MasterChef – Recap & Review – Top 6 Compete

photo: fox

MasterChef
Top 6 Compete

Original Air Date: Sep 8, 2010

JD – Staff Writer
jd@thetwocentscorp.com

Last night, the top six became the top four heading into next week’s finale. They took on venison, vanilla, and three of the top food critics in America. We lost two very strong cooks last night, one of whom seemed to simply forget about a little thing called salmonella, and saw one that I didn’t expect in the final four shine. So how did your favorites do? Read on and see!

The Mystery Box:
The mystery box comes first again, but this is the final mystery box challenge of the season. What did the chefs get? Venison. Also in the box is bacon, blueberries, red cabbage, quail eggs, fingerling potatoes, beets, hazelnuts, Brussels sprouts, and red wine.

Whitney and David get a great start, as both of them are comfortable cooking venison. Sheetal has high hopes, even though she doesn’t have much experience with meat. And Sharone immediately starts to overcomplicate things by doing venison two ways with three different sauces. When he asks Gordon if that’s nuts, Gordon says “nuts” is a polite way to put it.

Lee starts making a coffee blueberry sauce for his meat and Whitney starts making a brown gravy, both of which concern Gordon. But overall, everyone is pretty focused on this challenge. No one seems to wind up with a disaster, although they never really show us what Mike has done.

Which dishes did the judges choose to taste?

Sheetal, who made roasted venison with a blueberry wine sauce and creamed Brussels sprouts – This looked the most appetizing of the dishes to me, and it was good to see her get picked for something that wasn’t a pity vote like last week. Gordon said it was a dream come true and it tasted like she’d cooked it a thousand times.

Whitney, who made venison with southern gravy, with roasted Brussels sprouts and potatoes – Gordon was worried about the gravy at first, but said it tasted like it was cooked by an angel.

Sharone, who made pan-seared venison with a blueberry puree and venison tartare with borscht – The plate was a laughable disaster. Joe said Sharone was lucky to have been called up, and the plating looked like “Salvador Dali on crack”. Gordon said he was picked because the venison was perfectly cooked, but said the rest of the plate looked like vomit. He covered that half of the plate with a napkin before he tasted anything. When Sharone explained to Graham that he wanted it to look like a walk through the woods, Graham said it looked more like a walk through a crime scene. All three judges liked the taste of the meat, though, and gave Sharone warnings along the line of “slow down” and “less is more”.

Who won the challenge? Sheetal, who has the advantage going into the next challenge…

The Vanilla Challenge:
We get another dessert challenge this time, and Sheetal gets to pick an ingredient to be the focus of the dish. She’s given honey, a variety of berries, and vanilla, and chooses the vanilla, even though she expresses concern that she might be shooting herself in the foot.

Whitney is the most confident from the start. Sheetal isn’t a dessert lover, and neither is David. He’s choosing the most difficult method of making a creme brulee he could, while Lee is relying on old bread to make bourbon pain perdu (basically a french toast), and Mike… well, Mike is making a trifle, admitting he bit off more than he could chew, and flying in 100 different directions. Watching him run around during this challenge, while David is giving commentary about the benefits of being relaxed in the kitchen and Gordon is watching Mike like he’s a lunatic, is probably the funnest part of this episode. As time runs short, Sheetal cuts into her sponge cake to find the inside raw, David chooses not to fire his creme brulees much at all, and Mike finally realizes he’s creating disaster. And then comes the tasting.

Joe called Sharone’s mille-feuille with mixed nuts and vanilla zabaglione a real triumph. Gordon said David’s vanilla creme brulee was missing the brulee. Graham said Whitney’s profiteroles with Chantilly vanilla creme were super light and sexy.

Who won? Whitney. Gordon said she is not only the youngest in the competition, but the strongest as well.

Who fell to the bottom three?

Sheetal, who only managed to get a vanilla custard on the plate when her sponge cake didn’t cook – Joe said he was personally disappointed, and that she was in trouble.

Lee, who made bourbon pain perdu with a walnut vanilla sauce – Joe said it was not only bad as a dessert but also bad as a breakfast.

Mike, who made a poached pear trifle with vanilla scented brandy – Gordon asked what the foam on top was, took a bite, then was told it was eggs whites, he spit it back out. Joe came up to taste and asked if it had raw eggs in it. He had to ask a half dozen times before Mike admitted there was. Joe dropped the spoon and stepped away.

Who went home? Mike. Of course. Gordon said that apart from panicking for 90 minutes, he produced a dessert that looked like “toxic scum on a stagnant pool”.

It’s a bit of a shame, given that Mike really was a good cook, but as Gordon often said of Mike, he didn’t know how to slow down. In the end, it bit him in the butt.

Big, Bad, Scary Food Critics Challenge:
The five remaining cooks have to face three of the biggest food critics in America. They will be fixing them all a fish dish in hopes to impress, and not wind up facing the pressure test. Because the ingredients need to be fresh, though, they go fishing for sculpin first. David is quickly the first one to catch something. Unfortunately he only catches a rock. Sheetal seems to have jumped all her I-will-not-kill-animals hurtles by dropping the crab in the pot last week and seems unfazed by fishing now. She catches the first fish, and gets the ball rolling.

Being the winner of the last challenge, Whitney has the advantage of a fifteen minute head start on the other contestants. She seems to only manage filleting her fish before the other cooks get to start. Lee immediately starts to braise his fish, while David decides to prepare his like he might prepare a lobster. Whitney chooses an Italian route, Sheetal dumps the first thing she cooks due to over-salting, and Sharone makes the dubious decision to not only cook the fish, but also its liver. It feels like its over before it starts, and the chefs are thrown into the shark tank.

Who are the sharks… er, critics?

Jeffrey Steingarten, who is the food editor for Vogue and the man Joe calls the “greatest food writer in the country”. You may also know him as the grumpy judge from Iron Chef. Sharone points out that Steingarten is “best known for shattering people”.

Tanya Steel, who is the editor of Epicurious, the biggest food website there is.

Barbara Fairchild, who is the editor in chief of Bon Appetite

The cooks bring their dishes out one by one, and the judges barely say anything to them. Sharone give the judges his whole life history, but there still isn’t much conversation. In between being presented the dishes, the judges talk. They call Whitney’s dish way too salty and garlicky. David’s fish was nicely cooked and well flavored by the saffron. Lee’s dish was tasty, but lacked contrasting textures. Sheetal’s curry flavor was good, but there were some bones found in one dish. And finally they thought Sharone’s dish was bland.

Who won? David. His saffron butter poached sculpin over Israeli couscous got a whopping 11.5 stars out of a possible 12! The judges said it was a huge success and they couldn’t stop eating it.

Who had to face the pressure test? Whitney and Sharone. Whitney’s pan seared sculpin with Italian vegetables scored 5 out of 12 stars. Sharone’s spring asparagus citrus salad with grilled sculpin and seared sculpin liver only scored a pathetic 4 out of 12 stars and was called “shockingly disgusting”.

The Pressure Test:
It’s an easy thing to say: Whitney and Sharone have to make a souffle. It’s much easier said than done. As the judges say, it’s one of the most technically difficult dishes to make, and they need to get from oven to table in 90 seconds or less to prevent it from collapsing.

The cooks can make as many souffles as they want in 90 minutes, but they can only present one to the judges. They get started, prepping their ramekins, and making their batter while Lee, Sheetal, and David watch. Sharone gets a souffle in the oven first and waits on it, while Gordon urges Whitney to get one baking… which she doesn’t do. But it winds up a bit like the tortoise and the hare. Whitney pulls the win out at the last second and puts herself in the final four.

So Sharone, another strong cook, goes home, but he gets a good sending off. Gordon says he’s a quirky, confident risk-taker, who will go far with food. Joe said it took balls that clang to add salt to his souffle, and said that if Sharone wanted it, he had a job waiting for him at Mozza, one of his L.A. restaurants.

My Two Cents:
The closer it gets to the finale, the more exciting it gets, obviously. I really enjoyed last night’s episode, and it had several great moments. I loved the argument the judges had over whether or not Sheetal’s venison dish would have been improved with olive oil, with Joe saying to Gordon “just because you can’t grow olive trees in your country doesn’t mean you have to harbor that bitterness toward the Mediterranean climate”.

I also loved Whitney last night. I know I’ve waffled on her, and she’s had some inconsistent nights, but she pulled out great venison and vanilla dishes. What I was more impressed with, though, was the way she reacted when she lost the critics challenge. Yes, she cried, but she wasn’t ungracious, and when she said “I’m just gonna fight back because tomorrow I’m not going home,” it killed me. There was no bravado or ego in the way she said it. It was just matter-of-fact.

We lost two good cooks last night, but of the remaining cooks, there is only one that I never thought would make it. David is clearly in it to win it, and I was amazed at how well he did in the critics challenge.

So we’re left with David, Lee, Sheetal, and Whitney. All of them have had wins, losses and disasters, so I think it’s a pretty even playing field. It will all boil down to what the final challenge is all about. I’m really hoping they will have to prepare an entire meal, so that each cook can have at least one course to play to their strengths.

So what do you guys want to see next week? Who do you want to win? Give me your two cents!