Ah, the wishful thinking of listening to the news.

A second Big Man™ has hit the MasterChef kitchen.

Basic to Brilliant

I am so glad this is the final week of this format and then we can hopefully take it out back and Ol’ Yeller it because I think it’s jumped the shark. Turning up with a lobster is like bringing a gun to a knife fight – Big Sweaty Darren™ has a handful of mushrooms from his best friend and some risotto rice and you’ve swanned in with a pound of premium crustacean, sir

I don’t care if you say that tomatoes are your basic ingredient and you make a very good consomme, the star of your dish is always going to be the lobster regardless of if you throw tomatoes at it like it’s been sentenced for Scandalum Magnatum in 1685

I would suggest this challenge have some sort of budget restriction but even then Harry would’ve turned up with lobster because it’s only so hard to smuggle them out after work

I just preferred it when the MasterChef contestants learned to cook a lobster during their time on the show rather than being fully equipped with that knowledge. I think it’s an important milestone, like using your first chopsticks

my first chopsticks were at age 13 in Mr. Chan’s Candytown Buffet, I think I dropped at least £15 worth of crispy beef on the floor while my mum begged me to use a fork.

Harry wasn’t the only one serving fish and calling it a tomato dish, as Munopa went for a very similar approach except her Tomato Consomme was a Tomato Water

the Cod is less eye rolling and she at least did something interesting with her use of Tomatoes in making the brioche with the tomato butter that looked REALLY good

but again, I’m curious to know at which point someone becomes ineligible for MasterChef because Monupa does have a string of cookery competitions under her belt already, including winning Best Home Cook at the South West Chef of the Year competition 2022 and a place in FutureChef 2020

suddenly it feels like someone’s whipped out an industry planted bazooka at this knife fight and somehow it’s not Mojgan and her immediate deployment of the Zandra Rhodes Lore Drop

I am so sad that Mojgan doesn’t stick around for longer because I wanted to know who else she could name drop in a celebrity clientele slideshow. Sadly her Stuffed Peppers weren’t enough to quite pull her through this round

They were really nicely spiced with saffron and turmeric but the judges had issue with a lack of yoghurt

Gee, I wonder where the rest of it could’ve gone?

Vishal was making a Raj Kachori and he did say it was meant to be the King of All Chaats and every king’s castle needs an impenetrable moat of fermented dairy

Vishal was given that 1kg tub of Natural Yoghurt and he was going to us ALL of it.

Both Michal and Darren got praised for the fact that all of their ingredients were basic ingredients but their dishes felt very elevated. Michal probably moreso than Darren, just on account of her Chicken Ballotine with Carrot Puree seeming a more ~restauranty~ dish

my biggest qualm with it is that it’s too monochrome – all of these things are on the same page of the Dulux paint catalogue

I think a bit of cavolo nero would’ve both complemented the flavours and made the dish pop a bit more.

Darren is our Obligatory Military Serviceman of the Year and true to being built like a brick shithouse, his food only comes in sizes XL to XXXXL

boulders of arancini are of course the quickest way to my own heart, so I’m all yours Darren and I think we should cherish you, you beautiful Big Sweaty Man cooking Big Sweaty Food.

A Basic to Brilliant Dish Ranking:
1. Something Fishy’s Going On
2. Shades Rich Havana 6 through Spicy Sandalwood 3
3. Harry’s Perjured Lobster
4. Mojgan’s Yoghurty Dry Spell
5. Darren’s Friend-shaped Mushroom Arancini
6. Vishal’s Impenetrable Yoghurt Lake

Munopa was obviously through and joining her on the IJBOL couch was Michal

don’t worry Harry, I’m sure you can classify the lobsters as a tax write off.

The Building Box of Life

This episode’s Mystery Ingredients were Figs, Butternut Squash and Lamb Mince

and while most of the remaining contestants wanted absolutely nothing to do with the figs, Mojgan was using all three of the ingredients to create a sort of Mystery Box Triptych

I question how roasted that Roasted Fig is but the judges seemed happy enough with the dish but felt it was missing a flatbread or something similar to make it feel like a whole dish. A particularly glaring omission when you have both Vishal and Harry making their own flatbreads. The latter of which served his topped with Lamb Koftas and has clearly gone to the Vishal School of Liberal Yoghurt Arts

and Vishal on the other hand had made a Lamb Mince burrito while under careful yoghurt rationing supervision

unfortunately Vishal was slightly let down but some unseasoned rice but highly praised for knowing when to walk away from the tupperware box of decanted yoghurt. Knowing your limits is important.

Lastly we have Darren, who I was very nervous for because he immediately turned that bowl of mince into scarily uncookable sized meatballs

which he was serving with handmade tagliatelle and a tomato sauce

despite his obelisks of meat, the meatballs had cooked through properly. The judges’ only real qualm was that the dish was too big and unwieldy – how dare they try to cut the hair my Big Sweaty Samson! All his power comes from is hulkingly ponderous portion sizes! Take that away and he’s… Harry.

A Mystery Box Dish Ranking:
1. Not-Darren’s LONG COOKED BALLS
2. Darren’s BIG COOKED BALLS
3. A Triptych of Mystery Ingredients
4. See No Yoghurt, Speak No Yoghurt, Hear No Yoghurt

Darren and Lesser Darren From An Alternate Universe didn’t get any really damning complaints for their food – I would personally have maybe wangled Mojgan over Harry (who was the best, but I do have a Darren bias) purely because I find her more interesting and think there is easily a case for her getting through but ALAS, her name dropping ends hear along with Vishal’s quest to use up all the yoghurt in England

no dairy aisle in all of Christendom is safe from him.

A Two Course Race

The guest diners for this heat’s quarterfinal decider were the 2023 gang: Runners up Omar and Anurag

as well as the winner, Chariya

not to accidentally invent a MasterChef Monarchy or anything but I think her possession of the bedazzled MasterChef logo brooch should instantly make her one of the new hosts. If nothing else it would at least be a good time watching her joyfully eat anything regardless of quality

Anurag and Omar both turned their noses up at Darren’s Lemon Souffle that was trapped in a sort of omelette-y half-life of not being quite a perfect souffle but at least not looking like completely like someone had jammed their entire breakfast into a ramekin

I kind of wish he’d served the horribly congealed mass of raspberry cream just to see what Chariya would’ve made of it

and if you’re thinking “A souffle seems awfully delicate for a man that looks like he’s about to kidnap Popeye’s wife, don’t you worry, the souffle followed a slab of steak and three fondant potatoes per person

wearing my “Sickos” jumper and pressing my face to the screen the entire time

I will drag Darren through to Knockout Week if I have to because I need this big sweaty man who gives people a proper amount of potatoes and slaps your back like he’s trying to pile drive you into the earth to meet Trevor

I need them to have a Kat and Zoe reunion

and we can shoot the Basic to Brilliant Challenge afterwards – it’s perfect!

Darren wasn’t the only to have to skip something off the plate as Munopa’s confit egg yolks were overdone. So instead of plating up her well-lubricated hard-boiled eggs, she just served her Potsticker Dumpling and Beef Consomme – I don’t think the egg yolk was strictly necessary other than to make the plating up look slightly less like the poster for Smiley Face

she had struggled with this dish, her dough coming out too sticky which is why everyone only got 1 potsticker the size and shape of a sunhat that Nick Smith would wear

and while having your dumpling and consomme critiqued as “being like a burger patty in a soup” would end the MasterChef career of most other contestants – there were 2 things protecting Munopa: her very good Prawn Satay Starter with an Apple and Cucumber Salsa (The Fish and Apple Coin had been flipped and landed on heads, so it was a good combinations this time!)

but most importantly, Michals’s entire menu featured a number of ingredients that you could count on one hand – starting with Mushrooms on Toast

ok, sure – that’s 1 more confit egg yolk than Munopa managed BUT AT WHAT COST, BABE? It’s just 3 things on a plate

well, I hope you’re bracing yourselves, because here’s 2 things on a plate

what are you counting down to, Michal? This feels like a threat. Beyond the fact she’s managed to outdo even James Buckley in this game of ever decreasing things on a plate – the Horseradish Mash was lumpy and lacking in flavour and she’d burnt the Beef Cheeks so badly there was a brief moment everyone thought they had to evacuate the building

sometimes “We can smell it from here!” isn’t a compliment.

Harry continues to be the alternate universe version of Darren who never went into the Navy with his own steak dish featuring significantly less fondant potatoes per capita

it’s extremely well cooked and the beef shin bonbon with the tomato jam did sound lovely but, only 1 bonbon per person? That don’t impress me much because my love has already been bought with 3 football-sized arancini and all the potato one could possibly wish for. I could have potentially been swayed by Harry’s Raspberry and Pistachio Mille Feuille but unfortunately as everyone had grand expectations of French patisserie, in bursts this flatbed truck rendered in raspberries and puff pastry

I’m kind of obsessed with its lack of sophistication – it’s not dainty and the colours are… well, the colour of that pistachio cream looks like zombie skin in a tube

but in Harry’s favour was the fact that the flavours were distinct and not lost to sweetness, if anything he could’ve made it sweeter but it still had its appreciators

oh so NOW three things on a plate is fine?

A Two Course Menu Dish Ranking:
1. Three Potato Darren
2. Harry’s Lesser-spotted Darren Main Course
3. Munopa’s Saving Grace
4. Straddling The Omelette Half-life
5. *beep* *beep* Here Comes The Mille Feuille Bus
6. Hamburger Soup By Any Other Name
7. Michal’s Last Minute Brunch
8. You Have 2 Things On A Plate and Both of Them Are Bad

While Munopa had a bit of a disaster with her main course, I do think it’s probably the best thing that could’ve happened to her because it does at least make her seem more on a par with the other contestants than she actually probably is, and the fact Michal had just such a low effort menu gave them a perfect excuse not to overly penalise her. And so, it was Michal leaving the competition

only a few more sleeps until Darren and Trevor get to come together and maximise their joint Big Man slay. AND IF IT DOESN’T HAPPEN I WILL DRINK PAINT.