It's the battle for the ultimate culinary prize.
Ooh!
58 of the country's best home cooks...
I need to stop shaking.
..all with their heart set...
Fingers crossed.
Your sesame cracker's burning.
Oh, no.
..on the coveted MasterChef trophy.
That's a cracker of a dish.
Absolutely ace.
I'm so happy. I just want to dance.
Each week, 12 extraordinary amateur talents...
Come on, come on, come on.
..battle for a place in the quarterfinal.
I think it's exceptionally good.
I can't fault it.
But only the best can earn their passport...
I think we need to kick it up a little bit.
..to the ultimate culinary showdown.
Upstairs, there is bow ties, there's ballgowns
and there are Michelin stars.
This is where the wave of ambition hits the rock of reality.
Mr Wallace, welcome back.
It's MasterChef time.
It's early morning and the first six home cooks in this year's
competition are arriving at the MasterChef kitchen.
I haven't told my kids that I'm on MasterChef.
My youngest, she thinks I'm opening a cafe because I'm baking so much.
I'm really excited to get into the kitchen.
I feel really ready and I just want to get started.
Can't wait to meet John and Gregg.
Everyone's going to be cooking,
I'll be there like that, "It's John and Gregg!"
Hello. Welcome to a brand-new MasterChef competition.
You are our first six cooks. How about that?
We don't know. We may already have this year's winner in front of us.
Our first challenge is Basic to Brilliant.
We want you to take an everyday ingredient,
something that you would find in your weekly shop
and turn it into something exceptional.
To secure your place in the competition,
you need to get yourself a MasterChef apron.
At the end of this round, Gregg and I will choose our two favourite
dishes, and the people who cook those will get themselves an apron
and go straight through to the next round.
The remaining four will have to cook again for the two remaining aprons.
That does mean that two of you will be leaving us.
One hour, 20 minutes.
Let's cook.
Gregg's a lot shorter than I thought he was.
I think I have skills. I don't know.
I wouldn't be here otherwise.
I'm going to try and pretend I'm at home.
IT teacher Fateha loves cooking authentic Bengali dishes
for her family and has aspirations of creating her own recipe book.
I would like to show traditional Bengali food, and sometimes I feel
as if it is a bit underrated.
I want my children to understand my heritage and my childhood.
Where in the Midlands are you from? You've got a Midlands accent.
AFFECTED BRUMMIE ACCENT:Birmingham.
NORMAL VOICE:Born and bred, Birmingham.
I'm an IT teacher. I'm doing cooking.
Tell me your ingredient you're working with, please.
I'm cooking with lamb.
It's something that I use a lot at home.
I'm doing a lamb curry with shatkora.
This is a Bengali fruit. It's like a big lemon.
It gives a different smell to a lamb curry.
What are you serving this lamb curry with?
Three lentil daal, pilau rice, some rice flour rotis
and a tomato salad.
You've got under two hours.
I know. I'd better crack on.
The problem with putting lamb in a pressure cooker,
sometimes it can dry out, and that lamb has to be lovely, fall apart,
moist in your mouth with a wonderful sauce to go with it.
I hope she doesn't forget that whilst doing the lentils,
the bread, the rice and the salad.
Fateha's given herself a huge task here.
28-year-old Brin has hopes of swapping his career
as a veterinary surgeon for one which incorporates his true
passion for food.
Who taught you to cook, Brin?
Probably my parents. Being treated to all this amazing Sri Lankan food
growing up, that made me realise that I'm probably not going to spend
the rest of my life eating bland food.
So my basic ingredient is onions.
In a Sri Lankan household,
as soon as you smell the onions on the hob,
you know dinner's going to be on its way.
So we've got miso onions,
which is going to be the star of the show.
They're going to be on a spring onion puree,
with some crispy shallot granola and some pickled shallots.
And you've got sesame crusted pork tenderloin.
He's taking onions four different ways,
which I think is really clever.
The big thing, I think, for Brin right now is salty.
Soy in his granola, miso being reduced down with onions,
then a miso sauce going on the side of his pork as well.
I just hope all these things work together.
I feel a bit nervous about cooking for John and Gregg.
Hopefully, Gregg's got a few decent sounds to reply to my food,
maybe a little "phwoar".
30 minutes gone.
Children's mental health manager Muir grew up
on the north-east coast of Scotland.
She developed her love for cookery after graduating from university
and travelling across Asia and New Zealand.
What did you take from your travels food-wise?
Well, there's just so many different things you can cook.
You know, everywhere we went, there was another different take
on rice or another different take on onions,
another different take on whatever it is.
And it's amazing what you can do with simple ingredients.
So I've chosen couscous, not very Scottish,
but there's just so many different things you can do with it.
So I've got pan-fried lamb steaks, couscous with bits and pieces in it.
I've got some lemony yoghurt, baba ghanoush,
green olive, pomegranate and walnut salsa
and some lavash bread, hopefully.
We've got things from the Mediterranean, we've got
things from the Middle East.
With all those things from all around the world
coming together on one plate,
I just hope that couscous doesn't get lost in the dish.
I think I'm a bit overambitious sometimes in the kitchen.
I start off with a plan. It grows and grows.
And then it's often 11pm before we have a meal.
Digital project director Hope is an avid baker who,
along with her husband,
have aspirations of running their own supper club.
So my basic ingredient is chocolate. I have such a sweet tooth.
I would eat dessert for breakfast and dessert for lunch.
So we always have chocolate in the house.
Does your husband cook? Yes, yeah.
He did try and get on MasterChef before.
You didn't apply at the same time? No, he applied six years ago.
But YOU got on. But I got on. Brilliant.
One of my husband's favourite desserts
is a Black Forest gateau cake.
So I'm doing a Black Forest gateau chocolate brownie.
Are you making lots of this?
There'll be plenty to go around, Gregg. Don't you worry about it.
Black Forest gateau, as we know,
a classic - cherries, cream, chocolate cake.
There's no cherries or cream. It's not really a cake.
It's actually a brownie.
Brownie needs to be crispy on the outside, stodgy on the inside.
Then we're getting a hazelnut chocolate mousse.
Hope's making a gel with the blackberries.
And then we're getting extra texture
by a piece of sourdough crisp across the top.
Huge amount of skill on show here.
Cirilo works for a hotel in central London and wants to fly the flag
for his native Panama and showcase his passion for Latino cuisine.
Mood-popping flavours, a little bit of energy
and, of course, a good quantity.
Cirilo, paint a picture for me, can you,
the flavours and the food of Panama?
When we built the Panama Canal,
we had people from everywhere in the world.
So the marriage of all these cultures together gave us, like,
a special flavour that comes from there.
I love it like crazy.
You only imagine. Mate, I'm loving this.
So what is your humble ingredient?
Kidney beans.
I chop a lot of onions, garlic, pepper, and a little bit of passata
to create a little bit of a soup going.
We're going to have a little bit of white rice.
Also, we're doing a little bit of steak.
And what I'm doing is I'm creating my own version of a plate
that we call in Panama APC,
arroz, porotos y carne.
That means rice, beans and meat.
Really humble ingredients
but really good flavours coming out of it.
We have 15 minutes left.
No!
Right now, it seems to me Cirilo might be in trouble.
He's just burnt the sauce for his beans.
Now, the sauce for the beans, I'd think, would be quite
important if you want to showcase your beans.
Blackpool-born Matt is a butcher by trade
and has worked in his father-in-law's shop since he was 16 years old.
Matt's everyday ingredient is pasta.
Making good pasta actually is a skill in itself,
and he's going to serve it with a sauce of cream, prawns,
salmon and Parmesan cheese.
Fish, cheese and cream and pasta together?
That is a gamble.
You're a butcher. Yeah. You're cooking fish.
I wanted to do something a bit different
to show everybody that butchers aren't just cavemen
and we love to eat lovely, fresh fish,
not just steaks every night.
I'm definitely after an apron today. My wife said,
if I don't get the apron, don't come home,
so my house depends on this.
We have just two minutes to go.
That is finishing touches, please.
It looks all right.
"Don't be frownie, have a brownie."
It's just a little bit...
That's it! Time's up.
Everybody stop.
Well done, everybody.
First one done. First done.
IT teacher Fateha's Basic to Brilliant ingredient was lamb.
She's made a Bengali curry, flavoured with shatkora,
served with a three-lentil daal, a tomato and red onion salad,
pilau rice and a rice flour roti.
I'm impressed by the amount of work. Thank you.
Your lamb is really tender, so well done.
But you've allowed the rice, the lentils
and your curry to catch on the bottom
and it's unfortunately masking all your other wonderful flavours.
The spicing of the lamb's great.
The lamb is still quite moist, which is good.
Like the shatkora. That's nice and sharp.
Your breads, I think, are fantastic.
But I think you've given yourself too much work to do.
I don't normally burn, like, my curries.
Burnt. Burnt.
I just wanted to give it my best shot
and things just went wrong for me.
Veterinary surgeon Brin has taken his basic ingredient, onion,
and served it four ways -
white onions baked in miso, spring onion puree, crispy shallot granola
and pickled shallots, with a sesame crust pork tenderloin
and a miso, onion and white wine sauce.
Your use of onions, I think, is inspired.
Spring onion puree, that lovely, vibrant green on the plate.
Big white onions braised in miso,
all the lovely sweetness coming out of them.
Salty sharpness coming from the granola.
Pork cooked beautifully. Love the crust around the outside.
It's good, it's vibrant.
It's interesting.
Be careful with the seasoning. OK.
But I like it, Brin. Thank you very much.
Brin, do you know what this is? Mm-hm?
That's an impressed face, that is, Brin.
That shows someone with a fair bit of knowledge and a good touch.
But not only that, there's a lot of creativity there.
Pretty chuffed to have got an impressed face from Gregg.
Wasn't expecting that, to be honest, ever, let alone this early on.
Mental health manager Muir baked her couscous
with sun-dried tomatoes, almonds and parsley
and is serving it with a walnut, olive and pomegranate salad,
lamb steaks, baba ghanoush, baby courgettes,
a lemon yoghurt dip and lavash bread.
You chose to feature couscous and you've done a fantastic job
with that couscous. It has got a good texture, because you baked it,
and it's a lovely combination.
I get a different flavour each time I dip my fork in.
Your lamb could be rested a bit more
and a little bit more heat on the pan.
Your bread could probably do with a couple more minutes of cooking
cos it's just a little bit soft in the middle. Yes.
There are a lot of ingredients on this plate.
I was really happy with the feedback about the couscous because,
you know, it's pretty plain, couscous, isn't it?
Areas to work on.
I'm good with that.
Butcher Matt chose to showcase pasta.
He's made tagliatelle, served with salmon and prawns
in a cream, Parmesan and white wine sauce, topped with a Parmesan tuile.
You've got really good flavours here.
I think you probably got away with the cream fish combination,
almost the flavour of the inside of a fish pie.
Pasta, you did a really good job but, as you started to mix it,
it started to fall apart in the pan,
which just means it's probably a little bit over.
Good pasta skills, but the fish is overcooked
because you've already cooked it.
Then you've got no choice but to put it into hot pasta,
which will carry on cooking it. Yeah.
So it's going slightly dry.
I don't have any regrets as such.
Maybe I'd cook the pasta a little bit less next time.
But, overall, on the other side, I'm happy with the dish.
Cirilo, what have you cooked for us?
This is what we call in Panama APC,
arroz, porotos y carne.
Hotel worker Cirilo's APC consists of red kidney beans,
cooked in passata, peppers, garlic and herbs,
with griddled steak and white rice,
and a cabbage, mustard and sour-cream coleslaw.
Steak is cooked well, but your sauce started to burn.
You made another one.
There's a little bit of sweetness in there, little bit of smokiness
in there, and I'm just getting it.
But those beans are your favoured ingredient.
It's there that we were going to get the flavours of Panama,
but it's not quite delivering.
Rice lovely and free-flowing, but the main flavour
is actually coming from that slaw that's quite vibrant and sharp. OK.
That's where the big banger is.
Your beans are stepping up and they're shaking my hand,
but I wanted to dance with them.
Dancing is something that we love in Latin America,
so I wouldn't mind, honestly. I'll join you if you want.
I look forward to it. OK. No problem.
Hope, we're ready, if you are, please.
Digital project director Hope has taken chocolate
and made a brownie, with blackberry gel,
hazelnut chocolate mousse, pickled blackberries
and sourdough crispbreads.
Did you make these plates?
I did make these plates, yes.
I think your brownie's cooked really well.
I like the crust on the outside and nice and gooey on the inside.
The sharpness coming from the blackberry across the top,
the gel is good.
It's not too sweet.
There are some great skills on show here.
Thank you so much.
The nuts through the cream give it almost a toastiness.
I like that. Very much like your cracker. Thank you.
It's kind of almost oaty, but sweet.
I really, really like that, so well done.
Are you OK? Oh, yes...
Happy tears? Yeah.
To be told that I am good at cooking,
it's a very emotional moment to comprehend.
We said that we would choose our two favourite dishes
and those cooks would get themselves a MasterChef apron
and go straight through to the next round.
Our cook of the day...
..is Brin. Thank you.
Brin, congratulations.
Thank you.
The second cook showed us real technical ability and knowledge.
Hope, congratulations.
Well done, you.
Brin, Hope, come and collect your aprons, please.
Well done. Congratulations!
Thank you. Well done, you. Thank you so much. Well done, you.
Congratulations! We did it.
Oh, amazing.
That's such a great feeling to get through on that first round
and get this apron finally on.
This is the start, and I can't wait for what's to come.
There are still two aprons up for grabs.
We want to see how well you think on your feet.
In front of you all you have a cooked potato.
That potato is going to be made into one of Gregg's favourite dishes,
potato gnocchi.
You have a basic recipe for the gnocchi.
We've also got a selection of lovely ingredients over there
to make your dish something truly special.
We want from each of you potato gnocchi
with accompaniments or a sauce of your choice.
You've got 45 minutes to grab yourself an apron.
Off you go.
What we're looking for is a light, fluffy potato dumpling.
What they've got to do is make a sauce to go with it
and bring the two together to make it one.
There's so many things. It's just what to go with.
I never had gnocchi before, but I know what it is.
Even though they have a recipe, things can still go wrong.
I'm just going to treat it as a normal potato dish.
Put some something that you'd have meat and potatoes.
I'm going to make a kofta with gnocchi on the side and,
yeah, hope for the best.
Have you got any sauce going with that at all?
I've not planned one, but now, now you're making me question it.
There's a sauce going with it, Gregg.
Koftas, like little mince sausages.
He's not quite understanding what the gnocchi dish
should be and hasn't considered a sauce at all.
When I mentioned gnocchi, you smiled.
In Scotland we have tattie scones.
Same ingredients. A tattie scone
is flat and fried and gnocchi's
small dumplings and boiled.
Tell me what you're going to serve with your gnocchi.
I'm thinking sage definitely. Some sort of creamy sage kind of sauce.
This smile on your face,
is that a sign of being relaxed, or is that a front?
That's just a normal sign. Happy, sad, it's always there.
Right now, she doesn't know what's going to make up that sauce.
She's saying cream, herbs, maybe some tomato, maybe some mushrooms.
What we've got now is a maybe sauce.
It may be good and it may not.
30 minutes left, OK?
I don't even know what I'm meant to do with these.
You look like you're doing a great job.
Is it meant to look like this? It is, yeah. That's brilliant. OK.
Wonderful. And what do you think you're going to put it with?
I'm doing like a Bengali tangy soup.
There's tomatoes, garlic, chilli and lemon.
So what you're doing is using the food of Bangladesh,
but moulding it around... using the gnocchi. Yeah.
Fantastic. What did you learn from that last round?
Not to burn food.
I'm really impressed with Fateha.
She's never made it, but she's looked at the instructions,
she knows what she's doing.
"Cook the gnocchi in salted water till they float."
She's now going to serve that with a Bangladesh-inspired tomato sauce.
I'm looking forward to this.
Cirillo, first time making potato gnocchi?
First time. I'm doing like a red sauce with a little bit of
ground pork, some fried bacon on top. Great.
And then onion and some parsley and garlic.
You haven't got a lot of time.
May I suggest you get on with that gnocchi?
OK. Thank you. OK. Good luck.
Cirilo, I don't think he actually knows
what the dish is going to end up as. He's just starting cooking.
That's not the way to go.
That last round, his sauce failed to impress.
He's got to make a brilliant sauce in this round.
You've got nine minutes.
Nine minutes.
Decided on a tomato sauce. I'm going to get some chillies in there
and some garlic in there. Beautiful.
Have you boiled those yet?
No. Well, usually you boil gnocchi.
I've never had them just pan-fried. Tattie scones, you just fry it.
Just pan-fry them? Yeah. Well, there you go.
You need to think about your plates, guys,
you've got just three minutes left. Three minutes.
I'm going to plate up.
You've cooked them? I've cooked them, but I'm going to finish them off in the frying pan.
They've been boiled. You're going to finish them off with butter? Yeah.
Guys, you have just 30 seconds.
Your time is up.
Well done.
Cirilo is serving his gnocchi with pork meatballs in a garlic
and tomato sauce, with fried bacon lardons.
The problem we've got here is we've only got three pieces.
The whole thing is, it's about the celebration of the gnocchi.
Cirilo, your gnocchi's made really, really nicely.
Thank you. And that's why I'm so sad there's not more of them.
The flavour of the sauce is good, but you need to make a plan right
at the start, and you were sort of adding things to it and it
just hasn't quite come together. OK.
Thank you.
I'm not sure that's cooked all the way through, I'm afraid.
To cook that all the way through,
they need to be at least half the size. OK.
I'm a little bit sad.
Adding extra on the meatball wasn't necessary and that's
what really killed my dish.
Muir pan-fried her gnocchi and is serving them with a cream,
kale, garlic, sage and white wine sauce, topped with crispy sage.
You didn't boil your gnocchi.
You cooked them like a Scottish tattie scone.
The outside is obviously burnt, which is a shame.
Sage isn't a bad addition, but not that much.
At heart, you know what works.
You just don't know when to stop.
That sounds pretty much like me in general.
The story of your life, is it? Yeah.
The sauce itself has been cooked down too much, and it's become
the texture of cream cheese.
I mean, that's a, that's a pretty hefty sauce.
If I'd not got so giddy, I could have done it.
You know, if I'd just stuck to the recipe and boiled it,
it would have been fine, but I just got all carried away
about tattie scones and that was that.
Matt's gnocchi is served with a minced beef and chilli kofta
and a chilli, garlic and tomato sauce.
You can actually make a kofta.
We didn't ask you for a kofta dish, but you can make one.
Your gnocchi are pretty good.
They're light and they're fluffy, and you've put them in a pan
and you've got some colour on them.
We've got a sweet tomato sauce with plenty of garlic in there,
a fair amount of chilli.
There's good flavours here.
There's just not enough gnocchi on the plate for me.
I thought dinky is the way,
but apparently the boys wanted a big pile of food.
I had loads left as well. I could have easily given more.
Fateha is serving her gnocchi in a Bengali sauce flavoured
with fennel, garlic, chilli, tomato and lemon.
You had no idea what the gnocchi was,
so you followed the instruction we gave you to the letter,
and you ended up with very good, light, fluffy gnocchi.
We have sweet, slightly sharp tomato sauce, flavoured quite heavily
with garlic and a little bit of chilli.
Well, that is what you would want with your gnocchi.
Well done, you.
Although you may call this a Bengali sauce, actually, it tastes
like a spicy tomato Italian sauce. OK.
For me, it's great.
I didn't even know what it was.
I didn't even know how to pronounce it. LAUGHS
Nothing burnt in this round, so I'm happy with that.
I think that's a really quite a tough round.
All four of them had never cooked gnocchi before.
We did get decent gnocchi, but we got very differing
plates of food.
Fateha, I thought the dish was great.
Bowl of gnocchi, perfectly cooked. A little spicy tomato sauce.
I think she really redeemed herself from what happened
in that first round.
Fateha goes through. Well done.
Only one more apron and three to discuss.
Cirilo.
I think he had an idea what the gnocchi should be,
but serving us an undercooked meatball is not good.
Matt's gnocchi were actually quite good.
Tomato sauce was good. Flavour of chilli running through that beef.
Why he tried to make it look pretty and not be generous with the dish,
I'm not quite sure.
Muir made gnocchi for us.
She decided to actually just pan-fry them
and all those gnocchi were scorched.
I think she's got a decent palate,
but she doesn't seem to know when to stop.
If I went home today, I'd be really disappointed.
You know, I didn't come here to go out in the first round.
I feel that I've proved myself, that I can cook.
So let's see. Let's see what happens.
I'd love to stay, I'd absolutely love it. Just to get that apron.
I really want that apron.
We tasted some great food.
Well done, all four of you.
Two of you will be getting an apron.
Sadly, two of you will be leaving us.
The first person joining Brin and Hope and getting
themselves an apron...
Fateha. SHE GASPS
Really?
The last remaining apron...
..Matt.
Get in!
Congratulations. Thank you so much.
Cirilo, Muir, thank you very much for all your hard work.
You're both leaving us. Thank you.
I'm so glad to have been here.
So many new experiences and doing different things.
It's been really, really enjoyable.
I'd have loved an apron, obviously.
I'll just have to get a tattoo instead.
I'm a little bit sad that my journey on the show is finished now,
but I learned a lot and I think that's a big accomplishment.
Fateha, Matt, congratulations.
Do please come and get your MasterChef aprons.
Well done. Well done.
Well done.
I really thought I was going home. Just to get my name called out,
so buzzing.
I wanted this so bad.
I'm going to sleep with it on tonight.
Normally cooked for stress relief.
This was more stressful.
I like this apron!
Now you are cooking for a place in the quarterfinal.
You are going to be cooking for three really talented cooks.
The two runners-up and the champion of last year's competition,
Omar, Anurag and, of course, Chariya.
At the end of this, one of you will be leaving the competition.
This is a tough challenge.
One hour 15 minutes, we want two courses. Cook really well,
deliver something truly delicious.
Let's cook.
Right, OK.
I think my performance in the competition has been OK,
but it could be a lot better.
I've got a lot to prove on this round.
I'm bringing out some specialised cuts of meat that not many people
have seen before.
So I'm going to cook you the lamb pencil fillet.
It's just the most tenderest piece of lamb. It's incredible.
How are you going to cook those, the bits of lamb? On the barbecue.
And what are you going to serve that with? Pea and mint puree,
fondant potatoes, a red wine and port jus and honey-glazed carrots.
Fantastic. You're now playing to Mr Wallace's strength.
He's very happy, but the problem is, of course, being so happy,
the expectation is high.
I very much doubt he'll be disappointed. The only thing
that could go wrong is if I overcook it, cos it's so lean and tender.
Tell us your first course then.
Salmon mousse in a smoked salmon parcel, served with melba toast,
caramelised onions and chilli oil.
You've got a lot of work to do. Good luck. Thank you.
Matt is doing two dishes that really appeal to me.
A salmon mousse. He's covering the mousse in smoked salmon.
He's got to make it an elegant little parcel.
He can't do it like me wrapping a Christmas present.
It's got to be neat.
Then, his main course, he's got lamb, which is great.
However, lamb fillet cooks in a matter of minutes.
There's no fat on it.
So putting it on a barbecue, he's got to know what he's doing.
Great big smile on your face. I do.
What are you going to cook for us?
Baba ganoush that's topped with spicy lamb mince,
some pomegranate seeds, a herby yoghurt.
On the side of this baba ganoush,
we've got a flatbread that she's then stuffing with some
olives and feta cheese.
Really delicious!
My concerns for this challenge are timings.
I've had my husband sit there timing me, whilst talking to me,
pretending to interview me.
I've done it whilst I've had friends over.
If nothing goes wrong, I should be good.
So why Middle East?
Because I've just come back from Tel Aviv and had the most incredible
dishes and it's just really inspired me.
There's only so much that you can do with baba ganoush, so I know
that I need to try and elevate it a touch. And then, dessert,
you've got stewed peaches in dessert wine with a basil
panna cotta. Why basil panna cotta?
Why not just a good old rich vanilla panna cotta?
Nothing fun about that, is there?
The panna cotta with basil?
Basil is more aniseed in flavour and she's put a huge amount of basil
in that panna cotta. I hope that works.
Panna cotta needs to wobble, it can't be too hard,
and the peaches have to be lovely and soft.
I'm a bit mixed with my emotions.
I used to relax in my kitchen, it used to relieve me from school.
Now I want to do the opposite. I want to go back to school!
Two dishes. What are you going to cook for us?
So I'm doing a mackerel salad with a mustard mayonnaise and
aloo chop, which is like a potato aloo tikki, and that's spiced.
And then for my main, it's a fish curry with haddock and muki
and an aubergine bharta. Called a what, porter?
Bharta. It's like a puree-type thing, but we don't puree,
we just use our hands.
Bengali smoked haddock curry with little bits of muki.
Very, very starchy. Like a potato, like a yam.
There's no tomatoes, no richness of things like coconut milk,
it's just water.
She's got to stack that pot full of flavour, of spices, to make sure
that fish comes alive.
You're cooking for guests in the dining room.
How do you feel about that? Oh, I'm so nervous because they're like
super cooks and I just cook at home!
They did exactly what you're doing right now.
I'm going to be kicking off my courses with a cured mackerel dish
that's going to be served with a carrot veloute, parsley oil
and some pickled shimeji mushrooms.
And then I'm going to follow that up with a sambal crusted
rack of lamb with a curried pomme puree,
Sri Lankan aubergine relish and a coriander and mint sauce.
If somebody walked into your veterinary surgery
and saw your operating bench looking like this, do you think
they'd bring their own animal back to you? No, I definitely would not.
And this is probably me being good.
I'd like to say that I'm a calm cook, but I think
it'd be a massive lie.
I think I'm fairly chaotic.
I try to keep it clean, but by the end, it's an absolute mess.
I love lamb.
I hope he's got his timings right because I don't want to see him
carve into it and that lamb to be uncooked.
He's got to make a red wine sauce.
He's got to make a mint sauce.
He's got to make flavoured mashed potato as well.
He's got aubergines going on.
It's a lot of work.
I like ambition, as long as it's allied with a little
bit of realism.
There is so much to do and it's all my fault.
So since MasterChef, it's been absolutely whirlwind, it is crazy.
And then now, I literally just signed the contract for my first
restaurant, which is amazing.
Being back at MasterChef, I feel like I should be putting my
apron on over that side instead!
My advice to everybody
today is just stay calm, do your best,
be yourself.
I'm looking for that emotion to come through the plate of foods.
This is a really important round to show who you are, what you love
to do and how you love to cook.
So, yeah, it'd be great to see their personalities on a plate today.
Yeah, I really hope there's some good food today. I'm starving.
So for Matt's starter,
we've got salmon mousse in a smoked salmon parcel,
melba toast, caramelised onions, cucumber.
It's a very classic dish.
He's playing with flavour combinations that he knows works here.
Two minutes, Matt. You're doing really well.
Nice colours.
And then salmon roe and chilli oil, yes?
You've got 30 seconds.
Reading this, I think it needs a little bit of acidity, maybe
like a slice of lemon or pickles or something.
Who knows? He could prove me wrong.
Well done. Straight back for your main course.
Hello, everybody. Hi.
I've made you a salmon mousse with a smoked salmon shell.
We've got salmon roe, chilli oil, cucumbers, caramelised onions
and I was going to do a melba toast,
but it's turned out to be just toast.
Thank you very much indeed. Enjoy. Thank you. Thank you.
There's some really nice elements here.
The mousse is really nice and creamy.
It's just too big.
This dish needs acidity. I think could have added something,
probably pickled cucumber instead of just slice it and put in there.
Overall, good try.
All it needed is a bit of finesse.
I'm enjoying that mousse.
And I quite like the little bit of chilli oil as well.
I just think the plate's a little busy.
Matt, 15 minutes now, yeah? Yeah.
Finish off that lamb dish, please.
Oh!
I'm not even sure I really know what a pencil fillet of lamb is,
but hopefully it's lovely and thin and cooked beautifully.
They call me the barbecue master.
Fondant potatoes, pea and mint puree -
these are all things we've had before.
He really needs to execute this well, if it's going
to be a really standout dish.
JOHN:Are you happy with that? Absolute perfect.
It looks very rare to me. Is that right? Yeah.
If you overcook this, it will be just really dry.
Port and red wine jus, you know, you don't want it to be wishy-washy.
You know, it has to be nice and glossy.
Right. Come on, let's go. Let's go.
So, there, I've made for you lamb pencil fillet, fondant potatoes,
honey-glazed carrots, baked radishes on a bed of pea and mint puree,
with a red wine and port jus. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much indeed. Thank you. Well done, mate.
I can see, like, he has barbecued the lamb.
Probably he just wanted to have a char outside
and very rare inside,
but unfortunately I can't eat it.
Fondant potato, delicious. That I cut through like butter.
It's really nice and soft.
This sauce tastes like red wine come out of the bottle actually.
Didn't have time to reduce the sauce.
We said at the beginning this is a really familiar dish to us
and, unfortunately, I just don't feel like
it's kind of met the heights of how I've had it before.
We have an issue with that lamb.
For me, that's just too rare.
The outside of the meat is really lovely, but the meat
in the middle is completely uncooked. It's not edible.
It was just so hard,
but your mind just takes over and you don't think about it,
you just go, go, go, and I did the best I could.
Three and a half minutes, Hope. Yeah. You all right with that?
I am good with that. So, are these your little puffed up breads? Yes.
OK, and inside that, there's olives and feta cheese. Correct. Right.
Baba ghanoush... Yeah.
..lamb... Yeah. ..cucumber, yoghurt,
all going on the same plate?
All going on the same plate. OK.
You've actually made the plates and brought the plates in yourself?
Yes, correct. Yeah.
I absolutely love the sound of Hope's main course.
I want to really see that aubergine beautifully roasted.
The menu said spicy lamb, means I expect it to be spicy.
You know, kick you in the face. That's what I want.
Mm.
I'm a huge fan of flatbreads.
For me, it has to be, like, right balance
between the filling and the dough.
Wow.
You done? OK, I'm done. Yes.
Well done. Thank you.
Hi!
So, I've made for you baba ghanoush with spicy lamb mince,
some za'atar cucumber, a mint yoghurt
topped with pomegranate seeds and herbs,
and that's served with a puff bread
that's stuffed with olive, feta, sun dried tomatoes.
Intriguing. Enjoy, everyone.
Thank you! Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you.
The baba ghanoush is so lovely and creamy
when you compare it to that kind of crispiness of that lamb,
they kind of blend perfectly together.
She's layered the flavour beautifully.
I really love this dish.
The cucumbers, pomegranate seed.
It just brings this freshness to the dish -
and the crispy lamb, as well, is delicious,
and it has a spiciness that just perfect level.
The menu says flatbread, but it's kind of a roll.
It's baked to perfection.
So, I love this dish.
Are you ready for the little message underneath our bread?
"So kneady", which is just for you.
Great flavours.
Great spicing.
It's absolutely lovely.
There's a good amount of skill in here.
I think it's a really well-made dish.
Hope's dessert sounds amazing.
Basil panna cotta.
This is about the balance of the flavour.
If you put too much basil in there, it might be overpowering.
Hopefully she's been practising this panna cotta,
because if it doesn't wobble, she's going to have tears from all of us.
I'll be interested to see how they stew the peaches.
Are they going to use any spices,
or it's just going to be normally cooked?
And sourdough granola, I think, is going to add nice texture.
You've got two minutes, OK?
Thank you, Gregg.
They've been stewing in dessert wine.
Oh!
Granola.
Ready.
Off you go. Well done. Off you go. Let's go! Let's go.
Go, go, go. Good job. Good plate.
So, I've made for you a dessert of a basil panna cotta
with stewed peaches in a dessert wine and a sourdough granola.
Enjoy. Thank you so much.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
It looks pretty wobbly to me!
I'm happy with the wobble of my panna cotta,
so I just hope that I've put enough flavour, and it's punchy enough,
and good enough for their palates.
Can I have one more, please?!
I am not a huge fan of panna cotta, but I think today I have converted.
It's still nice and firm,
but just melts in your mouth when you eat.
That basil is so subtle.
She has done an absolutely sterling job here.
The peach just melts in your mouth.
Granola, I love this.
It's a bit of crunch into it.
Everything on Hope's dessert is really well made.
Two very good courses from Hope.
So, you've got four minutes, Fateha, on your first course.
Fateha's starter sounds very interesting.
Mackerel is a very, very strong fish, we all know,
and then how it is balanced with very pungent flavours
of spinach, chilli and coriander.
That'll be interesting to see.
That, to me, is the beginning of an elegant dish.
Well done, you.
I've personally never had an aloo chop.
I'm picturing it's probably quite similar to an aloo tikki,
but hopefully it's got a nice bit of crisp kind of coating on it.
Look at that. Someone's been putting a lot of thought in.
Well done, you.
Fateha's starter is a mackerel, chilli, spinach and coriander salad
served with an aloo chop spiced potato cake and mustard mayonnaise.
I think she did a good job on the mackerel.
It tastes nice and fresh.
It's good for light starter, I think.
To me, like, it's absolutely banging. Salad is very refreshing.
The aloo chop does have a lovely level of spice to it.
It just needs a little bit longer in the deep fryer
to really have a nice textural contrast
against the rest of the dish.
The mustard mayo brings a lovely freshness and creaminess
that really pairs well with the mackerel and that lovely potato.
This is fantastic.
I like the fact that there's little bits of mackerel
which are nice and oily, lots and lots of herbs. It's great.
I don't mind admitting I'm rather taken with that.
15 minutes. The best fish curry you've ever done, right?
Wow. Classic Bengali dish.
I love fish curries.
I expect it going to be very spicy and watery at the same time.
Will be interesting to see if she's going to blow my head off
or it can be a very mild curry.
An aubergine bortha, I'm really intrigued by.
It's something I've never tried before,
so it'll be really interesting to see how she executes that.
Fish looks beautifully cooked.
See? You're done now.
Breathe and smile. Off you go.
Go, go, go. Very good.
Hi, I've made you a basmati rice with a fish curry.
It's haddock with Bengali vegetables called mukhi
and an aubergine bortha,
spiced with some chilli, and tomato.
You can breathe now. You can breathe now!
Thank you!
That was so tough.
You don't realise how hard it is.
I know I can cook,
but cooking under these conditions, it's crazy.
I think she has executed it so well.
Fish is good. Perfectly just flaking away.
The mukhi is cooked really lovely.
Really kind of absorbs all that lovely flavour from the sauce.
The spiciness level is perfect,
especially when you eat it with this bortha.
It complements each other.
The fish is cooked very, very nicely.
The sauce has got a good amount of heat to it.
The curry itself, I think, is fantastic.
It's food she knows really well, and it's delicious.
Brin, you have 15 minutes till your starter goes out, please. OK.
Yeah, you all right? Yeah.
I love the sound of Brin's starter.
Whenever I cook mackerel, I always torch the skin,
because it brings such a nice textural element to the dish.
Pickling a mushroom,
I think it brings a really beautiful acidity to it.
So if he does it and it's not really overpowering,
it should really balance out the sweetness of that veloute.
Quick, quick, quick with these mushrooms, you've got 30 seconds.
Good to go. Off you go. Go on, go, go, go, go. Well done, Brin.
Hi!
Today for you I've made fennel cured mackerel with a carrot veloute,
pickled shimeji mushrooms and a parsley oil.
Enjoy.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Skin is nicely crisp and torched,
but he promised fennel cured mackerel,
and I couldn't taste any fennel whatsoever in this.
I like the carrot veloute.
I think that's very delicious, well-made, sweet.
I would just eat that by itself, actually.
Not getting a lot of pickle from the shimeji mushrooms.
I am just crying out for something that has a bit of bite to it.
I think the veloute is lovely and smooth.
I really like those pickled mushrooms.
The parsley oil is very, very good.
That fish has not had enough time in the cure.
He understands technique.
He's just given himself too much to do.
You've got 15 minutes. OK.
I think Brin's main course sounds delicious.
However, there's a lot of big flavours in here.
Sambal, curried pomme puree, Sri Lankan aubergine relish.
It should work really well together, if he can balance it.
Wow. The amount of work though, Brin. It's too much work.
OMAR:When you put a crust on a lamb,
you really need to take the time
to make sure that it's got a beautiful crispness to it.
I don't think I'll be able to get that more rendered than it is,
to be honest with you.
Next. Lamb. Go.
Do we need two sauces for this dish?
I've served for you a sambal crusted rack of lamb
with a curried pomme puree,
a Sri Lankan aubergine relish, a mint and coriander sauce
and a red wine, lamb and tamarind reduction.
Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you.
If I had a bit more time,
I could have got everything exactly how I wanted it,
but I probably should have just pared it back a little bit.
There's some really, really nice cooking on here,
and then there's just some elements he's really had to rush through.
The star, for me, is actually that aubergine.
I love how acidic it is -
but that sambal crusted lamb,
I'm missing out on a lot of that sambal flavour.
I was concerned about having two sauces on one dish,
but I think they worked well,
because both provide different flavouring.
My lamb is cooked well,
and I liked a pomme puree -
but I can't taste the curry.
I think he's run out of time.
He gave himself too much to do.
The flavours on that plate are delicious.
Absolutely delicious.
So, guys, we've got to pick one person
to go through to the quarterfinal.
I think there's one person that's absolutely chimed for me,
and I think we all agree, don't we?
Absolutely.
JOHN:What a fabulous cook off.
It's a tough round, but they are all being ambitious.
They all wanted to impress.
We've got the feedback from our guests in the dining room.
They've got a cook of the day - and we agree.
Hope really impressed with her two courses.
Really good mix of ingredients, almost effortless cooking.
Hope's got herself a quarterfinal place.
You really liked Fateha, didn't you?
I liked the style that she brought to the first dish of the mackerel,
but it was just the heartiness and the flavour -
that mukhi was just absolutely delicious.
Two very, very good courses.
Fateha, in my opinion, deserves a quarterfinal place.
We agreed? Yeah.
Hope and Fateha are through.
We've only got one more quarterfinal place, between Matt and Brin.
Brin's mackerel dish looked great.
We thought it needed longer in that cure -
but underneath it all, a fair amount of technique.
When you think about Brin's lamb dish,
everything on that dish was skilful.
It was a lovely use of Sri Lankan flavours in a European style dish.
Matt's two courses were very much set in the classics.
I quite liked that smoked salmon parcel.
The issue was, of course, the cookery of his lamb.
The lamb was not cooked.
It was raw.
Words can't describe how much I want a quarterfinal place.
As this competition moves on,
the more hunger you get is phenomenal.
BRIN:I feel like I've got the ability to go further.
I just don't think I've done myself justice with this round.
We truly understand how tough that challenge is -
but you've done yourselves proud.
We have made a decision.
Sadly, one of you will be leaving the competition.
Our first quarterfinalist is...
..Hope.
Very, very well done.
Our second MasterChef quarterfinalist is...
..Fateha.
You're a good cook. Well done.
Our third quarterfinalist is...
..Brin.
Matt, it was a very tight call, my friend.
A very, very tight call.
Sorry to see you go. Thank you very much indeed.
Thank you for the opportunity. Thanks so much, Matt.
Take care. Thank you.
I'm happy with what I've done. I've tried my hardest.
The pressure is incredible in the MasterChef kitchen.
Obviously, you'd like to carry on in the competition,
but, yeah, I can't wait to see my family and just relax for a bit,
have a couple of cold ones.
You three are MasterChef quarterfinalists. Well done.
MasterChef quarterfinalists! Pretty big.
Possibly a little bit of celebrating,
but I think I'm going to have to get back in that kitchen ASAP.
FATEHA:I'm so, like, in shock.
Never dreamt that I'd get this far -
and I'm proud of myself.
I'm a quart... I'm a quarterfinalist.
I want more, I want to go all the way to the end.
I want to be a semifinalist.
I want to be a finalist.
I want to lift that trophy.
Next time, six more home cooks compete
for the right to wear a MasterChef apron...
Fingers crossed.
Oh! It's fine. Aah!
Boom!
Absolutely ace.
..before battling for a place in the quarterfinal.
That's like malt vinegar.