Past Seasons Discussion

[katisha]

The instant the magenta team brought out uncooked chook, any remaining suspense went out of the episode because that's something you don't come back from.  Whatever happens tomorrow, I have to give Steph a lot of credit for owning up to the fact that she stuffed up by not checking that chicken herself as team captain.  Abbey could learn a thing or two from her attitude. 

3 minutes ago, Rosenrot said:

Loki's fate from last season is probably still haunting their minds. 

Agree - it's the Loki Curse!

[babs1226]

That was a really tense team challenge!  I did feel bad for the burgundy team, because both teams really worked their butts off, but you have to make sure the chicken is cooked!  I don't recall another team challenge where they took the food back from the diners.  

Also, I have no issues at all with Nigella, but I thought that time call at the beginning was a little over the top lol.  I guess she wanted to show off the fringe on her jacket?

[xchouchoutex]

4 hours ago, babs1226 said:

 Also, I have no issues at all with Nigella, but I thought that time call at the beginning was a little over the top lol.  I guess she wanted to show off the fringe on her jacket?

I was thinking the same thing haha because she kept her hands up a while after the go thing 

[ppl]

Steph's not team captain material. A team captain would never delegate the brainstorming of the dishes to her teammates. I did like that she owned up to not checking the chicken.

How stupid of the purple team to roll their fish up and cook it in the oven. They were very lucky that the burgundy team served raw chicken.

I preferred the burgundy team's menu. I think if they had cooked the chicken, they would have slam dunk won all 3 courses.

[babs1226]

9 minutes ago, ppl said:

How stupid of the purple team to roll their fish up and cook it in the oven. They were very lucky that the burgundy team served raw chicken.

I think the issue was that they left the skin on.  I thought I heard one of the judges say that, when you cook flounder like that, you take the skin off.  Also, according to what Gary said, not all of their fish was under cooked.  I think he said it was inconsistent.    But yes, they were lucky burgundy stuffed up the chicken.

[Rosenrot]

I'm a librarian, so I have a real soft spot for libraries, and that - pardon my French, but this sentence needs it - was a fucking awesome-looking library! Really, really nice setting for a team challenge (although I would've liked it more if they had fed the library employees).

I question Steph's leadership skills, but at least she owned up to her mistakes. Also, I think it's somewhat amazing that I live for sugar but have never had Baked Alaska. It's not a common dessert here. I may have to bake one sooner rather than later.

Edited May 15, 2019 by Rosenrot

[katisha]

I am not sure whether everyone else who posts here is of my vintage, but I am 52, turning 53 this year, so I am in the Mandy/Steph age group and I can absolutely see how the pressure made them say the wrong word.  It happens to me too!  It's really damn frustrating if, like me, you were always a person who had the right word instantly to hand and used to be pretty sharp.  So I felt sorry for them both that they ended up in the elimination round when it could so easily have gone the other way.  And of all things to make a mistake on, corn relish!  Even without being able to smell or taste it I could tell through my screen that's what it was.

Still on the age-related thing, I don't think we are ever going to get an over 50 winner on this show of either gender.  I thought Mandy had the potential to go far.  Steph, if she reins in her "headless chicken" routine, might do OK.  But I am really glad Tati didn''t turn into a second disappearing contestant we never hear from until the day they get eliminated.  She seems really fun and sweet. I hope she stays a while longer. I didn't even know where she was from originally until tonight.

[misgabi13]

1 hour ago, katisha said:

But I am really glad Tati didn''t turn into a second disappearing contestant we never hear from until the day they get eliminated.  She seems really fun and sweet. I hope she stays a while longer. I didn't even know where she was from originally until tonight.

So glad you said this Katisha.... I thought I was going mad that I had never heard of her!  Saying that I would be all over those satays!

As for Mandy and Steph .... I am exactly the same age as you but I am not a fan of either.  Steph seems really proud now of being Macgyver and keeps being the headless chicken and taking not much responsibility.

Mandy was just hopeless so not surprised she went home.

This is the weirdest season ever - I kind of like some people but then think 'meh' they can go home.  Not a real front-runner amongst them!

[babs1226]

54 minutes ago, misgabi13 said:

This is the weirdest season ever - I kind of like some people but then think 'meh' they can go home.  Not a real front-runner amongst them!

I think Tessa will go far, and possibly Abbey, although I have really soured on Abbey since she screwed her team in the relay challenge.  Basically I try to avoid picking a favorite to root for, since anything can happen in this competition.

[Mellowyellow]

I have totally and utterly soured on Abbey.

The smug way she smiled during the elimination challenge when it was her fault that they all landed there in the first place. Ugh ugh ugh. There is something about her I do not like. She chickened out when she was team leader and started her team off on the wrong foot, then had the gall to look so self satisfied in the elimination.

I always expect the Masterchef US contestants to be shady and they kinda own it at least so there is something (sneaky? smug? lack of self awareness?) about Abbey that rubs me the wrong way!

In other news I have decided to skip the damn immunity pin episodes and I have never felt so free. Lol it's like I've been released from a prison of my own making. I absolutely dread those immunity challenges for some reason. They are just so........bland.

Edited May 16, 2019 by Mellowyellow

[Rosenrot]

1 hour ago, babs1226 said:

Basically I try to avoid picking a favorite to root for, since anything can happen in this competition.

Same… probably a wise thing for me. I don't want to have the meltdown I had last year when Mr. Battered-Fish-and-Pea-Purée went to the finale instead of Khanh. I was so angry I didn't even watch the finale until much later. (I'm sure Ben is a perfectly nice bloke but I MEAN COME ON HIS ATTEMPT AT A PEA DISH WAS TO SPRINKLE INDIVIDUAL PEAS ON THE PLATE! AND DON'T GET ME STARTED ON THE FINALE'S 'BATTERED WHITING WITH PEAS'! WHAT THE EFFING EFF!)

(I am still not over it, clearly!)  

Mandy's dish didn't look appealing at all. (Well, the chicken maybe, but chicken almost always looks appealing.) Cabbage and beurre blanc? Huh? 

[ppl]

On 5/16/2019 at 2:17 AM, babs1226 said:

I think the issue was that they left the skin on.  I thought I heard one of the judges say that, when you cook flounder like that, you take the skin off.  Also, according to what Gary said, not all of their fish was under cooked.  I think he said it was inconsistent.    But yes, they were lucky burgundy stuffed up the chicken.

I think the inconsistent cooking of the fish was due to the fish being different size fillets. Rolling up the fish would only compound the cooking issue.

8 hours ago, katisha said:

I thought Mandy had the potential to go far.

I didn't. I think she was all over the place in previous challenges like when she and the rest of her section forgot to screw on those pressure cooker lids tightly in that farmers' team challenge. Even today when she said she had a million ideas, I knew she was going home.

Alas, I really wanted Abbey to go home but she is one of the better cooks this year so she might make it to top 10.

I see Jess as a sleeper pick. She really knows flavours well and like today, that will save her from elimination.

Nicole reminds me of the previous Nicole from season 9.

I have no clue who Ben is.

Masterchef AU ratings are really going downhill. Only 573,000 watched Nigella's Mystery Box/Team Relay challenge. I wonder if they will cancel the show if things stay where they are right now.

[katisha]

16 hours ago, ppl said:

I didn't. I think she was all over the place in previous challenges like when she and the rest of her section forgot to screw on those pressure cooker lids tightly in that farmers' team challenge. Even today when she said she had a million ideas, I knew she was going home.

Yeah, must admit I really only thought she might do OK once, when she kept up pretty well in the Curtis Stone challenge.  But that seems a long time ago and it's not like she didn't get warned that last night's dish wasn't a good idea.

[retrograde]

I'm not blown away by anyone -- and still don't recognise half of them -- but so far I like Tati, Simon and Kyle OK. 

[katisha]

Well, I realised tonight I do have another "old lady" to support after all, and it's Tati! Despite her very youthful appearance, at 49 she is older than Steph. So glad she did well tonight because I like her.

Rick Stein is always good value and even though there was some fangirling going on, the Nigella stuff was worse.

As for the elimination tomorrow, I think the odds are Derek will be safe because so far not a single male contestant has been eliminated so the odds are in his favour while we still don't have equal numbers.

[ppl]

What did Anushka say to Gary after he said fridge blindness? It got a huge laugh from George.

Not a fan of Derek this episode. Undercooking fish is such a rookie error. I also don't understand why he didn't cook the potatoes and fish separately and put them back together at the end. He seemed more concerned about the 'potato scales' on top than the fish. For all his creativity, it seems like he's missing some cooking sense.

I thought for sure Blake was going to get tasted in the Mystery Box.

Just when I said Jess is a sleeper pick, she goes and puts up that sad dish.

Abbey's invention dish looked ugly.

Can we just stop with the curries already? Isn't that Sandeep's 3rd or 4th curry this season?

Does anyone else HATE the type font and size when the contestants are introducing their dish this year? All I can see is the main part of the dish and the rest is so small that it is very hard to see.

One season later and I still dislike the Mystery Box tweak where the winner is safe from the Invention Test. Bring back the Invention Test advantage and give the winner an extra 15 minutes cooking time automatically if you want to switch it up.

[Rosenrot]

4 hours ago, ppl said:

What did Anushka say to Gary after he said fridge blindness? It got a huge laugh from George.

Something about Specsavers, but I couldn't make out the beginning of the sentence. "I should've gone to Specsavers", maybe?

To me, bone marrow purée sounds all kinds of disgusting, but maybe it's just me since the judges seemed to love it. 

So many "I want to get tasted"s in this episode! It will never NOT sound dirty to me. 

E: Forgot to say - I'm scared for Derek. 😞

Edited May 19, 2019 by Rosenrot

[katisha]

1 hour ago, Rosenrot said:

Something about Specsavers, but I couldn't make out the beginning of the sentence. "I should've gone to Specsavers", maybe?

That's what I heard. 😊

[dnagirl]

I just finally caught up.

I'll summarize.

Like:  Tess(a?), Tati, Big Nose One Pancake, Anushka (because I find her to be like a cute little mouse I want to stick in my pocket who will make me tiny layer cakes)

Dislike: Abbey, Steph (I have an automatic irrational dislike for people who wear those glasses and that hair lol and her spastic cooking annoys me),

Meh:  Derek (who has slipped from the like category from sheer lack of good judgement of late), Jess, Walleed (because I have zero idea what he actually cooks), Hipster Moustache Guy, Get a Haircut Dude, Prince Fauxrry, and everyone else because I don't know who they are.

Bonus Like:  Rick Stein simply for the "it's just me!" after the fangirling by Tess(a?).

Bonus Dislike:  Nigella.  And this pains me to say because for years I liked her and I love her recipes, but the more I see her (especially interacting on this show) the more fake she seems to me.  The smiles seem forced, the comments seem forced.  It may be just me...heck it probably is just me.  Though, she wins a couple of points back for the eyebrow raise while Steph was "leading" her team in the library challenge.  Because I was totally giving the same look from my couch.

Anyway, these opinions are solely my own and based upon some irrational feelings I have and not necessarily on the competence of the individuals.

Although I do want to eat Tati's whole fish in banana leaf and Jess's pav (dying to try my first pav).  Mmmmmm food.

[xchouchoutex]

Please producers let us see what the other contestants are cooking !  

And Tati and sandeep i think they should cook things other than curry and get out of there safe side 

There is something that makes me dislike jess , leah and abby I hope dereck will be safe 

Edited May 20, 2019 by xchouchoutex

[retrograde]

I have no problem if Tati makes nothing but Indonesian food and Sandeep makes nothing but Indian food. Plenty of the Anglo contestants make nothing but Western fare. "Curry" is an English term that we lump vast swathes of very different Asian foods under in the west. The tomato "curry" Sandeep made really had zero in common with the fish "curry," and he might as well just called it a "dip" or a "spread" or something. 

Edited May 20, 2019 by retrograde

[Mellowyellow]

7 hours ago, retrograde said:

I have no problem if Tati makes nothing but Indonesian food and Sandeep makes nothing but Indian food. Plenty of the Anglo contestants make nothing but Western fare. "Curry" is an English term that we lump vast swathes of very different Asian foods under in the west. The tomato "curry" Sandeep made really had zero in common with the fish "curry," and he might as well just called it a "dip" or a "spread" or something. 

I prefer it to panna cotta, parfait, a crumb and an ice cream to be honest! I have seen enough of those for a lifetime!

[katisha]

The female contestants continue to be picked off one by one. I wonder when a bloke's going to be eliminated?

I didn't like the guest chef much. I found her rather rude and nasty but I suppose 10 years of working for GR will do that to you. Also, a few people on FB said she was smirking about all those meringue shells cracking. I didn't notice but it's poor form if she was IMHO.

Edited May 20, 2019 by katisha

[ppl]

12 hours ago, retrograde said:

I have no problem if Tati makes nothing but Indonesian food and Sandeep makes nothing but Indian food. Plenty of the Anglo contestants make nothing but Western fare. "Curry" is an English term that we lump vast swathes of very different Asian foods under in the west. The tomato "curry" Sandeep made really had zero in common with the fish "curry," and he might as well just called it a "dip" or a "spread" or something. 

The problem that I have with Sandeep is more often than not he goes back to his curry. There are lots of Indian foods he can showcase but he hasn't shown a variety yet beyond his curries. It's like Anushka's layered cake repetition or Season 8 Matt's prawn heads or Season 9 Ben's ice creams, etc. Season 9 Diana had no problems showing off her Malaysian heritage while still showcasing variety and technique.

4 hours ago, katisha said:

I didn't like the guest chef much. I found her rather rude and nasty but I suppose 10 years of working for GR will do that to you. Also, a few people on FB said she was smirking about all those meringue shells cracking. I didn't notice but it's poor form if she was IMHO.

I didn't like her back in season 9 and still don't today. I caught that smirk too.

I have to give Derek credit today for being methodical and quick even though he almost flubbed his jelly.

Funny how things almost went pear-shaped for Leah after she forgot to put water in her gel for her puree.

If Jess had gone faster in the beginning like she went near the end, she would have been safe and Leah would have went home. You would think after a world class chef tells you to get your meringue shells in the oven in 2 minutes that you would haul ass like crazy to shape those domes in a hurry but nope, we got slow and steady from Jess.

Spoiler

I believe Donovan Cooke is the immunity chef tomorrow. I don't know why the editors bothered to block his face out when they spoiled it in the first 5 minutes of the 1st episode.

If you remember, he was the chef that gave Laura (season 6) an automatic pin for putting the dish on his plate 5 seconds late and was disqualified. You can't have your reputation shattered if you don't plate a dish!

[babs1226]

1 hour ago, ppl said:

If Jess had gone faster in the beginning like she went near the end, she would have been safe and Leah would have went home.

Maybe so, but Jess's meringue was too thin, and 4 of her 5 cracked before she got them out of the molds.  It was really not a surprise that her last one cracked under the weight of the dessert.  Also,her creme pat wasn't right,and she knew it, but she had to move on anyway.  I am sad to see Jess go, but if you compare the mistake Leah made with her discs to the errors in Jess's dish, I think they made the right decision. 

[ppl]

1 hour ago, babs1226 said:

Maybe so, but Jess's meringue was too thin, and 4 of her 5 cracked before she got them out of the molds.  It was really not a surprise that her last one cracked under the weight of the dessert.  Also,her creme pat wasn't right,and she knew it, but she had to move on anyway.  I am sad to see Jess go, but if you compare the mistake Leah made with her discs to the errors in Jess's dish, I think they made the right decision. 

They made the right decision. I am not disputing that.

Those errors could have been easily fixable had Jess moved faster in the beginning like she did at the end. I am simply stating she didn't move fast enough at the start and that costed her.

[Rosenrot]

9 hours ago, katisha said:

I didn't like the guest chef much. I found her rather rude and nasty but I suppose 10 years of working for GR will do that to you.

😄 I was about to come here and say that "did that guest chef seem not very excited to be there?" Almost every time she was watching what each contestant was doing, she looked appalled. I thought maybe she just has a resting bitch face or something, but working for Ramsay for 10 years (a fact that I managed to miss) probably explains it.  

Why did they plate up in front of the judges? I don't remember them doing that often. Is it like an extra bit of pressure?

Yay, Derek and his gunshow are still in game!

Edited May 20, 2019 by Rosenrot

[retrograde]

I think the guest chef was just very British. She seemed to express some genuine happiness when the contestants pulled certain difficult things off or put up a good dish.

I wasn't surprised Jess went home because they'd barely bothered to show her this season.

[katisha]

As always, I found the first half of the episode far more interesting than the second.  They should do stuff like that more often in challenges because limiting equipment/time/ingredients is the only thing that will force some contestants to think outside the square and do something a bit different. 

Much as I'm pleased for Tati that she managed to get into round 2, again we entered the realms of true fantasy when TPTB expected us to believe the judges had NO idea who cooked which dish.  Donovan was NEVER going to cook a dish anything like the sort of thing Tati does, which is obviously good but far more home-style in presentation, etc.

Edited May 21, 2019 by katisha

[xchouchoutex]

3 hours ago, katisha said:

Much as I'm pleased for Tati that she managed to get into round 2, again we entered the realms of true fantasy when TPTB expected us to believe the judges had NO idea who cooked which dish.  Donovan was NEVER going to cook a dish anything like the sort of thing Tati does, which is obviously good but far more home-style in presentation, etc.

Yeah right ? I even heard Matt while tasting Donovan’s dish that it’s a french meal which is his style of cooking so it was way obvious

Edited May 21, 2019 by xchouchoutex

[seltzer3]

So caught up this week.

The contestants have stepped up their game this week in the challenges so far.  A lot of good looking dishes.  I guess fish and potatoes forced people to not make ice cream :D.

What was up with Gary telling Tati to unwrap the banana leaf so they could see what was inside?  Then after Tati unwraps, Gary and company were like "Oh you are running out of time to bake your fish, you better wrap it up quickly."  Um, way to completely undermine her, ROFL.

Really impressed with the microwave, sandwich press, and tea kettle challenge.  All the dishes looked amazing and creative.  Matt getting excited that alfalfa sprouts being used the first time in 11 seasons is hilarious.

[misgabi13]

22 hours ago, katisha said:

As always, I found the first half of the episode far more interesting than the second.  They should do stuff like that more often in challenges because limiting equipment/time/ingredients is the only thing that will force some contestants to think outside the square and do something a bit different. 

That was an excellent challenge and I agree they should do more like this in the future!

[katisha]

10 hours ago, seltzer3 said:

The contestants have stepped up their game this week in the challenges so far.  A lot of good looking dishes.  I guess fish and potatoes forced people to not make ice cream :D.

His name escapes me at the moment but there was a contestant last season who was very in love with his weirdo Heston-style granitas/crumbs/domes and I am sure he'd have done something in that style with only fish and potatoes as ingredients.  I am sure someone will remember who I mean!

What I learnt from tonight's episode: no rice is worse than bad rice when you are serving a curry.  And love her or hate her, there is no doubt in my mind that Steph saved the Blue Team from the elimination round with her dish, which it appears she prepared single-handedly.  Sandeep, on the other hand, managed to stuff up cooking rice, and with his cuisine speciality it's hard to believe he could do that.  I guess some people handle pressure better than others.

Meanwhile, WHO is this bloke from the green team? Has he ever spoken a single word?

[babs1226]

1 hour ago, katisha said:

Meanwhile, WHO is this bloke from the green team? Has he ever spoken a single word?

His name is Ben, and I know that only from the intros.  :)

I thought that challenge was brutal!  90 minutes to come up with 3 dishes and prepare them properly for 120 people.  On top of that, not having enough of any one protein for more than one team!  I really felt for Simon.  Having to switch from lamb to fish on the fly, it's no wonder nobody thought of the rice.  I am surprised, though, that Tati didn't realize it earlier.  Of course, I am not in the thick of it.  I just feel like this challenge was designed to set everyone up for failure.

[ppl]

Yay. Someone with little screentime won their way into the 2nd round of the immunity challenge!

I am shocked that the Yellow team won that team challenge. I thought they would be headed for trouble after they chose their captain based off her knowing 1 Mexican condiment really well but their menu was top notch. That Charred Corn dish was smart. Good of them to have the foresight to change their quesadillas dish before service.

Simon's team had all the nobodies except for Anushka and Blue team was loaded with Masterchef Season 11 all stars.

Derek running into the kitchen like it's a sprint while the rest of his team lightly jogged their way in was hilarious.

I know she is going to annoy me later on but Steph definitely kept Blue team out of elimination. Tessa seemed very resourceful like trying to fix Sandeep's mess of a dish.

Ben's first real words in the Masterchef kitchen: bacon.

[Mellowyellow]

I really hope Simon and Tati are safe. 

Poor Simon looked so crushed about the verdict I really felt for him. 

Really liking Tessa and Nicole. Haha they look so similar! I like their mild temperaments. Actually I like everyone except Abby but there is something "Heads down and just work" about Tessa and Nicole that I enjoy. They probably make terrible reality TV but I appreciate the calmness. 

Haha just had a thought of what it would be like if you grabbed the calmest Masterchef AU contestants (e.g. Billy, Elena, Diana) and threw them in with the craziest Masterchef US contestants.  Fun times 😂

Edited May 23, 2019 by Mellowyellow

[katisha]

Yay! Tati lives to fight another day!

As for Blake, if that's the best he could do with bacon as his chosen ingredient, WTF? After all that talk about going to the deli all the time and being half-Italian, that challenge should have been right up his alley.

As for Ben, I can see now why he hasn't been on camera much - he's really quite dull and rather a morose sort of guy.  And if he's going to do wanky desserts, he's going to have to do a lot better than that mess he served up today.  He certainly didn't have  much to show for an entire hour of work. Again, he was another who said how he loved deli foods and actually helped make some of those meats, so his choice of ingredient was weird.

So we have finally lost a male contestant, but if that's the level of skills hiding in the middle of the field, it's a miracle we didn't lose one sooner.

[ppl]

The deli taste test portion of the elimination was odd. Why wouldn't you pick the easiest ones to go first like bacon or ham? Instead ham goes in the what 4th round?

1 hour ago, katisha said:

So we have finally lost a male contestant, but if that's the level of skills hiding in the middle of the field, it's a miracle we didn't lose one sooner.

You'd be surprised at how far those middle people go. Amy from season 7 middle'd her way to the top 9 without having a single Mystery Box dish tasted or top 3 dish from the Invention Test.

Legends week was a bust. It feels like they brought back chefs who appeared on previous seasons to replace Gordon Ramsey week and as a sort of snipe against MPW.

Edited May 23, 2019 by ppl

[retrograde]

I love Yotam Ottolenghi (coincidentally, I use his vegetarian laksa recipe) but it was a waste that none of the challenges were at all specific to his style of food. Especially the deli one, when he's largely known for cooking vegetables. (It did make me homesick for the quality of cheese, olives, dips and nibblies like sundried tomatoes you can get at even the most bog-standard suburban Woolies deli in Australia though).

So Blake's parents own a restaurant and he works there? I miss the days when the judges would grill prospective contestants on why they claimed it was their "dream" to dedicate their lives to cooking but hadn't bothered with culinary school yet. 

"Secrets week" sounds dumb. Can we please just have "cooking great food" week?

[akr]

2 hours ago, ppl said:

Why wouldn't you pick the easiest ones to go first like bacon or ham? Instead ham goes in the what 4th round?

I think because there are a lot of varieties of ham and bacon. What if they asked you to be more specific? If you know your deli meats, distinctive things like prosciutto & coppa & mortadella are actually easier calls.  

I don't know why Blake didn't go for the roasted peppers right after Tati missed on those. 

[Mellowyellow]

What is the rule about how much the peanut gallery can help?

As I was watching I kept wondering why they couldn't tell that guy not to puree his potato.

[retrograde]

13 hours ago, Mellowyellow said:

What is the rule about how much the peanut gallery can help?

As I was watching I kept wondering why they couldn't tell that guy not to puree his potato.

It's a good question -- sometimes they're evidently allowed to say things like "check your rice" but they don't seem to ever offer actual cooking tips.

I wish they'd kept the Din Tai Fung guy around to judge the dumplings.

I think Leah will go.

[TVbitch]

Whew caught up! 

Steph is the new Tim.

There's a Blake? Bye Blake. It must suck to get on the show and then watch it back and they have basically cut you out except for your elimination.

Billie mentoring: "Oh, your custard hasn't set ... ... what are you gonna do?"

I think I have heard enough about Derek's guns. He doesn't seem to mind, but it's gotten a bit ridiculous. I can't imagine everyone going on and on about a female contestant's physical attribute without being called out for it.  

[ppl]

Derek absolutely deserved to win the dumplings Mystery Box in a landslide. His dumplings dish and skin were both the nicest. Dumplings Master, indeed.

Loved that Matt called Anushka out on her layered cakes! Too bad Abbey escaped with her own layered cake in the Invention Test.

I'm going to give a pass to Tati's curry this time because those candlenut crackers looked so good.

I also enjoyed Sandeep making another Indian dish besides curry. It looked awesome.

Why did Leah leave to go to the pantry without turning off the stove if her curd was perfect? Why did she leave the strawberry caviar to the last 5 minutes?

Tim is really sliding back into the middle of the pack.

I really did not enjoy Kyle's secret of hiding the sorbet underneath the mint leaves. It reminded me of that surprise challenge in season 9 where everyone failed to meet the brief.

[retrograde]

1 hour ago, ppl said:

I really did not enjoy Kyle's secret of hiding the sorbet underneath the mint leaves. It reminded me of that surprise challenge in season 9 where everyone failed to meet the brief.

I expected a lot more of this laziness, though, and was pleasantly surprised at how many contestants had genuinely interesting takes on the theme for once. 

[katisha]

Very interesting "alimination" tonight, seeing how the three very different contestants adapted to this challenge.  Anushka was great to watch.  I never had any fears she wouldn't get pretty close to making a decent paella.  Kyle, I wasn't sure because he's very inconsistent but when he said he prefers not using recipes I thought he'd be okay.  Leah never inspired confidence in this challenge.  For starters, she really only has herself to blame for ending up there in the first place. I have a very clear memory of her audition where she failed on the first try and had to cook again.  Her mother was telling her she makes wanky food and the judges agreed, so what did she do in the invention test last night?  Made more wanky food which didn't work.  She reminds me of the girl from last year or the previous season (Michelle?) who could do Reynold-style domes, etc, but had no idea how to prepare scallops.  To me, before you get into food wankery with liquid nitrogen, etc, you should at least get a few fundamentals mastered.  I would also have said the broth tasted "fishy" but then I don't like seafood or eat it, so anything in the category of fish or crustacean tastes "fishy" to me.  Unless Leah is in that category with me, I think as an aspiring chef she should know more!  Happy to be corrected if my lack of seafood knowledge is off base, though. 🙂

[seltzer3]

I never like that "secret" theme challenge.  It was way too vague, for everyone to essentially just do what they wanted to do in the first place.

Kyle should thank his lucky stars that Leah burned her paella.  Kyle's paella looked terrible.  You could tell that the rice was overcook, because when the judges scooped it out it looked like mush.

I have a feeling that Leah is really not aware of her surroundings.  Kind of hilarious that Anushuka was freaking out, because she thought her paella was burning, because of what she smelled.  Yet Leah, was the one with the actual burnt paella and didn't notice at all.

[akr]

Even before they went in, as they were going up the steps, I was thinking about the generational differences between these three: Kyle just in the early stages of setting up life with his young family, Anushka with her kids already grown or nearly so, and Leah still essentially in late adolescence herself (she seems a young 22).  And what do you know, those differences really showed in the cook, with Anushka's fuller lifetime of experience in the kitchen really paying off. Kyle's nerves seemingly partly due to how much is at stake for him and how much is  on his shoulders at this stage of his life, as well as knowing enough to know that he doesn't know enough and to worry about it, and Leah with all the enthusiasm, optimism, & inexperience of youth, with some obliviousness about what she doesn't yet know. 

That's over-analyzed, of course, and obviously set up by the intros, but it certainly seemed to showcase the strengths and weaknesses someone might bring to this competition at different stages of their life.

[limecoke]

Leah seems like a sweetie but she’s been out of her depth from the beginning.  I really liked an elimination challenge that wasn’t recipe driven and some super-fiddly dessert.  Cooking paella without a recipe seemed a reasonable test of who should stay and who should go.  More of these, please.   I really like Anushka and was happy she excelled.  Kyle was one lucky guy.

[Myriad]

One more "I want to be tasted" and I'll really be feeling dirty.

"I think they come together at the end." <-- Anushka, cooking dumplings

I'm officially dirty for rolling on the floor at this.