Masterchef‘s Ben, Sashi and Khanh cooked for 60 guests in a bid for a place in the finals taking place on Tuesday night.
With four hours to cook the ultimate main and dessert, sadly it was Khanh that didn’t make it through.
At first he burnt his fish and found himself in a tizzy just before plating up: “I’m still cooking my fish and I’m prepping my herbs for the garnish. This is just so much pressure. I think I’m breaking, I’m breaking, I’m breaking, I’m breaking. At this point, all I’m thinking is how I’m not going to finish. … I’m freaking out,” Khanh gasped.
He also found himself at odds with his dessert predicting his end. “What a disaster. I can just see my dream of being in the finals slipping away from me,” he lamented.
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Ben won the Masterchef judges over with surf and turf, which is crispy skin snapper with smoked celeriac puree and a Madeira jus.
“Wonderfully cooked bit of fish. Brilliant carrots. Restraint, lovely. That smoke on the celeriac puree, that bit of hickory in there is brilliant. And I love the surf and turf idea of putting a meat sauce with the fish. I think that’s great. Fish, I think, is… That is just rock’n’roll,” enthused Matt Preston.
“Cooked beautifully. Can’t do it any better ourselves, let’s be honest. And I love how the carrot’s cooked, and I love the simplicity of that puree – it’s really clean,” he gushed.
The judges also loved his pavlova dessert. “If you’re gonna reinvent a classic and especially something that is so close to all of us and our Australian hearts, if it’s not better, don’t put it up. This is so much better. This has got everything I love about a pavlova – chewiness of meringue, with a little bit of crispiness on the outside, and a little bit of marshmallow in the centre. The acidity that I love, you know, he’s put passionfruit curd on there. I love passionfruit on pavlova. The coolness of that berry gelato… This is bloody beautiful,” said George.
“I’m so excited,” said Ben about his place in the finale.
Ben and Sashi will now compete in the grand final and will have to face the ultimate challenge recreating a masterpiece created by Heston Blumenthal.
