheese.
13:15This entire dish rests on the cooking of the salmon.
13:18It really needs to be beautifully soft and it really needs to pair with his homemade mayonnaise.
13:26OK guys, you've only got 25 minutes left.
13:34Joyce is Mauritian Chinese by heritage and she made a mark on the competition with those wonderful dumplings.
13:43Stroker genius.
13:45We've had an aromatic curry and we've even had a wonderful pandan sponge pudding.
13:51I love what she does.
13:55So my plan to stand out today amongst the other competitors is to stick true to my cuisine.
14:02I think what's worked so far is the flavours.
14:05Making sure that if you're saying something spicy, it is spicy.
14:08Don't worry about what's going on around you, just do you.
14:14Joyce, what do you think of this challenge?
14:17Yeah, I'm loving it. I'm enjoying this one.
14:19Only because of my girls, so they don't get up early.
14:21They live in London, they come for weekends.
14:23They'll come at about half eleven, hungry, starving, haven't had breakfast.
14:27So I'm cooking a rice noodle in a spicy chicken broth
14:30and serving it with a sausage meat spring roll.
14:33This isn't something I've ever seen on a brunch menu,
14:35but this is something that your daughters would want.
14:38Yeah, they would, yes.
14:38They'd always pick something that is of that sort of tie or the fur element.
14:43Joyce, what do your daughters think of you being in this competition?
14:45They are amazed. I think they're very proud of me,
14:48which is lovely to hear that from your 26 and 28-year-old telling you that,
14:52that they're proud of you.
14:53So they just want me to do the best I can.
14:58Joyce's brunch dish on first inspection feels more like a lunch.
15:03However, when I drill down in it, she is making sausage meat and mushrooms
15:08and putting them inside a spring roll case in.
15:11Joyce, have you invented the breakfast spring roll?
15:14Yes.
15:15This is a momentous day.
15:17Hopefully she gets a really good, crispy exterior,
15:20but a nice juicy filling in the centre.
15:24She's serving it with rice noodles
15:26and what smells like a really potent chicken broth.
15:30I really want to be able to taste the galangal, the lemongrass, the ginger.
15:34I want those beautiful flavours to sing through.
15:37When Joyce cooks us food that she cooks her daughters,
15:41we're always happy.
15:42So, fingers crossed, we get more of that.
15:46That's ten minutes to go.
15:48Make sure it looks as beautiful as possible.
15:55These are basically here.
15:56I'm just sort of doing the last finishing touches.
15:58I feel good and then I'll choose a lovely bowl
16:00and life will be good.
16:05Hoping they're not going to rise too much and then collapse,
16:09so there's still plenty that can go wrong.
16:15Right, guys, that's five minutes left.
16:23I'm not that happy with my presentation,
16:25but I have not got that much time to now invent something new,
16:29so I'm just going to get my food on plate and hope for the best.
16:33I am absolutely happy with those at the moment.
16:43Hey, that's it, guys.
16:45Time's up.
16:45Step away from your benches.
16:52Daniel, come on up.
16:55Inspired by his late father's favourite brunch,
16:58actor Daniel has made a souffle Arnold Bennett,
17:02a smoked haddock egg and comte cheese souffle
17:06flavoured with clove and star anise,
17:09served with toasted comte crisp bread
17:12and a clove and star anise bechamel.
17:22I love the fluffiness of the souffle.
17:28I think you have the ratio of haddock and egg and cheese just right.
17:33The posh cheese on toast just pushes it
17:37into a whole new level of decadence.
17:40Your souffle, your fish, is really nicely cooked.
17:43There's a real elegance to it.
17:45You've got more flavours of the aromats coming through in your sauce.
17:50To be honest, I could eat, I'd say, mine and Grace's.
17:54I have to hold myself back from finishing it.
17:58I'm pretty sure your father would be delighted to eat this.
18:03It means absolutely everything to me, so thank you.
18:06I'm feeling relieved and proud.
18:12I feel like my dad was looking down at me.
18:17I'm going to treasure that for the rest of my life.
18:21Product manager Jamie's brunch is a take on a smoked salmon bagel.
18:26Smoked salmon pan-fried in capers and parsley.
18:30On fennel and shallot pickles and toasted sourdough.
18:35Served with a caper and parsley cream cheese.
18:39And a lemon and caper mayonnaise.
18:46The salmon is really beautifully cooked.
18:49Really nicely seared on the outside, but still pink and juicy on the inside.
18:54Your mayonnaise with capers is a little bit salty.
18:58And I think I would like the cream cheese on the actual bread instead of it being on the side.
19:03But for me, really, the star of the show is that salmon. It is wonderful.
19:07This is definitely a brunch dish that I would eat.
19:10Jamie, the presentation of this dish is utter chaos.
19:15However, there are some great tastes on this plate.
19:18Your pickles.
19:20Gorgeous.
19:21To take fennel and get that amount of zing into it.
19:25Wonderful. Love, love, love.
19:27Let's forget about this overly salty, quite bitter mayo.
19:30And let's prettify it up.
19:32And that is an absolute winner.
19:36I've got mixed emotions after that challenge.
19:40It's so intense.
19:41And I'm just glad I managed to get some elements up which they enjoyed.
19:46You look great from here.
19:50GP receptionist Shayani has served bruschetta,
19:54toasted sourdough topped with a buffalo cheese and tomato salsa
19:58flavoured with sage.
20:01served with Stilton stuffed mushrooms topped with garlic breadcrumbs.
20:07Asparagus wrapped in bacon.
20:10And an avocado rocket and chilli salad.
20:20You, at first, were going to cook something which was very not brunch.
20:24And I am very spirited by the fact that you moved with that idea
20:29and have cooked something which is very much more classic brunch.
20:33I think that you have nicely dressed avocado.
20:37Your asparagus still has a crunch.
20:39But the Stilton in the mushroom is such a pungent, stinky, whiffy cheese.
20:45And, to me, it's overpowering the whole plate.
20:47You've got lovely caramelised crispy bacon and there's still an al dente bite in your asparagus.
20:54And that's really key.
20:56However, the sage in the tomato salsa, it is too strong.
21:01So, the really strong blue cheese and the really strong sage,
21:04there's a battle going on in the plate.
21:09I feel relieved that I finished the challenge.
21:13A little bit disappointed that I didn't bring flavours that they were expecting from me.
21:19I should have left the mushrooms behind.
21:21I regret the amount of time my friends invited me for brunches and I didn't go, so...
21:28Cake decoration business owner Joyce has made her daughter's favourite homemade brunch.
21:34Chicken and shiitake mushroom noodles.
21:38In a galangal ginger and lemongrass broth.
21:41Topped with sliced soy egg omelette and crispy garlic.
21:46Served with a sausage meat and mushroom spring roll.
21:56There's great flavours of caramelised garlic throughout, which is really nice,
22:00like little surprises of that.
22:02The shiitake mushrooms are very nice as well.
22:04The egg with soy sauce, kind of a little bit sweet.
22:08That's quite interesting.
22:09So, I can see the brunch-inspired elements.
22:12But for me, I cannot taste the galangal, I cannot taste the ginger,
22:15I cannot taste the lemongrass.
22:16There's lots of skills here, but lots of room for improving this dish.
22:21Thank you for inventing the breakfast spring roll.
22:25Really beautifully crisp, nicely cooked.
22:27I loved the sausage meat.
22:29There was a real hit of coriander.
22:32Nobody can take away from the fact, Joyce, you give yourself a lot of work
22:37and you deliver all the things you say you're going to do.
22:41Anna and Grace gave me fair comments.
22:43I should have concentrated more on the broth.
22:45But they were impressed with the fact that I made my own spring rolls.
22:48If I'm going to be known for flavours, I've got to deliver.
22:52Corporate banking relationship manager Antosh has served Mexican drunken beans.
22:58Cannellini beans flavoured with coriander, cumin and bacon,
23:02braised in cider and lime juice.
23:06Topped with pickled shallots, parsley salsa and sliced avocado.
23:13Served with corn elote, corn with mayonnaise and lime and a flatbread.
23:24It's unlike anything I've eaten before, which always makes me ecstatic.
23:30Bearing in mind you took a jar of cannellini, shoved in some cider,
23:35some onion and some bacon.
23:37I think that what you've created has got such depths.
23:40I think that what's elevated it further is this parsley salsa
23:45that you've got across the top.
23:46I like that you hit the brief.
23:47To me, I have seen these types of dishes being served
23:50in posh brunch places time and again now.
23:53I think that's a great plate of food.
23:55Your flatbreads are beautiful.
23:57There's a nice crunch to your sweet corn
23:59and the pickled shallots are very good.
24:01But for me, I feel it has far too much cider in there.
24:05So the beans are far too sweet.
24:09Well, congratulations, Antosh.
24:10You split the judges right down the middle with that dish.
24:13The one true judge, right?
24:16Oh, no.
24:17Oh, no.
24:21I'm feeling good enough.
24:22It was mixed response.
24:24There were definitely bits I knew I could have worked on and got a bit better,
24:27but in the grand scheme of things, one judge loved it.
24:30For today, Team Grace.
24:33Inspired by a childhood dessert cooked by his mum,
24:38operations manager Muckel's brunch is carrot halver,
24:42shredded purple carrots, spiced with cardamom, nutmeg and black pepper,
24:48roasted in sugar and butter, topped with yoghurt, toasted oats and a fruit salad.
25:00I've never had anything like this before for brunch.
25:04It undeniably belongs on a brunch menu.
25:08Your purple carrot halver is really delicious.
25:11There's a great balance in there of green cardamom, which goes so well with carrots.
25:16The black pepper is elegant.
25:18It is not hot.
25:19It is a perfume at the end and on top your yoghurt fruit salad.
25:24It's a match made in heaven.
25:26The two of them really go very, very well.
25:29I love that by stewing these carrots down,
25:31they've become something that to me feels a bit like porridge or a semolina pudding.
25:39I can completely see how your mother made it and you'd end up having it for breakfast and then sometimes
25:46lunch.
25:47It's a hug in a bowl.
25:50I'm really feeling relieved.
25:53I took a big risk today.
25:55Since my childhood, my mom has made me this and I think what I'm going to tell her today,
25:58she'll be very, very proud of what I have done.
26:01And yeah, yeah, I'm super happy.
26:04That was a really positive round.
26:06It's times like this in the MasterChef kitchen that make me so proud to be involved with it.
26:12Some of those cooks really impressed me today.
26:16I think the two standout dishes were from Daniel and Muckle.
26:19And I think the other four cooks, they showed some really great flashes of brilliance,
26:24but I think there's definitely some room for improvement.
26:27Anna, this competition never sleeps.
26:29If they think that was difficult, wait till they see what we have next.
26:37All six of you are still fighting for a place in Knockout Week.
26:42You need to show us why you deserve to stay in this competition.
26:49To help us make this decision on who goes through, we have invited a very special guest.
26:55May we welcome the esteemed restaurant critic, Jimmy Famarewa.
27:03Hello.
27:04Hello.
27:04Welcome.
27:06Thanks for having me.
27:09I've set you a brief to cook a dish that celebrates nuts.
27:13I want you to make a nut or a variety of nuts the star of the show in an unforgettable
27:20dish.
27:23You have 90 minutes.
27:26At the end of this, three of you will be going home.
27:30Start cooking.
27:35Jimmy being his, like, makes me amazed and nervous.
27:40I think I'm gonna go nuts.
27:45Nuts are a real sort of obsession for me and in my family.
27:49They're a huge part of Nigerian culture, which I grew up in.
27:52They really are so versatile.
27:55They can be ground up into flour.
27:59They can be roasted in the oven and turned into, like, a brittle.
28:04Sweet dishes, you know, you can do Bakewell tarts or pecan pies.
28:09Then you can go over to savoury dishes.
28:11They can be used in curries or dipping sauces.
28:14The really important thing here is that a dish is balanced.
28:18It needs to taste delicious and it needs to be technically spot on.
28:22It's so exciting to see Jimmy here today.
28:25It's a privilege to be able to cook for him.
28:26But I've got to stay calm.
28:31Joyce. Hello.
28:32Were you kind of cursing my name when you saw this brief?
28:34Yeah, I thought, who's nutty enough to think of this?
28:37Nicely done.
28:38A nut something that you kind of cook with a lot.
28:40I've taken my inspiration from my travels across the USA.
28:43I've been fortunate enough to have road trips
28:44and I've done 48 states of America.
28:46Wow.
28:47And tried pecan pies in many a state.
28:50So I'm making a Swiss roll with pecan nut in the Swiss roll,
28:54a caramel sauce inside.
28:56And I'm going to be making a pecan nut and bacon crumb.
29:00Pecan and bacon Swiss roll.
29:02Didn't have that on my bingo sheet today.
29:03You are never boring, are you?
29:05Never.
29:09The key to a Swiss roll is that perfect sponge.
29:12If she overcooks it, it will be dry and it will crack when she goes to roll it.
29:18She's putting chopped pecans and bacon through her Swiss roll.
29:22Something like bacon is a lovely salty contrast for a sweet dish.
29:27So it's not as wild as it sounds.
29:29Is it sweet? Is it savoury?
29:31Who cares as long as it's delicious?
29:34I'm just going to serve it with a maple and bourbon caramel.
29:38I think it's a wonderful idea, she just needs to be careful with balance.
29:41Too much bourbon and it will dominate the dish.
29:44I am doing a lot of work, which if it goes wrong, it goes really wrong.
29:48Because if there is no Swiss roll, we haven't got anything,
29:51you might have a bit of sauce and nuts and cream.
29:56I love this brief. I love nuts, I eat nuts all the time.
29:59It's great when you're way hiking.
30:00And when you're out in the hills, like a handful of nuts is a lot easier to carry than a
30:04big elaborate sandwich or something.
30:05And sometimes we don't even stop, so yeah, nuts are great.
30:10So Scotland, nuts, what are your first thoughts and what are you making?
30:15Yeah, immediately to me it was like Scotland in autumn, nice walk through the forest, all the orange and browns,
30:20wild chestnuts, wild hazelnuts.
30:21So I'm doing a shortcrust tart with chestnut flour through that, filled with hazelnut frangipan, topped with whole hazelnut pralines
30:30with a pear poached in chestnut liqueur.
30:32You are not just doing a little sprinkle of nuts on the top, you've put them all the way through.
30:37How risky do you think this is?
30:39Well, pressure is a privilege. I love this brief, so I'm just really glad to be here and it's good
30:44people.
30:46So Jamie is making a chestnut tart, which sounds fantastic.
30:51The pastry has got to be short and buttery and flavoursome and not soggy.
30:56Frangipan is a nut based sponge.
30:58Hazelnut frangipan for me is a wonderful thing.
31:02That needs to be perfect consistency, right balance of sweetness, lovely and rich and candied and fragrant.
31:11I love a good poached pear.
31:13He needs to get them on quite early because we want the poach to soften that pear.
31:19He's using hazelnut liqueur in his Chantilly cream and then as well as that there's nuts on the side.
31:25That is really going nuts.
31:29OK guys, that's 30 minutes gone.
31:33At first the brief troubled me a little, so I did what I always do is I just went back
31:38to the concept and broke it down and I basically explored the word nuts.
31:43And it's definitely a celebration of nuts.
31:48So I'm making a raviolo stuffed with walnut mousse and lamb's nut fried in nut brown butter.
31:56And you said lamb's nut. Are we talking about testicles?
32:00Testicles.
32:01I am talking about testicles, Jimmy.
32:05I'm all about championing the lowly, uncelebrated ingredients.
32:13I feel like Dan is kind of having a little bit of fun with my brief with his play on
32:18the word nuts.
32:19But I'm kind of here for his creativity and he's showing some cojones.
32:25Sheep's testicles is very similar to a sweet bread.
32:28It's gave me almost a little bit like a super mild kidney flavour.
32:33Daniel's going to create this walnut and lamb's testicle mousse and add some eggs and some cream to lighten that
32:41mixture as well as quite a lot of walnuts.
32:44This should have big, bold flavours.
32:48He's going to serve that with a walnut and tarragon pesto and a butternut squash and nutmeg veluté.
32:57Yeah, I'm really pleased with that.
33:03Mukul, tell me what you're cooking.
33:05So there is a very popular chocolate nowadays which is selling like hotcakes.
33:09That's Dubai chocolate.
33:10So Dubai chocolate is basically a chocolate filled with kadayef which is a filo pastry and pistachio.
33:16My wife is addicted to it.
33:17I'm cooking a pistachio crempette which will be sitting on kadayef nest and there will be a saffron cream on
33:23top of it.
33:23I also have a rose and chilli, jelly.
33:26I'll be putting some raspberry coulis around it just to balance the acidity.
33:30So I've lived in Dubai for three years.
33:32People know what Dubai chocolate is so that's the perfect opportunity to bring them in.
33:36You're cooking a dessert which is influenced by your wife's favourite chocolate bar.
33:40Has she been a great support during the competition?
33:42She's looking after her 90 months old by herself which is just great.
33:47I couldn't have done that without her.
33:48So yeah, she's been an amazing support to me.
33:52Yet again Mukul is showing us his creative side.
33:55He's been inspired by pistachio nuts in the famous Dubai chocolate bar.
34:00I'm just going to set it after tempering and just make a shard out of it.
34:04Especially tricky to temper chocolate when you are running against time.
34:07But I hope I'll get to it. It's fine.
34:11He's going to use kadayef pastry as the base of his dessert.
34:17It's similar to filo pastry and he's going to fry that to get it really crispy.
34:22Kadayef can go really dry if I roast it for a longer time or if I don't add enough condensed
34:27milk to it.
34:27It's topped with a pistachio crème patisserie, a type of custard and you add cream to it.
34:36I really hope that has got a good balance of sweetness and nuttiness.
34:42As well as the pistachio, Mukul is making a rose and chili jelly alongside a saffron cream.
34:50Those are gigantic dominant flavours that if you're just a little bit too heavy handed, the pistachio won't be the
34:59star of the show.
35:01We're halfway now. We have 45 minutes left.
35:07This dish brings me loads of memories from my childhood.
35:12Despite the wobbly round and the last challenge, I am confident that Anne and Grace is going to love the
35:19dish.
35:23Cashew nuts are very, very popular in Brazil and I remember my mum bringing the Brazil nuts covered in chocolate.
35:31It's really, really good.
35:31It sounds like it's unlocked all these nostalgic memories. How are you going to bring them to life?
35:36I'm making a cashew nuts brownie with Brazil nuts and cuposu mousse.
35:42Cuposu is a fruit from Amazon forest. It's got some acidity in it.
35:47I use a lot of juices, jams. That brings me a lot of memories, picking up in my grandma's garden.
35:54In a bed of pasokka. Pasokka is a peanut with sugar and salt.
35:59Lots of flavours here I've never had before. This is going to be really interesting.
36:03Yeah. Thank you. Let's go to the Amazon.
36:05Oh, I know.
36:08This is a really interesting sounding dish. A cashew brownie.
36:13I really want a crisp exterior and a real soft, fudgy centre.
36:20I want to taste those cashew nuts. I want to taste the cocoa from the chocolate.
36:24Gianni's been really ambitious. She is steeping Brazil nuts in milk and she's taking that and turning it into a
36:32mousse,
36:32which is also going to flavour with this citric Amazonian fruit.
36:36It's a real balance of flavours. If the citric flavour dominates too much or if the Brazil nuts aren't coming
36:43through, it's going to be hugely disappointing.
36:49I really believe in this dish. I think it's really exciting, shows a lot of skill, a lot of creativity
36:54and I think it's good enough to get to Knockout Week.
37:00Antosh, what is your nutty recipe?
37:03What's the biggest nut of them all? Coconut. So I'm celebrating coconut in many forms.
37:07So I'm doing a coconut rice pudding, coconut biscuits, a coconut and sesame brittle, coconut liqueur, infused mango and then
37:14the most exciting bit, for me at least, a Thai green curry ice cream.
37:18Whoa. That's the face I wanted.
37:20Antosh, you had our attention, now you have our interest. Thai green curry ice cream.
37:26I'll be honest, everyone I've fed it to has the first bite and goes, oh, this is a bit weird.
37:30Second bite, love it. So you have to have two bites.
37:36Antosh is using coconut, which technically isn't a nut, but I think he's having a little bit of fun with
37:42the brief, a little bit like Daniel.
37:45So I think I'll let that one slide.
37:47I love rice puddings. For me, the rice needs to be fully cooked, but not too mushy and full of
37:54coconut.
37:56Antosh has been true to his Polish roots. He's going to make kokosanki, which is Polish coconut biscuits, and they
38:03should be crunchy on the outside and chewy on the inside.
38:07Antosh, I can also see some peanuts on your bench.
38:10So the peanuts have gone in the curry paste to add a bit of crunch, a bit of nuttiness.
38:15From that Thai green curry ice cream, I really want them to feel like they're eating a Thai green curry.
38:19So getting that hit of coconut, but also chili, lemongrass, galangal. I want that, but in a cold form.
38:27He's also going to give us some coconut rum compressed mango.
38:33And then as well as that, there's a sesame brittle. There are so many elements. It's going to be a
38:39tricky plane to land, but if he can pull it off, it's going to be extraordinary.
38:44OK, guys, you've only got 15 minutes left.
38:51My roll rolls well. Nothing cracked. Everything's still in it. We're cooking, literally.
39:05There's never enough time. Tarts could have done with a bit more time to cool up. I'm pretty sure they're
39:10cooked.
39:11Two minutes left. This is the moment of truth.
39:27That's it. Time is up.
39:36Daniel, come on up.
39:39First up is Daniel. His play on Jimmy's nut brief is a lamb testicle and walnut mousse raviolo in burnt
39:48butter with a walnut and tarragon pesto served in a butternut squash and nutmeg veluté and a walnut and tarragon
39:58oil.
40:03The actual filling of your raviolo is actually really, really delicious.
40:08There's a soft lightness to the actual texture of the meat itself and you do get little pops of kind
40:14of different nut flavours throughout.
40:16You get it from the pesto, you get it from the nut butter, so there's real complexity and different layers
40:22to it.
40:22I find myself really, really enjoying this kind of journey you've taken us on of different forms and different readings
40:30of the word nut.
40:33Your pasta work is excellent. It is thin and it is holding the filling in very well.
40:39Your balance of your walnut and your lamb's testicles is also very good.
40:44The burnt butter has that nutty flavour you get from butter that ties all of the other ingredients in.
40:52I think your dish is full of skill and it's bursting with flavour.
40:58Your butternut squash and nutmeg veluté, I'm getting the nutmeg and it's silky and smooth.
41:04You have tarragon in pesto and tarragon in the oil. It's beautiful and it's aromatic.
41:10The amount of work that you've put into this dish is incredible. I think you need to be proud of
41:14that.
41:16I can't believe some of the comments that I had today.
41:19If I can get through to the knockout week, then, you know, I'm just going to keep growing and growing
41:22and growing.
41:25Oh, I'm loving it. And I want more.
41:30Jamie's nut inspired dessert is a hazelnut and chestnut tart.
41:36A chestnut flour short cross tart case filled with hazelnut frangipan.
41:42Topped with pears poached in chestnut liqueur, praline paste, candied hazelnuts and a praline crumb.
41:51Served with a chestnut and hazelnut liqueur chantilly cream.
42:01I think your hazelnut frangipan is nutty and sugary and sweet and delightful.
42:09The chestnut flour pastry has salted butter in it, which really pulls the entire dish back from the edge of
42:15too sweet, which I think is clever.
42:18This is inventive. It's intriguing. And I think it has moments of delight.
42:24I love those kind of fanned, delicate, translucent slices of poached pear on top.
42:30I like that the chantilly cream isn't too sweet as well because you are on a knife edge here.
42:35But my favourite thing might be those praline candied hazelnuts.
42:41You crunch them and it's like it could like set off car alarms or something.
42:45I was trying to not noisily crunch.
42:46They are delicious. It's a distinct, really one-of-a-kind celebration of nuts in all sorts of different forms.
42:57Mine's not cooked. It's raw.
42:59You can see that the pear actually sunk into the tarts.
43:03As far as flavour goes, it is delicious.
43:06It's undeniably a beautiful expression of hazelnut and chestnuts.
43:10But this is not cooked enough.
43:14I don't know. Mixed emotions.
43:17I know that Jimmy's feedback will live, in my head, rent-free forever.
43:20But to undercook the frangipan, I've fallen down a little bit.
43:24But it's all about lessons learned.
43:26So, try and focus on that.
43:30Jeanne's dessert is inspired by the nuts of Brazil.
43:35She's served a cashew nut brownie, topped with a Brazil nut and capoissu fruit mousse, and a caramel tuile.
43:45And pissoca, a Brazilian roasted peanut crumb.
43:55The brownie has a lovely intensity.
43:57There's a real richness and depth of dark chocolate flavour.
44:01I like the cashews through it, but I do think they could probably have stood some roasting or some kind
44:06of blooming of those flavours.
44:08That crumb, which is a bit salted, is very nice.
44:11I don't think we need it so much.
44:13It feels a little bit dry, and that is something that nuts can do.
44:18The Coupoissu and Brazil mousse, for me, has not worked.
44:22The acidity of it, it just keeps kind of demanding attention, as opposed to complementing the brownie.
44:28For me, it's too dominant, too strong.
44:31You have put so much cashew into the brownie that it's sacrificed the feeling of it being a brownie.
44:38It feels more like a flapjack.
44:42I'm not entirely sure that this works as a dish.
44:47I am feeling a little bit disappointed with the feedback.
44:52It's OK, I've tried something new.
44:55But I'm happy that I brought something that they never tried before.
44:59Not sure if it was enough.
45:01Just going to keep my fingers crossed.
45:06Antosh's twist on Jimmy's nut brief celebrates the coconut.
45:11He's made a coconut milk rice pudding topped with kokosanki, Polish coconut biscuits, coconut and sesame tuiles,
45:20and a coconut liqueur compressed mango, served with a Thai green curry ice cream flavoured with peanuts.
45:35Antosh, I think we can comfortably say you've not played it safe.
45:39You've got that thick, quite intense coconut milk rice pudding.
45:44And then we get to your Thai green curry peanut ice cream, which, you weren't kidding, it really is Thai
45:51green curry and an ice cream.
45:53It's that jolt of coldness, it's creamy, there's heat flowing through it, and it kind of scrambles your brain.
45:59It's inventive, and I really, really do applaud you for that.
46:06I adore this thick, coconut-y rice and peanut ice cream.
46:13With shallot and garlic and a lot of Thai, lemongrass and galanga.
46:17To me, it's delightful.
46:19It's so playful and ultimately really wonderful.
46:26Your sesame brittle is, it is really good.
46:31It's a very difficult technical sugar work to do, and I think you really nailed that, so that's wonderful.
46:36And those beautiful, succulent, juicy cubes of mango are stunning.
46:43You've got a lovely kind of rum hit off it as well.
46:48Your coconut biscuits are burnt.
46:50They're missing that delicious kind of sweet, slight chew.
46:56I went in knowing that the coconut biscuits were over for sure.
47:01But, do you know what, the rest of the dish was well received.
47:05Good job.
47:05I'm really proud of what I did, so honestly, either result, I can leave here with my head held high.
47:11Hello.
47:13Joyce's nut dish is a twist on an American pecan pie.
47:17She's served a Swiss roll, pecan sponge filled with cream, maple and bourbon caramel, and a pecan nut and bacon
47:26crumb.
47:28Served with a pecan tuile, crushed praline, and a maple syrup and bourbon caramel sauce.
47:39Your sponge is beautiful, it's light, it's fluffy. I'm enjoying the chopped pecan in the centre.
47:46Your bourbon and maple sauce is as creamy, it's luscious, it has a hit of alcohol.
47:53If a pecan pie can inspire you to make this, I'm very curious of where else you're going to take
48:00food.
48:01Joyce, I have to say this is a really very, very good idea.
48:04I think at the moment we have an abundance of sweet and I'd like to have tasted more of the
48:10bacon so that there was just a bit more saltiness to it.
48:14The pecan nut just comes roaring through every element of it, the beautifully crisp tuile and the sponge as well.
48:25I said celebrate a nut and you have done that and you've done it in a really, really effective and
48:32impressive way, so well done.
48:38I'm very proud of my dish and the feedback that I got, some of the critique in it, totally agree
48:43with.
48:43I could have got away with putting much more bacon in there.
48:46I feel I have done enough, but I'm also against very talented cooks, so we'll just have to wait and
48:54see.
48:57Inspired by Dubai chocolate, Mukul has chosen to highlight pistachio.
49:03He's made a Kadaif fine pastry nest topped with pistachio creme patte, saffron cream and a chocolate and pistachio chard,
49:14served with a rose and chilli gel, pistachio crumb and a raspberry coulee.
49:26The pistachio flavour comes through both in that creme patte and the pistachio crumb.
49:32The raspberry coulee is great in terms of flavour because it's a sharp bit of contrast, but it's also quite
49:38a necessary source because it all does feel a bit dry.
49:42You've got that huge wadge of fine pastry underneath.
49:46And for a riff on Dubai chocolate, it's not really got much chocolate.
49:52I don't think this is your best work.
49:56The pistachio cream and then the pistachio crumb, for me, are not sweet enough.
50:02Your saffron cream, to me, it's very elegant, the flavour of saffron.
50:05Same with the rose. It's really well balanced with your chilli.
50:08You have incredible ideas, Muckle.
50:12I think the presentation ultimately let this down.
50:15If you'd used a smaller ring and you filled each layer up, it would mean every spoon had an even
50:23distribution of each flavour.
50:25But if they are eaten in the wrong ratios, it's falling flat and I think that's what's happening with your
50:29dish.
50:33I don't feel like completely happy about what I did there.
50:37I did not think about layering the flavours in one go so everything could be eaten in one bite.
50:43Oh well.
50:44I am not very confident at the moment. I am really disappointed and very nervous.
50:53Thank you all so much. I asked for dishes that celebrated nuts and you delivered with skill, with personality and
51:02with more than a few surprises.
51:05It's been a real privilege to be here and try your food.
51:18Jimmy, thank you for your wonderful brief. This is when things get really hard.
51:23Yeah, good luck guys. You'll need it.
51:27Thanks Jimmy.
51:33I have to admit, I'm very impressed with our cooks today.
51:37But we can only take the best ones through to Knockout Week.
51:43There's one cook who really stood out today and that was Daniel.
51:47I just feel it was skill on skill on skill and really creative.
51:52I think we're in agreement. Daniel goes through.
51:55Yeah.
51:57I was not a huge fan of Gianni's brownie today.
52:01She put quite a lot of cashew in there. The texture wasn't right.
52:05I thought the mousse was very acidic.
52:07And the nuts along the bottom made the whole thing quite dry.
52:11Gianni goes home.
52:13Yes.
52:16Muckle, time and again in this kitchen, has delivered dishes that have impressed us.
52:21But that was the weakest dishes ever cooked.
52:23It's a great shame. I think Muckle has an excellent palate.
52:27But the construction of that dish really affected how enjoyable it was to eat.
52:32The pastry, it was far too dry. The pistachio, not sweet enough.
52:38Sadly, it feels like it's the end of the road for Muckle.
52:43It leaves us in a discussion about Antosh, Jamie and Joyce, three cooks who all have a place in my
52:51heart and my stomach because they've cooked some wonderful things.
52:57Antosh brought us what was essentially a Thai green curry, but in rice pudding and ice cream form.
53:03He's very, very creative. I think he has wonderful ideas.
53:08Antosh does make mistakes with his cooking, but there is a playfulness that intrigues me.
53:16I really loved Joyce's pecan sponge in her Swiss roll. I thought it was light and fluffy and lovely and
53:24thick.
53:24She promised bacon I could have done with more of that. However, there's no denying it was an incredible invention.
53:33Jamie's frangipane tart certainly divided us as judges today.
53:37I like the crispness of the pastry and those little praline nuts were just complete flavour bombs.
53:44But my tart was undercooked. And the question is, can we forgive that?
53:50This is a really tough decision. There are three very exciting cooks.
53:56Anna, what are we going to do?
53:59Now that we're so close to Knockout Week, I feel like I can just reach out. I can see it.
54:03I just want to reach out and grab it. But I just have to hope that it lets me.
54:09I'd like to go through. I'd like to stay. I'm really enjoying my time here.
54:13And I would like to show what else I can do.
54:18The other cooks here are unbelievable. So if I were to get through, I'd be surprised.
54:22But I would also be absolutely ecstatic.
54:35Thank you so much for that round.
54:40You really put your heart and soul into those dishes.
54:45Which is what makes this incredibly hard because we can only take the best cooks through to Knockout Week.
54:55The first cook leaving the competition is Gianni.
55:00Thank you so much for introducing us to flavours and ingredients we'd never seen before.
55:08Thanks Gianni.
55:15And the second cook leaving us today is...
55:22Muckle.
55:23Muckle, we have been delighted by your flavours and your creativity.
55:28But I'm sorry, your time here at MasterChef has come to an end.
55:32Thank you so much.
55:34Thanks.
55:37To be heading home tonight feels disappointing, but I'm feeling proud of what I have achieved here.
55:46I did show to the judges the flavours of the Amazon forest.
55:52Definitely coming back home with my head high.
55:55This competition has unlocked a lot of confidence in me.
55:59I totally had fun. I had a blast almost.
56:03It was an amazing experience.
56:05I cannot describe that in words.
56:13This is where it got really tough.
56:18But Grace and I, we've made a decision.
56:24All four of you are through to Knockout Week.
56:31I'm just feeling dazed but so happy. I just can't believe I've actually got through to Knockout Week.
56:37Yeah, bring it on.
56:39I'm over the moon right now, honestly. I don't think elation even describes it.
56:44Like, everything about it is fantastic and I just didn't want it to stop.
56:47The three others who've got through are unbelievable cooks, so even to be in the same wheelhouse as them, it
56:53means the world.
56:54I'm feeling shell-shocked, to be honest, utterly drained.
56:58But really, really pleased and proud of myself, which, it doesn't come in easily.
57:02So, yeah, it's just magic.
57:10Next time, six more home cooks...
57:16...compete for the right to wear a MasterChef apron.
57:21A wee bit of a time issue, I think.
57:23You went a little crazy with that pepper.
57:25Would I finish all of this? Yes.
57:27Before battling for a place in the quarter-final.
57:30I don't know whether I should eat it with a fork or a straw.
57:36I don't know whether I should be a pro.
57:37That's a cold.
57:50It's not going on.
57:54I don't know.
57:56I won't see the rest of the universe.
57:57I won't see the rest of the new life.
57:57I won't see the rest of the universe.
58:01I won't see it in heaven.
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