My favourite movie is Sel-mento.

I think I went to school with a Sole Veronique?

Clamming Up

I was under the false impression that every episode was going to have a new MasterChef Guest Lecturer coming in, however it seems each was hired for the week so we’ve got Gary Maclean again. My favourite part of this slight format alteration is the blank faces of the constants who have no idea who he is

it’s not quite seeing Monica Galetti stalking out of a backroom with a scowl on her face because you did something terrible to a woodcock. Can you imagine if the President of the Monica Galetti Fan Club over here and got to meet her this way!?

I do think Sel meeting Monica Galetti is a violation of basic time travel theory because clearly he is from the alternate reality where Monica transitioned 13 years ago

you have to be careful about crossing the timelines, babe!

For the first Skills Test, Sel and fellow contestant Gemma, were having to create a Razor Clam and Pickled Fennel dish with an accompanying Jerusalem Artichoke component

which is all the fault of Gemma and that cursed monkey’s paw

but despite the fact that Gemma cooked her way through the entire challenge with a buffering icon on her face at all times

she got through it with a mostly passable dish

the only real issues were the fact she’d overcooked the Razor Clams, which she also hadn’t rinsed off, and had a Beurre Blanc sauce that was watered down and lacking flavour. But the judges were just relieved that she’d used the correct bits of the Razor Clams – and it’s a wonder to imagine that anyone would use the wrong bits because really you just have to remove the parts that make it look like an eldritch abomination from the deepest fathoms of the ocean

much like the first person to ever work out you could milk a cow, you do find yourself wondering who thought of eating razor clams.

Sel however didn’t get around to trimming his razor clams because he’d tried to make a puree from his Jerusalem Artichokes, something he definitely didn’t have enough time for

and had to use the last few minutes of the challenge to pickle artichoke shavings instead and so his plate ended up looking like a violent sneeze with a valiant effort to hide the fact he’d just served up Razor Clams, entrails and all

but even if his razor clams did loom like something I make my players fight in a long abandoned cave system during a game of D&D, they were cooked perfectly and his Beurre Blanc was amazing. But maybe he could’ve done with just making an omelette

I’m setting up a petition to have the Cod Cheek Omelette Guy return to put together one of these Skills Tests. I want to track him down, I need to know if he’s still haunted by that fiasco. I have a level 2 counselling skills qualification, I can fix him!

Tart Attack

Gary’s final Skills Test was a pastry challenge seeing Haydn and Luke having to make a Molten Chocolate Tart with an Oatmeal Crumble and Cranachan Cream

and given that pastry is more of a speciality, both chefs admitted to not having a great deal of experience with it. However, given all that, both of them were FAR TOO COMPETENT, how dare they!? One of you could have at least split your Cranachan to make the previous pair feel a bit better about their various mollusky nightmares.

Luke was almost onto a bit of a failure given that he hadn’t listened to the brief very carefully and missed the fact his tart was meant to be molten, intending to bake it for 10 minutes rather than the desired 5 to 6

and this was before he’d started spoon-feeding himself whisky liqueur to make the nerves go away

as they say 1 for the pot, two 5ml spoonfuls every 4 to 6 hours, four times a day for the chef

his near failure to melt was luckily saved by the judges dropping hints with all the subtlety of an episode of Blue’s Clues and he managed to get it out in time with a perfect ooze in the middle

and Haydn was similarly successful without having to have Marcus Wareing spelling “TAKE YOUR TART OUT OF THE OVEN” in semaphore on the sidelines

there was some concern over his decision to bake the crumble instead of toasting it in a pan but much like the concern over Luke angering the Scot in the cupboard with his whisky opinions, it never really amounted to much.

Signature vs Nurture

The Signature Round was a very seafood heavy affair with the only non-fish dish coming from Luke, who had instead opted for Yeast-glazed Venison with Beetroot Fondants

the main components of the fondants and particularly the venison slathered in marmite were probably more successful than they had any right to be. However, where the dish came a bit unstuck for the judges was with the Tartare Tartlet and the use of maple syrup therein

and this would not be the only errant tartlet in this round as Gemma’s Taramasalata and Pickled Grape Tartlet is a thing of truly malevolent evil

the light of God does not shine upon this tartlet. It was all part of her dismantling of a Sole Veronique – a dish I cannot wrap my head around and just reject on impulse

it’s the grapes, I simply do not understand them and it feels like the French are playing a practical joke on us. Gemma had at least relegated them entirely to her Tart of A Thousand Sins. This was however a problem for Marcus who thought the deconstruction of the dish had unbalanced the whole thing, particularly the sauce

but she was further hampered by promising Pommes Souffle and delivering glorified Ready Salted Walkers

ok, they’re Tyrrell’s at least.

The star of the round was Sel by a country mile who delivered a truly excellent Halibut dish with a Celeriac Puree and Jalapeno Emulsion that the judges really couldn’t get enough of

I just enjoyed that he’d laced the celeriac puree with such a potent amount of white truffle oil that it eventually just started being called a truffle puree

Marcus told him after the Skills Test that given he’d worked all over the world and has a case of Asian Amnesia

he was expecting fireworks and Sel definitely delivered.

Lastly we have Haydn who became the biggest cropper this round, having ended the 80 minutes proclaiming his fish was cooked and he was happy with the whole thing

and universe conspiring against him IMMEDIATELY

this is only funny when it happens to a chef that deserves to be humbled, Sad Tilda Swinton did not deserve this!

the judges did at least praise him for the components happening around the food poisoning risk but you didn’t have to be a clairvoyant to know his place in the competition had gone up in flames. Which is a shame because the purple merkin bowl in his intro VT showed great potential for nonsense

huge fan of the Pacific Purple Sea Urchins – blessed with the gift of immortality and doomed to have their gonads prized as a delicacy and end up with their shucked out bodies used as a bowl.

A Signature Dish Ranking:
1. He’s Sel-ing Out
2. A Tartar Tartlet Too Far…tlet
3. Gemma’s Grapes of Blurgh
4. You’re Hay-done

The decision was a no-brainer really with Haydn having scuppered himself and the judges being very cold on Gemma’s dish, it was Luke and Sel going through to the first quarterfinal

I shan’t doom him but Sel’s Cheshire Cat neck tattoo is an immediate blog favourite.