If you pull a silly face I might pause the episode and then you’ll be stuck like that.
It’s the first quarterfinal and Danny Jones is playing by MasterChef: The Professionals’s portioning rules.
A Two Course Race
The quarterfinal was the usual affair with the three remaining celebrities having to cook a two course meal for a trio of returning celebrity contestants, this week being the turn of Christmas Champion and Taskmaster hero, Judi Love
last year’s Gregg Wallace Associated Banterer, Joe Swash
and of course Lisa Faulkner who was making a particularly brave return after last year’s Scallop Incident
but apparently she’s developed a taste for undercooked seafood because despite Danny’s piece of cod being very undercooked, she was more than happy to eat it, like a seafood vampire
John can’t take her to aquarium anymore lest she wreak havoc upon the stingray tank.
Danny’s approach to the challenge was to try and “masterchef up” his favourite take-away dishes – his main being his take on a Thai Green Curry
it was a hit and miss dish, Lisa Faulkner loved it but Judi wanted more of a punch from it and Joe Swash was making no qualms about letting us know where his allegiances lay
Danny’s other dish was Satay Chicken which he was very generously calling a starter and I would argue that a single 30g piece of chicken on a stick is actually a canapé
and somehow nobody took issue with it, I’d have stormed the kitchen looking for the rest of my portion if it was as good as everybody claimed it was.
Danny wasn’t the only one having issues with rawness because unfortunately for Paul Chuckle the pork medallion that he served Gregg Wallace was ever so slightly still squealing
but don’t worry, nobody else’s was John Torode assured us despite the fact his piece of pork looked distinctly the same colour as the one Gregg was staunchly refusing to eat
Judi had many of the same issues with Paul’s Pork and Cider Sauce dish as Danny’s main in that she couldn’t really taste much in the way of seasoning, Lisa Faulkner was meanwhile battling with her hatred of prunes
she was partially converted to them, although I think I was deconverted by the sight of them just sitting in that slightly too thick looking very yellow cider sauce.
Faye was cooking a very similar dish to Paul, the only real difference being that she was using pork chops and instead of prunes had decided that in order to make the dish ~fancy~ she was just going to throw some pine nuts and grate some parmesan over them because that’s what Zizzi’s does
the pine nuts did not go down particularly well and her pork chops were pretty overcooked but her mustard mash was good and earned her the respect of Joe Swash, the now self-declared King of Mashed Potato.
Faye and Paul were also battling for dessert supremacy with Paul’s being a “Boozy Chuckle Chockle Choc Pot” packed with so much Drambuie that by the end of it he could not say the name of what was just a chocolate mousse
as is well known, alcohol can severely affect the ability of something to set, which had very much happened to Paul’s mousse as everyone poured out an egg white laced chocolate gloop
which is only marginally worse that the batch of Chocolate Scrambled Eggs he made during his first attempt at the recipe and only a little more visually upsetting than his chantilly cream that looked like he was trying to quennell rice pudding
this dessert was just a textural horror movie.
Faye’s dessert was your bog standard Syrup Sponge Pudding and Custard – no fancy names, no extra additions, just a syrup sponge complete with half of the damn thing stuck in the bottom of the pudding mould, as is tradition
quite why she served it on a plate like a heathen, I do not know, but everyone was pretty pleased to try and spoon up the flat custard, which was made slightly easier by the fact it was a little lumpy, but the syrup sponge went down very well, which was the main thing.
A Two Course Meal Dish Ranking
- Danny’s Satay Chicken Canapé
- Faye’s Topless Syrup Sponge
- Faye’s Overcooked Pork
- Paul’s Hit’n’Miss Pork
- Danny’s Flopping Fish
- Paul’s Egg White Gloop
I had come into the episode expecting that Paul Chuckle would be the next one to go home, and I was staunchly sticking to that the moment he failed to put an apron on
and as much as they weirdly tried to amp up the tension that Danny “The Favourite” Jones might be going home, Paul Chuckle was sent home
I’m mostly sad we’ll not get to see anymore of his shirts – he’s the most unlikely fashion icon.
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