Another weeknight another ultimate instant restaurant round and while I’d love to say the end is in sight, let’s be honest, it’s not. Presumably MKR has another 12 months to go but that doesn’t mean we’re any less excited about tonight.
Once again we’re back with hipster foodies, crying Court and bearded Duncan.
The couple are hosting their instant restaurant at Courtney’s parents’ house in the Yarra Valley. We see a lot of nice shots of the house and the surrounding land. Maybe they’re putting it on Air BNB and this is a subliminal ad. Anyway it looks lovely. They pop off to buy all their produce for the SIX meals they have to cook. That’s way too many – a thousand bucks says Court wells up before the second course at LEAST.
Tonight’s restaurant is GastroTurf, which is the same name they used last time round, that’s LAZINESS guys.
Though it makes sense in a hipster kind of “everything old is new again” way. It is meant to replicate the laneway bar they met working in.
Hmmm, I’ve never seen a laneway bar that looks so last supperish.
Laneway more like LAMEWAY
Court and Duncan are busy prepping their meal when it occurs to me that no matter what Courtney is talking about it sounds like she’s reading a story to a young child. “And now I’ll start to fry off the capers? And why do we fry off Mr Caper, because he loves to get all hot and yummy!”
DING DONG the guests arrive and we’re off and running. It takes about three seconds for everyone to remember they hate Josh. Courtney doesn’t even hug him.
Oh, Hey Josh….GET OUT
Manu and Pete arrive and then it’s time to begin. The guests are treated to a quick run through of the menu and TBH it’s pretty impressive. Seafood, game meat, chicken, even some kind of whiskey sour dessert concoction – they’ve really covered all bases. The couple head into the kitchen but it’s at the table where the real action is.
Della makes a joke about Courtney picking berries and Pete does this face. He is clearly gutted.
It hurts but I will pretend it doesn’t hurt
Entrée is served but the snapper isn’t up to scratch while the venison looks the goods.
Pete calls it the best meal they have cooked in the competition so far. BOOM. Manu is also pretty stoked on the snapper. That’s win-win straight out the gate.
Josh says something about tasting grit from his blackberries. Then Betty accuses him of nit-picking and says “Hashtag Nitpicking.” Glad to see some things really haven’t changed.
Back in the kitchen things are getting super tense. Duncan’s crispy skin chicken is more grey than golden and it almost looks translucent. He’s not happy and things go from bad to worse when Courtney says it looks like balls and they should pan fry it.
PAN FRY OR I’LL PAN CRY
Panfrying works a treat and the hipsters share a hug. Things aren’t so rosy out at Gastro Turf where the other contestants have been waiting THREE hours for their food. If this was an actual restaurant you would have passively aggressively asked “How long till our food” and the less-than-impressed waitress would’ve said “Oh you guys are up next” despite the fact you obviously aren’t. But it’s not so instead the guests just have to wait while Court and Duncan tend to their mains.
Finally the food arrives and it’s been 3 hours and 30 minutes since entrée, that’s 210 minutes!
Which means you could have watched the entire Lord of the Rings: Return of the King.
Finished up with ten minutes to spare.
The chicken is a disaster, Manu thinks it’s far too dry and there’s not enough sauce. Pete likes the kangaroo – done two ways – but not everyone is as sold. Prob fair to say that the main courses were a bit of a misstep. Can they bring it back with dessert? Who knows.
While the guests wait – presumably four hours – for dessert they use one of the menus as a mock phone, the “turf” phone to fake a phone call to Court and Duncan. This is what being delirious looks like.
I can have fun too guys.
No joke it’s now been 3 hours and 10 minutes since mains. So it must be around 3am now which is precisely the time you feel like having dessert.
MY KITCHEN DROOLS
Everyone is filthy on this situation now, including Court and Dunc who just want everyone to go home. Manu thinks the profiteroles were pretty unimpressive and small. Pete thought the whiskey sour was “ok but not perfect” which pretty much sums up this entire night.
The scoring relives this whole nightmare so I won’t inflict it on you but ultimately they get 77 placing them squarely at the bottom of the leader board.
Not an ideal result.
As the sun rises the guests finally leave – next up Karen and Ros – best of luck ladies!
