It's the Celebrity MasterChef semifinals...
..and only the seven best cooks remain.
Me and MasterChef right now, we have a proper relationship.
MasterChef has completely taken over every waking hour.
I wake up at four in the morning now thinking,
"Is it too early now to cook?"
In the kitchen, I mean, the sweat on the brow is real.
Pressure is high.
We're in the pressure cooker right now.
But do you know what pressure makes? Diamonds.
Tonight, the pressure ramps up...
Oh!
..as the celebrities are challenged
with cooking for one of the country's most iconic chefs...
Go on, Tamer.
Woohoo!
..before battling it out...
Oh, wow! ..to secure their place in the final six.
As this competition is going on, painting a supermodel
is actually hella easy.
Naomi Campbell, bring it on.
Meatballs?
Pffft! Never again.
I am utterly consumed by MasterChef.
Never in a million years did I think I would be here today.
Semifinalist doesn't ring right with me.
Finalist sounds good.
Winning sounds even better.
It really is, "Do it well or go home."
GREGG: They need to be ready. They need to be steady.
And they've most certainly got to cook.
Welcome back.
This is a round where you're going to have to trust your instinct
and use all the knowledge that you've picked up along the way
in the competition.
Listen, this is the semifinals.
And every now and again, you've just got to roll out the big
guns, and the cookery guns don't get a lot bigger than this.
I now want to introduce you to somebody
that has been tickling our taste buds and gracing our television
screens for decades.
Ladies and gentlemen, Ainsley Harriott.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
LAUGHTER
Oh! Why, hello, celebrities!
LAUGHTER
Yes!
Ainsley Harriott captivated the nation with his fun, flamboyant
approach in the kitchen.
Ready, steady, let's get cooking.
A British icon and best-selling author, he's celebrated a 30-year
career on screen.
He's also published 16 cookbooks, selling millions worldwide,
and in 2020 was awarded an MBE for his services to broadcasting
and the culinary arts.
I think the love of cooking comes from home.
My mother was a fantastic cook, and as a young kid there were people
from all parts of the world on our doorstep and we went
to their houses and I experienced different flavours and foods
from around the world.
It's all about learning the experience of all these wonderful
global flavours and tastes and then bringing them together
and cooking them.
And I'd like to think that I've continued to do that now.
Each of you have got one of my favourite recipes
that I've written over the years.
You know, I'm full of flair.
I like to put my personality into the food.
You can recreate that here today.
At the end of this, we will choose a cook of the day, and that cook
will go straight through to the next round.
Whoa!
The remaining six will need to cook off against each other
to secure their place in the competition.
Hour and 45 minutes to bring out your inner Ainsley.
Good luck.
Having Ainsley here is absolutely epic.
You know, a bit of British history walking into the room.
He's a class act. Salute the guy.
It's got to be flavoursome, it's got to be colourful, the textures
have got to be right. Yes, it's a little bit difficult.
Yes, they're under pressure, but, yes, they've got an opportunity to
do something really amazing.
Rice and peas.
What is rice and peas?
Professional dancer Vito has been tasked with making one
of Ainsley's childhood favourites from his Jamaican heritage.
Vito is stepping out of Italy today and he's going straight
to the Caribbean.
Curry goat, rice and peas and johnny cake.
Just saying that kind of takes me back
to my mum cooking a wonderful meal on a Sunday.
I've never been to the Caribbean.
I mean, I have no idea.
Vito, what's troubling you the most?
I have never eaten goat before, so I have no idea.
It's important to get the flavour in there, to marinate it, yeah?
Yeah. And we've only got an hour and 45 minutes,
so you really want to get it on cooking. Good luck.
Thank you.
Goat is quite a tough meat. What he's got to first do is get
it marinated and got lots and lots of spices
around the outside.
Then all covered with stock, a lid put on and into the oven
and cooked away for an hour and 25 minutes.
Served with that goat curry, we've got rice and peas.
He's taking rice, coconut cream, red kidney beans, Scotch bonnet chillies
into a pot and bringing it up to the boil
so all the liquid disappears.
That's it. Let it cook, let it cook.
Put the lid on. You don't want to stir it.
It's not like a risotto. OK.
I want to treat it like a risotto.
He was like, "It's not like a risotto."
Harry's dish is classic chicken Kyiv.
A lovely breast of chicken filled with garlic butter, with crispy
breadcrumbs on the outside, served with creamy mashed potatoes
and beans flavoured with lemon.
Chicken Kyiv - it's been around since the '70s.
Kyiv is all about the revealing of that wonderful oozing garlic
butter and those lovely, familiar, retro-style,
"yeah, boy!" flavours.
That's what you're talking.
Have you cooked a Kyiv before? I haven't cooked a Kyiv before.
I'm going to add a little seasoning myself, if you don't mind.
I can see you've got a few things there.
Is that the way you grew up,
a lot of lovely flavour going into your food at home? Yeah.
West African. Yeah. Ghanaian of heart.
So... A bit of jollof rice. A bit of jollof.
A little bit of seas... Wind up with the seasoning...
Winding up, winding up... LAUGHTER
That's what the food makes you feel like.
I think chicken is a lovely meat.
Get the pan nice and hot. Just sear it a little bit.
Two or three minutes each side.
Then finish it off in the oven.
Does it say put butter in it to start?
Um, it didn't say, but I thought it would just help.
No, no, no, no.No? Because it will burn the pan?
Yeah.Cool.
I put butter in too early, so it started to burn on a high heat,
but I don't know.
I don't think it's that bad.
CRAIG:This is truly, truly terrifying.
Television presenter Craig is working on a dough for a dish
celebrating Ainsley's love of a global staple.
Everywhere you go in the world have got their own bread,
haven't they? Their own style of bread. Bread is king.
He is cooking bao buns filled with tofu, hoisin sauce
and a spicy Asian slaw.
This is a food that people spend decades learning
how to make properly.
So that's going to be interesting, isn't it?
How did this Asian stuff end up in your repertoire?
Because I kind of do so much travelling now
and you start experiencing things.
"How do they do it?" This is so tasty, so wonderful.
Hoisin tofu buns. Is that your style, Craig?
It's my style of eating. They're just amazing.
They're like no other food, and I have to try and create that.
And it worries me.
Craig's got to make a dough which has got yeast in it,
and he's got to beat it enough so it goes nice and shiny
and becomes quite elastic.
What's troubling you there, Ainsley?
Very shiny. How long did you leave that in the bowl for
with the hook? Maybe it needs longer, do you think?
Bung it back in. Get that hook working on it.
Do you think shiny like our heads as a point of reference?
I think so.
I'd say shiny like your smiles, lads.
Come on now, come on.
Actor Rochenda is also working on a dough
for a technically challenging pasta.
I'm such a massive fan of Ainsley Harriott.
He's been with me since I was a kid.
It's just really lovely to be able to cook something for him by him.
I hope he likes it. That's...
Rochenda has a dish called trofie.
Trofie is a spiral pasta, and that's going to be served with a pistachio
and mint pesto and some little courgette fritti.
I've made pasta by hand, but I've often just done
it like spaghetti or tagliatelle.
I've never actually made individual pieces of pasta before.
It's a skill.
It's learning how to use the whole of your hand, pushing it one way
and pulling it back the other way, creating that lovely little tube.
Push and come back like that. There you go.
Even I have to go and practise it.
That's quite difficult.
Where did this dish come into your life?Yeah.
Sicily. I was down there on holiday and it was handmade.
Watching them do it quite, quite beautifully.
If there's going to be trouble, where are you expecting it?
I would say probably the shape of the pasta, and the width
of the pasta so that it's not too chewy.
So if something's a little bit thicker,
cook it a little bit longer.
Last minute, though, eh? OK?
Yeah. You want to impress the judges.
Last minute - pasta. You are one of the judges.
Yeah, you are one.
ROCHENDA LAUGHS
It's one thing cooking an Ainsley recipe
in the comfort of your own home where he's nowhere to be seen.
He does these recipes all the time.
He's going to know if it's wrong.
Make-up artist Dominic is responsible for Ainsley's Mexican
twist on a British institution.
He is making his own taco shells filled with scampi, a pea
and avocado guacamole, a radish and tartare slaw, and that's
going to be served with pickled onions.
That's a lot of work to do.
Kind of one of those old traditional dishes, isn't it?
Scampi and chips, Friday night down at the old chippy.
It's a modern take on fish and chips.
But instead of having the chips, we're having tacos.
So far, I'm just prepping everything.
There's about five different things I've got to do.
Once it's all done, it's the assembly.
I've got to make a little factory and just make up these tacos.
Pea and avocado guacamole.
What a great idea.
It's going to be sweet from peas,
lovely and creamy from the avocado.
When you're making up your guacamole, getting the texture right,
that's important.
So you can pick that up and that can go onto your beautiful tortilla.
Ainsley, Dominic loves a bit of colour.
Is there enough colour in this dish for you?
We've got some chillies, we've got some peas.
There's a lot of colour going on.
I believe looking at your beautiful shirt and my fantastic cuffs,
I think we've got something going. Too much colour.
Oh, get out of here.
I don't want to put you under pressure, but this might
be my favourite recipe.Really? Yeah.Oh, wonderful.
WHISK SQUELCHES
Pop star H is working on a batter mix for a dish inspired by one
of Ainsley's childhood dessert memories.
He's got banana fritters, rum and raisin ice cream
and chocolate sauce.
Mum made quite a lot of banana fritters because she'd buy bananas,
and of course, we all know what happens to bananas
when they've been hanging around in your fruit bowl for three
or four days.
Ainsley's recipe is taking pureed bananas and then adding
to that flour, baking powder, some sugar.
That looks a little bit on the thin side. Oh, thin?
Yeah. Let's put the flour in there now. OK.
This menu has elements I've never done before in my life.
I'm eager to learn.
And I really want to impress John and Gregg as well.
Oh!
You are having a wonderful time here, aren't you?
I get in this room and I get excited.
I think it's because I'm proud of where I started and where
I am now. Next Steps tour,
he's got the catering truck.
And we get free tickets.
I don't know about that. Front row! Front row! Front row!
My family are going to be so overwhelmed you're here, right?
Yeah.
They've been calling me Ainsley forever.
Go on, then. Give it a go. Let's go, let's go.
Yeah! CHEERING
I don't know if I'm going to give Ainsley a run for his money
because I've got to cook a dessert.
Go on, Tamer.
Woohoo!
So I'm already in panic mode.
How am I going to do this?
Actor Tamer is racing to make a perfect meringue for Ainsley's
peach and mascarpone pavlova with pomegranate caramel syrup.
I was a young lad and my mum took me to her cake-baking evening class
and I absolutely loved it.
We made this pavlova and I just thought it was magnificent.
A great pavlova,
it's got a crispy outside with a marshmallow-soft inside.
It's the word pavlova. Just says it.
"Eat me, eat me now!"
Tamer, now, I know you're not a dessert man, are you?
No. That for me,
when I pulled it out, I was like, "Oh, God." Panic set in.
Well, do you know what?
I had a quick look in your oven, and I'm telling you, those meringue
nests look really, really lovely. Thank you.
So if you actually do manage to smash a fantastic dessert,
what would that do for you?
If I get this right, and if the critique's right from you guys,
I'm going to be overwhelmed.
You have an hour to go.
Ainsley says an hour to go.
NARRATOR: Vito and Ainsley are checking on the progress
of the goat curry, which needs most of the cooking time.
Yeah, you see, there's not enough heat in there at the moment.
Yeah. Lots of lovely flavour going on there.
Look. But you just need to get it cooked.
Put it on the top here and let it cook down.
OK?
Vito is also going to cook some johnny cakes.
Centoventi millilitri...
It's a hard dough cake. Shaped and then deep-fried.
It reminds me a bit of a little pizza.
A little... Like pizzini. You know the little pizzas?
Pizzino, a bit small. Yeah?
My mum always used to do these amazing johnny cakes.
You've got that warm, sort of spongy bread in the middle.
Take a little bit and dip it in there.
Wow. Fantastic.
It looks good. They were a disc, and now they became balls.
I like the look of your balls.
HE HUMS THE STRICTLY THEME TUNE
Woohoo!
Harry has been working on the mashed potato to go with his chicken Kyiv.
Mm. Smooth.
Despite there still being 45 minutes left, he's keen to get
the Kyivs cooked.
I'm just making sure I get these chickens in the oven
to cook well enough.
Ainsley's chicken Kyiv needs to go into the oven only for 20 minutes.
Seasoning up my beans now.
Just hoping the chicken comes out well.
The star of the show, and it's in the oven.
CRAIG:Come on, dough, be good.
The all-important dough for Craig's bao buns has rested.
And he's prepping it for the steamer.
One, two...
Key thing is you've got to get the rise.
You want them to puff up and you just see them kind of grow
and become this lovely, spongy invitation
to be filled with loveliness.
Listen to me.
I need you to be gorgeous and fluffy like food clouds.
Can you do that for me?
Bye-bye. See you in eight.
He's also got to cook some tofu.
Pan-fried so it goes nice and crispy on the outside.
Then he's got to make a hoisin sauce, which is salty and sweet,
but also slightly sharp and the flavours
of great Chinese food.
It just is so inviting.
And do you know what? We love a sandwich in this country.
Look. Look at my fingers. Look how I'm holding it.
Can you imagine your hoisin in there? Oh, yeah.
Turn around. Look.
Does that mean I'm good at this or bad at this? I think...
I think... CRAIG LAUGHS
I think you need an apron on your back and your front.
You have 30 minutes to go.
NARRATOR: Rochenda has spent over an hour shaping her spiral pasta.
Oh!
SHE LAUGHS
Rochenda is also going to make pistachio and mint pesto.
There needs to be some texture to it.
Her final element is courgette fritti.
Courgettes cut into chip size,
rolled in a seasoned flour and then fried.
You want to get that oil nice and hot.
It's getting them straight in there.
They look like they're boiling in there.
You don't want to be boiling them.
You want to get them crispy.
Oh! Fritti fritting!
Dominic is now working on one of the most crucial elements
of his scampi tacos.
DOMINIC LAUGHS I didn't put the other...
Didn't put the other bit of paper. So, rookie mistake.
That in itself is a skill - that you've got to know how to get
that dough the right consistency so it's not too thick.
So you're able to roll and put all your lovely ingredients
inside your beautiful tortilla wrap.
Every day's a school day, Dominic. It really...
I'm telling you, I'm getting myself one of these.
They're great. You're having a whale of a time there, mate.
Cut that in half. Yeah. Give it a good old spank.
Look at that.
With his pavlovas baking, Tamer's next pastry challenge
is the pomegranate mascarpone filling.
If he whips it too much, it turns to almost butter, or the water comes
out and it looks like curdled cream.
I think this has been over-whipped because it seems
like it's separating, so I'm going to have to start again.
On the other dessert,
H now has the task of perfectly deep-frying
the all-important banana fritters.
Oh, they look like they're floating.
Is that right?
And how long were they in there for? A minute each side.
OK. I think it needs three minutes each side, because you can look
here now and see? Oh, OK. Not quite cooked enough.
That is still a bit raw.
All right? Brilliant. Good luck. Thank you.
You've got just ten minutes left.
Kyivs come out of the oven.
Pavlovas to decorate. Tacos to cook.
Come on, guys. Pasta's not even in the pot yet.
Stress.
H:Oh, my gosh.
Everybody is scrambling.
CRAIG:Oh, they're so soft.
Thank you, bao. Thank you. We had that chat.
So I've just got to boil my pasta for two minutes,
salt these and then just putting the sauce together.
And that's about it, really.
You have just five minutes.
Ainsley's kitchen and five minutes left.
Mamma mia. Look at this.
They look so nice.
Hey!
Some of them are losing a bit of their butter now.
You see, they've been in there a bit long. I was just scared.
I didn't want to undercook the chicken, so I put it in the oven
for longer than I needed to.
You have two minutes. Listen up,
finish up, stuff on plates. Let's go.
That's it! Stop!
Time up. Well done.
Yay! Woohoo!
Oh, bro. This is so good. This is so good.
Can I cry?
Am I allowed to cry now?
First up is Gladiator Harry.
How are we all?
He has made Ainsley's chicken Kyiv, adding his own twist of cayenne
and allspice seasoning to the breadcrumbs.
It's served with tarragon and lemony beans and creamy mashed potato.
GREGG: Is it going to ooze? Is it going to ooze?
No.
Where the butter gone, Harry? Where the butter?
How long were those chickens in the oven for, Harry?
For about 40 minutes.
And the recipe says? 18 to 20.
Right.
The butter's not oozing, but the flavour is there.
It seems to have seeped through the chicken.
And so you're getting that lovely garlicky taste.
You've got a lovely crispy outside with that breadcrumb.
And I love the bit of lemon that's running through your beans.
Lovely seasoning on the breadcrumbs on the outside.
Your mashed potatoes, superb.
Mate, we are an ooze away from a triumph.
Oh!
Imagine - an ooze away from a triumph. That was...
Oh!
APPLAUSE
Got to take it, and we keep moving.
Rochenda has served trofie pasta with pistachio, mint and chilli
pesto sauce and courgette fritti.
Your pasta, you've got a nice little bit of bite in there.
And that sauce is just fantastic.
So strong with mint, and you've added a fair bit of chilli
in there as well. Give it to me.
That is a great dish of pasta.
Oh, thank you very much.
The funny thing about courgettes is if you cook them too long,
they go really limp.
Yes. You need to cook them for less time.
Hot oil. OK.
Pistachio nuts make it quite nutty.
It's really delicious. I'd eat the whole bowl.
Oh, nice one. Good bite to it.
Bags of flavour going on in there. But they're normally
a little bit smaller. Ah.
But you've taken it to another level.
You've created your own.
I think we're going to call this the Rochenda trofie.
Oh! Trofie di Rochenda.
As soon as I put the courgettes in the fryer, I knew
that they were going to be a little bit soggy, but Ainsley really liked
the taste of the dish.
Hey.
Craig made Ainsley's Chinese-inspired bao buns filled
with fried tofu, hoisin sauce
and a spring onion, cucumber, coriander, chilli
and sesame slaw in a Sriracha mayonnaise.
You followed the recipe to the T there, because of the way
you've combined the hoisin with the oyster sauce and you've got
the soy in there. It's all come together.
The bao buns - spongy, pillowy.
It's what I expect from a bao bun,
so I think you've done really well, Craig. Thank you.
It's an envelope of absolute brilliance.
The tofu texture,
it's like a piece of meat in there, with all the great flavours of all
the sauces. It's a really delicious thing.
Thank you. You've got the freshness of coriander.
There's a lot of chilli.
I'm picking up a bit of sesame as well.
That is really quite yummy.
I've really enjoyed that. Thank you.
Thrilled.
I'm so giddy on the inside. I'm like a little bao bun.
Fluffy on the outside, but inside all spicy and happy.
Wahey! That was cool. Thank you. Come on!
Dominic has made Ainsley's Mexican take on classic scampi and chips.
Deep-fried scampi in a corn taco, tartare radish slaw,
pea and avocado guacamole, and pickled onion.
Your tortillas are a little too thick, so they won't fold round.
They're cracking. But everything else is just fantastic.
That scampi...
You've got a lovely crunchy outside. Your slaw...
Putting the radishes on there has made it peppery.
I'm thoroughly enjoying it.
I haven't had scampi for years and years and years.
It really takes me back.
Nice crispy fish.
Still lovely and crunchy.
Love the pea guacamole.
Yeah, boy. Guacamole!
Your pickled onions are lovely. They're sweet. They're sharp.
They've still got a nice bite to them. Tortillas...
Really good texture.
They just need to be thinner.
I knew the tacos weren't right, but I'm relieved.
I'm proud and I'm really happy.
Three things I never thought I'd say at the start of this competition.
Hello.
Vito has made Ainsley's curried goat with rice and peas and johnny cakes.
Rice and peas.
The rice is going claggy on the outside and sticky.
And it doesn't have that lovely freedom that good rice should have.
Your curry has got a really good amount of spice, the cumin
and the coriander and the cloves and the cinnamon. Sharpness as well
from that Scotch bonnet.
I really love johnny cakes.
And yours are very, very good indeed.
They're cooked all the way through.
You've got a nice crust on the outside.
My mum would have been proud of those. Really?
She really, really would.
Rice and peas...
I saw you stirring it because you're so used to making risotto.
Yes. You put the lid on and you leave it.
The goat curry is really, really good.
And I think you've really captured it here.
Lovely.
Thank you. Thank you.
I was wondering what was going to happen if we took
you out of Italy.
You landed smack bang on a Caribbean island.
You've done pretty well.
Thank you so much. I feel overwhelmed.
Honestly, when he told me that his mum would have been proud
of that johnny cake, I was like, "Thank you so much."
I feel good, very energetic, very positive.
I cannot wait to go - boom! - forward again.
H has made cinnamon banana fritters with chocolate sauce dip and rum
and raisin ice cream.
Just by looking at my napkin there,
H, you can see that I just wanted to get stuck into it.
Banana is oozing out of this.
Could be a little bit more spongier - just a tad bit.
Otherwise, I think it's great.
Your ice cream is set perfectly, which is amazing.
Your doughnuts themselves,
we've got one half which is cooked and crispy,
the other half is quite spongy. But the flavours are fantastic.
Your chocolate sauce is splitting.
The oil is coming out, which is a shame.
So it's not perfect, but banana fritters with cinnamon sugar
and a rum and raisin ice cream is really working for me, H.
Really chuffed.
LAUGHTER
I literally followed that recipe to the T, but I took my eye
off the chocolate sauce.
HE GRUNTS
Tamer has made pavlova filled with pomegranate mascarpone cream,
drizzled with a pomegranate caramel syrup, and topped with fresh peaches
and pomegranate seeds.
I like that.
I think the pavlova is great.
Slightly crunchy, slightly chewy.
I love the beautiful pomegranate caramel sauce.
It's just really, really lovely.
The lovely freshness of the peach against the richness of that cream
and mascarpone, with the sharpness of those little pomegranate seeds.
You've done a great job.
You've turned the corner here, my friend.
It's not a stew. It's not a pie. It's not a steak.
No. It's quite an elegant, delicate dessert.
Appreciate it.
Being scared was an understatement.
I was petrified. But overall, I'm feeling great.
I think I've got rid of the dessert demons, for sure.
If I could win immunity out of the next challenge,
that would be amazing.
We're going to ask you to step outside.
But before you do, would you please give Mr Ainsley Harriott
a round of applause? Because I think it was amazing.
All together!
CHEERING
Yes, mate!
Oh, my God.
Can you pick out three you think that are worthy of note?
I've got to say that Tamer, to come up with a pavlova,
with that crunch, that softness, we were going, "Wow."
Certainly Craig's bao buns.
The texture of them, that pillowy-ness. Loved that.
And then after that, I think it's Vito and that goat curry.
As far as those johnny cakes were concerned,
"Mummy, them cake taste good!"
Brilliant. Cheers, guys. Yeah. Group hug.
Come on, come on. Love you, boys.
Fantastic. Great recipes.
Our seven truly came alive.
But we've got a decision to make.
Who's cook of the day?
I think one of these here was absolutely outstanding today.
I think there was a lot of good, happy Ainsley energy
in the MasterChef kitchen today.
What you did there was absolutely fantastic.
Well done.
There is, however, only one cook of the day.
Craig. APPLAUSE
What?! Yes!
Well done.
Buddy, you deserved it.
You deserved it. You step outside.
See ya!
LAUGHTER
Get in there! Get in there!
Honestly, I'm blown away.
I'm part of the final six.
Wow.
Oh, wow. That's amazing.
Right, now, look, there's absolutely no need to be disappointed.
Perk yourself up.
We've got a fabulous challenge for you.
In this round, you are cooking to a brief, and that brief is to cook for
Gregg and I a pizza.
We want a pizza dough, a sauce to go across that dough,
and then various toppings.
But we're also going to ask you to fire your own wood-fired oven
and maintain the temperature so that your pizza
is cooked absolutely perfectly.
At the end of this, five of you will go through to the next
round, and that does mean one of you will be going home.
Two hours. Let's cook.
This is a fantastic challenge.
A pizza is an art.
And they're about to realise that it's not easy.
You know, it's going to be a fine art of getting the timing right.
But I'm an artist.
I mean, what else am I going to do?
Three component parts to the pizza.
A dough which is made from yeast, which needs to rise.
If it doesn't have enough water in it,
the dough won't be elastic and it'll be tough.
The sauce base of that pizza can be anything they want it to be.
Some of them are doing tomato, some are doing pesto, some
are just doing cheese.
But whatever it is, it needs to be cooled down because you can't
put a hot sauce on pizza dough.
It starts to collapse and then you end up with a really soggy pizza.
The toppings need to be enough that you get flavour, but not
too much that it weighs down the dough.
Yeah. Go, go!
They have got to cook their pizza in a proper wood-fired oven.
OK, how do we light it?
They're going to have to take wood and a match and make sure that comes
together to make a great fire.
And the ovens have to heat up.
It's lighting.
I hate playing with fire.
I'm not a fire starter.
I go with the flow.
The heat has to be really high.
Somewhere above 400.
If the oven's not hot enough,
the pizza won't cook all the way through.
Lovely. Lovely bit of fire, that.
Game face is on.
Lots at stake in this round. Everyone's coming with their A-game.
Taking no prisoners.
I absolutely love pizza.
Once upon a time, a young Harry Aikines, at 17 years of age,
had two meat feast pizzas before a race.
I broke a record.
I ran amazingly. So whenever I can, I always have two pizzas
before a race.
What's on your pizza?Spicy nduja.
Going to have some spicy beef, pepperoni on it,
and some sweet peppers.
That is a meat fest.
It's a meat feast, basically, yeah.
And how spicy do you want it?
I want you to feel spice because that's how I feel when I eat it.
It makes me want to run faster.
Yeah, it's always been a bit of a good luck meal.
I'm delighted you love pizza, Harry.
Let's hope it brings you luck today, mate.
Thank you. I appreciate that.
This is going to be spicy.
He's got pepperoni, a spicy sausage.
He's got minced beef, which he's going to cook with some chillies in it.
And he's got nduja, which is a spreadable salami from Italy,
which has got lots of chilli running through it as well.
My mince is done. Nice and spicy. Very spicy.
That's the way I wanted it to be.
Minced beef has got moisture in it.
Mozzarella - moisture.
Tomato sauce - moisture.
Too much moisture on a pizza
and the dough doesn't cook all the way through.
The fact I get to cook something that I want to eat
is quite exciting.
Had chicken earlier, which wasn't too bad.
Just obviously lacked the ooze.
But now...this is the one.
VITO SINGS IN ITALIAN
My grandfather always say, like, "The best way to do pizza
"is with your hands."
So let's try.
I am a big pizza fan.
I'm not going to lie, I feel a bit of pressure because pizza, Italian,
you are Italian, there is an expectation.
But I have never used a pizza oven
before and I feel very nervous about it.
Vito, you are from the home of pizza.
I know. This is the pressure, you know, because I just don't
have you and John's pressure.
I have my grandad's pressure, you know?
Am I right in thinking...? So, if you mess this up...Exactly.
..you won't be able to show your face back home on the streets of Napoli?
No, no. He said to me, literally, "Don't come back."
You know what I mean?
So if the pizza is raw or it's not enough cooked or something,
just stay there.
My pizza is salsiccia e friarielli.
So, friarielli is a kind of broccoli which is from Naples.
And I give a little twist.
So I want to do, you know, the border, the edge
with the ricotta.
This sounds fabulous, my friend.
I'll tell you what. Our expectation is high.
Thank you. No pressure.
Vito is making us a friarielli pizza.
I think it sounds delicious.
Very classic Italian. Fennel, sausage,
this wonderful green vegetable.
Chillies running through it.
It's very tasty.
I would say spicy, but tasty. That's what I want.
I just want to bring the fire, you know?
It's like... HE MAKES EXPLOSION SOUND
Vito is not making a tomato sauce.
He instead is making a pizza bianca - a white pizza.
Mozzarella cheese on the base. Then in the crust,
he's going to make a filling of ricotta cheese.
And the stuffed crust is the most difficult part.
The edge has to be very thin.
Otherwise, it's going to be too much, you know, chewy.
The inspiration behind my pizza is looking at all the kind of artisan
pizza houses that are going on around London at the moment,
and they're really experimenting with flavours.
It's definitely not an authentic Italian pizza.
Believe it or not, it's a pistachio pesto pizza
with gorgonzola, some conference pears
and some walnuts and hot chilli honey over the top.
Is this a pizza you've had before?
I've had these combinations on pizzas before, yeah.
It's a bit like a cheese board on a board of a pizza.
Yeah. That's... SHE LAUGHS
Yeah, because I love cheese. We've got pears, we've got honey.
You know you're going out on a limb here, right?
It's just a risky combination, I guess, in terms of whether or not
the individual likes it.
Well, that is extraordinary.
Pesto with pistachio nuts, pears,
cheese and honey cooked on a pizza?
Let's see. This might be a dangerous combination,
but I'm hoping it works.
I've tasted it. I like it.
If it doesn't work out, it doesn't work out, you know?
It's just the way that it is.
SHE LAUGHS
Just got to oil up my...my balls, and then we're good to go.
I mean, I've eaten a pizza or two in my time,
let's just say, so I would say, yeah, I'm a pizza connoisseur.
You have got a very eclectic group of ingredients.
What are you making?
We're actually going to do a caramelised onion white sauce.
Making a roux, adding in the cheese, then adding the onions at the end.
So I'm going for roasted fig with bacon and goat's cheese
over the top.
I love salt and sweet, so for me, I love it.
Never entered your brain to do something simple
like a margarita, did it?No.
I don't understand the word basics.
What's the point? Life is about flavour.
Life is about adventure.
So every day you've got to try something new.
A nice thin pizza from Dominic, I hope.
Because there are really big flavours here.
Oh, my God. It looks like my mum's knickers.
It's like... It's really wrinkly.
She's going to kill me for saying that.
Dom is doing a bechamel sauce from butter and flour and milk.
That's quite a big risk.
A white sauce is quite thick and heavy.
I just hope that that doesn't make his pizza go too soggy.
I'm currently multitasking.
I have my red onion marmalade.
I've got my kindling on the fire, my pizza base reducing.
Who am I?!
HE LAUGHS
I love pizza.
My kids love pizza.
We have, in my village, an amazing pizza restaurant that has proper
wood-fired pizzas.
I can tell you what I like to eat, but I don't know how to make them.
H, are you as excited about this as you are every other round?
Do you know what? Yeah, I am.
Even though I have no idea how to use a pizza oven.
But life is about challenges, right?
What's your pizza, please?
So when Steps shot our video for
One For Sorrow, it was in Italy
and I had THEmost amazing pizza there.
And it was blue cheese and steak.
So I'm doing -
if you're a Steps fan, you may know this reference - a deeper
shade of blue cheese and steak pizza.
Right.
THEY LAUGH
What H is attempting to do could be truly delicious.
Classic tomato base.
Oh, wow! That's good.
Top of the pizza, blue cheese and steak.
Steak has juice.
That juice, if that runs into that pizza dough, will make
the pizza really, really soggy.
It's really good.
Wow.
Buy one, get one free. The pizzas here are free.
The dough's stolen, the filling's nicked.
And I'll give you one for nothing if you buy one.
So that means buy one, get one free.
Buy one, get one free.
I'm of Turkish Cypriot descent, and recently I found out
that we have an Italian bloodline in our family.
So I want to try and infuse the two together.
Hopefully it works and hopefully it tastes good for the judges.
I'm going to do an Italian base. Italian cheeses.
And then on top I'm going to do a Turkish beef topping.
Smoked paprika, turmeric, chilli flakes, sumac.
Tamer, are you enjoying this? You look like...I am.
Do you know...do you know what?
Even though Craig got the title today, earlier on today,
there was so much of me going, "I don't want to pass."
I'm here to learn. I'm having a great time.
This sounds fantastic.
Nice light tomato sauce.
Hopefully not too wet.
And then on top of that is going to be minced beef.
He's got turmeric, sumac, that lovely lemony spice from Turkey.
The flavours of all those spices need to come alive.
That's going to be a bold pizza.
But you know what? We know Tamer.
He likes it big. He likes it bold.
He's pulled it off before.
Go for it, Tamer.
We are at 410, which means we're almost ready to cook.
It's nearly Chef time.
You have just 30 minutes.
30 minutes, and there's not a single pizza in the oven.
Oh! Nearly ready.
Can't get too moist, though, so I've got to get it on the paddle.
Oh.
Oh, my God.
I don't know what's gone wrong with my dough.
H has turned out his dough, but he put quite a lot of oil
in the bottom of his bowl.
The problem is, the oil has gone into the dough and made
the dough fall apart.
Know what you need to do, is you need to dry that out.
So put some flour on the bench and you can save it.
Soak up the oil. Keep on turning it and flour on that.
More flour on that.
First dough, it wasn't what I intended.
Right now, H is quite upset.
I hope he gets this done.
He's really worried about it.
Come on, come on, come on.
Let's go, go, go, go. Got enough on that?
Come on. Oh, sexy.
That is a manly pizza right there.
All man in there. All man in there.
It's looking full. It's looking hearty. There's a lot on there.
You want to try it? It's a man's pizza, for sure.
Oh, you're ready. Because then I'll get mine going. Yes!
Pizza maker!
LAUGHTER
You've got just 15 minutes, guys.
Some of you have got pizzas cooked.
Some of you don't have any pizzas at all.
Go, go, go, go. Come on, come on, come on.
It's looking wunderbar.
We're doing good. We are doing good.
Yeah, looking good, mate. Just doing the old turny-turny.
The old turny-turny, mate.
Oh, my God, I can't believe I've made a pizza.
Try not to burn it.
Come on, please.
I'm excited, but I'm scared at the same time.
Come on, come on, come on. Are they cooked?
Yeah.
That's looking good.
HE LAUGHS
You've got just ten minutes left.
You need to get a move on.
CHEERING
I'm really happy.
Like, the dough is rising.
It's going to be more of a deep pan, I think.
But, you know, it's still a pizza.
I'm taking it. I'm taking it.
Right. I'm done. We're done. We're done.
Yes. Right. OK. Happy, happy, happy.
H, you've got to move.
Yeah! I made a bloomin' pizza.
Wahey!
Yeah. I'm cooking my pizza!
You've got 60 seconds to finish off. 60 seconds, please.
That is really good.
I'm done. Is that cooked, though?
I don't know.
I got a pizza!
Right. That's it. Stop!
Everybody, stop! Thank you very much.
HE LAUGHS
Wow!
Battered.
Oh, my lord.
This is something else. That looks so good.
Oh, my gosh, I had so much fun.
Might open a pizza shop. Who knows?
Tamer, come on up.
NARRATOR: Tamer has made an Italian pizza with Turkish influence.
An Italian base of mozzarella and burrata cheese, and a tomato
and oregano sauce topped with a beef mince spiced with sumac, turmeric
and chilli, Turkish green peppers and a honey chilli oil.
GREGG: My dough is perfect.
It's dry, it's holding it all. Look.
I love the sweet tomato and the sticky mozzarella.
Then on the top I've got sumac and I've got minced beef.
And it does taste like a mixture between the Italian and the Turkish.
I love the smokiness coming off that beef and also the sweetness
in the honey.
Those sweet peppers across the top are delicious.
It's big, it's bold, it's gutsy.
It's got good flavour to it.
I think that's very, very good indeed.
Best critique was Italian and Turkish, and they both said
they feel the flavours in both, so I'm really happy.
Next up is Dominic.
He's made a fig, goat's cheese and bacon pizza with a caramelised
onion bechamel sauce and a maple syrup and chilli drizzle.
I was nervous of the ingredients, but the flavours are great.
Salty, smoky bacon with wine-like sweet figs,
and the tangy, obvious saltiness of that goat's cheese
really works together.
But it's the white sauce on top of quite a thick pizza
dough is making the whole texture very, very thick.
The crust around the outside, I like. And the flavours, I think,
are really good.
The maple syrup, there's not a huge amount on there.
I'm pleased about that.
The issue here is the white sauce.
That's a mistake. It needs to be a lighter sauce than that.
And that means that in the middle,
it's not quite cooked all the way through.
It's a bit doughy and a bit sticky.
The white sauce was quite heavy.
So it is a learn.
But I'm still glad that I put all those flavours together.
Oh, fancy.
A pizza disc.
A deeper shade of blue cheese and steak pizza.
That is fabulous.
LAUGHTER
Hey, hey!
NARRATOR: As well as the blue cheese and sirloin steak topping, H's pizza
has a tomato and basil sauce with mozzarella
and a red onion marmalade.
H, you don't give up.
You had literally 30 seconds to cook the pizza.
It's not quite cooked all the way through.
But your flavours are great.
The steak - nice and rich and lovely.
Your tomato sauce is ace.
Slightly chunky, a little bit rustic.
Blue cheese, sticky saltiness.
Sweetness of the tomatoes.
Really sugary sweetness of those onions.
I think your flavours are wonderful.
We've got an issue with your pizza dough.Hmm.
Sorry.
Oh!
I'm a little bit deflated by that.
But I have to remember to focus on the positives.
Everything was great apart from the dough.
Rochenda has made a pizza inspired by a cheese board, topped with pear,
blue cheese, caramelised onion and walnut, with a pistachio pesto
sauce and a honey and chilli drizzle.
GREGG: Rarely do you see pear on a pizza.
LAUGHTER
But I love these flavours, the juicy
pear, really strong blue cheese.
And walnuts - they have a bitterness.
I love the onions around the outside.
They give you a little bit of bitterness.
The honey only comes in right at the last minute
with the pistachio nuts. It's great.
I'm really impressed with your dough.
Really lovely and thin.
Crispy and bubbled up around the outside.
Really nicely made. Love the invention.
I think that's very, very good.
I'm quietly confident
because they were very happy with the actual...the thinness
of the pizza.
I'm like this.
"Give yourself a little pat on the shoulder, mate."
You know what I mean?
Harry has recreated his good luck charm
meat feast pizza.
It's topped with nduja, pepperoni, mozzarella, spicy beef mince,
and peppers, with a tomato, oregano, garlic and basil sauce.
GREGG: Mate, you like it hot and spicy, don't you?
Yeah. You've used nduja in there.
Peppers that are also tangy and hot.
There's also pepperiness of salami.
That's a proper fiery-hot pizza.
But we've got an issue with the dough as we get into the middle
of the pizza.
It's spongy and it's a little bit wet in part.
Loads of garlic. God, you love garlic. I do, yeah.
But because your tomato sauce was hot, it's gone onto the pizza,
it makes it go wet.
A bit deflated.
The confidence has gone down a bit.
We live and learn. You did a good job. We live and learn.
I'm processing at the moment, keeping my fingers crossed.
Last up is Vito.
Hello.
He's made a classic pizza from Naples, topped with friarielli,
an Italian green vegetable,
fennel sausage, sun-dried tomato and chilli,
with a ricotta-stuffed crust.
GREGG: Great flavour of sweet sun-dried tomatoes.
The salty, bouncy mozzarella.
There's chilli in there as well.
I like the friarielli. It's very juicy,
like a spinach.
I love, love, love your flavours.
Your pizza dough is very, very good indeed.
It's thin enough that it's cooked all the way through, but it's thick
enough that it's holding the filling of the ricotta.
That's amazing.
Fennel-rich sausage in there with a little bit of chilli as well.
Salty sun-dried tomatoes, creaminess of cheese and the richness
of that green veg.
Good pizza dough. Thank you so much.
Thanks, Nonno. Thank you, Nonno.
I am happy because my pizza was well cooked. I think, and I hope,
that my nonno would be proud.
THEY LAUGH
Thank you so much. I did it.
These six are really inventive and adventurous.
Some great-tasting pizzas.
I absolutely loved it.
Look, pizzas get you muscles. Just believe that.
I eat pizza all the time and my arms don't look like that.
Get off!
Craig's gone through. He's into the next round.
We've only got five places from this cook-off.
Whose MasterChef competition is over?
Tamer gave us a type of pizza fusion.
Italy, of course, and Turkey.
I thought that was great.
Vito's pizza dough was very, very good.
Ricotta stuffed inside the crust.
The flavour of fennel sausage.
Smoked cheese, as well as that lovely vegetable.
I loved his pizza.
Rochenda - she had the thinnest of pizza bases, John.
It was done beautifully.
And those flavours did really work.
Cheese, pear,
bitter walnuts.
I thought it was great, actually.
Right. So we've got Tamer, we've got Vito, we've got Rochenda
going through. Now we need to have a chat about Harry, Dominic and H,
because we had dough issues.
H's idea of a pizza was really good.
Steak and blue cheese.
A really good tomato sauce in there as well.
I liked his pizza, but that dough wasn't right.
It wasn't cooked enough.
Dominic's pizza, the fig, the acidic goat's cheese and the salty, smoky
bacon really, really worked.
However, bechamel on a pizza, it was always going to make
that dough collapse and it meant the dough couldn't cook properly.
Flavours were good. It was design was an issue.
Harry - I really liked the spicy beef.
I liked the sweetness of the tomatoes.
I thought the whole thing was properly peppery, chilli-hot.
The hot tomato sauce went on to the pizza dough,
which just made it slightly soggy in the middle.
Harry, H, Dominic.
One of them goes home. John, it's such a shame.
I'd be absolutely buzzing to make it to the final six, purely
because of the fact I feel like I've got so much more to give.
I feel like I'm thriving, just not right now, this second.
I don't know if I've done enough.
I am feeling a little nervous, but whatever happens,
I'm really chuffed with the pizza that I've made today.
I really want to stay.
There's so much more I want to learn.
I'm not ready to go yet.
Well, what a fantastic challenge.
Some great flavours. Real adventure. Really exciting food.
Thank you very much for your hard work.
The contestant leaving us is...
..is Dominic.
Dom, really sorry to see you go.
You have had a fabulous competition.
APPLAUSE
This competition has totally inspired me to get more creative
in the kitchen, and I think that might just leak
over into my make-up.
Fancy a bit of a bacon highlight?
Sausage lips? Bit of egg on the eye?
I mean, it's a full breakfast right there.
CHEERING
Congratulations, you five.
You are through to the next round.
CHEERING AND LAUGHTER
Oh, I was shaking in my boots.
Gosh, that was not a nice feeling.
I was very concerned.
I am over the moon to be still in the competition,
but that was very, very close.
I'm happy to be here, I really am. I'm elated.
I've got the MasterChef bug in a big way, and it's like you just don't
want it to end.
Let me tell you, today was the most under-pressure challenge so far.
I'm just very, very grateful and thankful.
I want more. I want more, more, more.
Who don't? Who don't, mate? Come on, we've got the bug now.
We want to rip the meat off the bone and, you know,
go for it. Go for it right till the end.
LAUGHTER
CHEERING
LAUGHTER
Next time, it's the last of the semifinals...
..and the six remaining cooks...
This is stressful.
..battle it out...
No mistakes.
..for their place in finals week.
Whoo!
Boom!
Mate, that is an absolute treat.
Thank you. It's been emotional.
The celebrity leaving us...