MasterChef Australia - S13E35 - Single Murray Cod Elimination with Josh Niland

Turns out today is an elimination. I would be surprised but this is not the first time they have followed up a nice episode with unnecessary sadistic elimination – this is the literally the first cook after they got 2 contestants back into the competition.

Minoli, understandably is like “Dude WTF” – at least give one cook in the competition proper before you get into eliminations.

Jock says there will be no easing back into competition – and that they are going full on sadistic today.

For the guest chef today, he is apparently some stud. Mel says that Jamie Oliver describes his cookbook as a masterpiece (not sure this is necessarily a compliment lol). Okay it’s Josh Niland – big time fish guru.  

Josh is doing a mini masterclass and creating a 3 course meal from a single fish – Murray Cod. He has removed the scales which he will use in a dessert! He is expertly cutting through the fish.

Kishwar says he is an absolute magician – so pretty sure she will use all these cool skills and make a Bengali curry.  

Josh says “This is something you can all achieve” highlighting to the contestants that they are useless. Contestants wholeheartedly agree and are laughing at the idea that they can just see him cut a fish *once* and suddenly become experts at those techniques. 

Tommy also says Josh is like a magician – clearly this line was fed to contestants to avoid “What is your death dish” type faux pas.

For the challenge they have to do something similar - take one Murray cod and create 3 dishes. Thankfully they are not expected to make 3 courses – just any three dishes.

They have 30 mins to cook the first dish – and the top 8 will be safe post that. Then 45 mins for the next dish – the top 4 will be safe. And finally, 60 mins for next dish and the worst dish goes home.  

Pete says this is overwhelming but he seems only as stressed as usual.  

Sabina crowns herself fish queen – but she doesn’t cook with Murray cod – she is doing Thai style street snack.  

Minoli has decided to game the system and is making curry for all 3 rounds. I cannot wait to see the judges faces when they realise how easily this challenge can be gamed.

Brent is doing something Thai style. He is making betel leaf cod tacos – just using the tail end.

Linda is making fish skin chips and a tomato salsa – she seems to going down route of making tomato sauce and adding the words “south east Asian” before it quite a few times in recent cooks. Jock is underwhelmed with the idea of just getting fish skin and a tomato sauce he’s probably already tried.

Tommy is going Vietnamese so we can safety assume that he is safe.

Pete is keeping it simple – he’s cooking the cod on hibachi with hollandaise. Josh says firstly hollandaise is something that is classic, so he has to get it right. And more importantly, it might be too much fat on the dish. 

Jock is now coaching Josh on how to shout – and we can see that Josh can not be a professional shouter.

Dan is doing pan fried cod with braised fennel. Justin is doing chicken wing with fish. Kishwar is making (this should surprise no one) curry and has also (this should surprise no one) started crying.  

Mel shows Josh how to shout and Jock points out that Mel was louder than Josh as if shouting skills is something Josh Niland gives a fuck about.

Fusion Dan apparently doesn’t have time to check which of his fish fillets he can put on for this fish challenge – so he puts one at random. And he’s put them skin side down – so they will be rubbery. This is such a stupid mistake that even Scott, the nicest guy in the kitchen, calls him an idiot.

Tasting – Round 1

Brent’s tacos are very crispy, very tasty. Josh says they are unbelievable. He’s surely safe

Tommy’s dish is expectedly super deliciously. Jock hi-fives him as if there was any doubt about him being safe.

Justin seems to have discovered that he needs to put full dishes to not get screwed in this competition. He has cooked the fish well and the sauce is also nice. So he seems safe.

Dan has cooked the fish well, but the sauce is rubbery. Mel gives too much credit and says “don’t be afraid to leave the skin off if you aren’t happy with it” – clearly not knowing that what happened is much more embarrassing.

Amir’s dish is meh. I’m pretty sure either here to some other upcoming cook, this guy is going home soon.  Mel says work on your sauce and focus on you fish. Surely in the next round.

Kishwar’s curry is delicious but fish is undercooked. So she’s in the next round.

Linda’s sauce itself is not great so surely she’s in the next round. Took simplicity a bit too far with this.

Maja’s sauce is too strong and the fish gets lost. 

Sabina’s dish is the perfect canape – she seems to be safe.

Elise’s fish was standout and well cooked.

Depinder’s Fish Amritsari was predictably delicious and she’s 100% safe.

Pete’s sauce is not great and the fish is borderline undercooked.

Minoli’s fish is basically raw. They all say the sauce and the sambal was excellent and Mel rubs it in and says it would be the top dish for sure if the fish was just cooked.

Going into Round 2, we have Linda, Pete, Kishwar, Amir, Maja, Dan, and Minoli.  

Linda says she has the whole fish to play with, so she has an advantage. I mean it’s a really big fish you really didn’t have to conserve the entire fish for the second round! Now she is doing fried fish with kohlrabi, carrots and a sauce. Josh and Andy say it sounds safe – like who cares at this point. In an elimination you just have to do enough to survive not create some Michelin star dish.  

Minoli is gaming the system and doing the exact same dish. The judges have now realized they’ve been incredibly stupid in not clarifying this before – so now they have no choice but to keep Minoli safe and get her out of this round asap – so they don’t have to go through the embarrassment of having the same dish thrice.

Dan is going Asian – but he’s going to steam the fish which seems like a very complicated, very high risk way to cook fish.  

Amir is making fish fingers. Andy says the minimum expectation from this home cook who is just trying to not be the worst dish today is to make sure that “they are THE BEST fish fingers they’ve EVER HAD”. Sure. That sounds reasonable.

Pete says he’s spooked with round 1 – so now he wants to do something familiar. So well of course he is going super ambitious and is trying to do a tomato bisque in 45 minutes.

Kishwar is doing a steamed fish served with tamarind and coconut sauce.  

Maja is using the loin and serving with nectarine puree and salad on side.  

Dan is happy with the sauce – but for some reason he has decided to add eggplant to the dish. Now he is worrying about the eggplant and it is not as crispy as he wanted it. Sensible thing to do is to just leave it off. 

Linda has now decided to add a crispy tail to her “too simple” dish. Jock is bribing Linda with safety so he gets to eat the crispy tail.  

Justin is giving stupid advice like “use your instinct” to Amir as if this is going to help in the dying minutes of the cook.  

Tasting - Round 2

Pete’s fish is totally raw. This is a true achievement since he had actually done a tester and it had come out well.  Jock has told him to his face that he is 100% in Round 3.  

Linda’s too simple dish is delicious, and she is surely safe.

Maja’s dish is described as “interesting” which could mean its good or terrible. But it seems like Jock liked it.

Kishwar – Andy says huge bold flavours, she’s safe

Amir’s fish is cooked very well but Jock finds the overall dish to be meh. He enjoyed it but didn’t love it. Andy says feels incomplete. Looks like Amir is in Round 3.  

Dan’s fish is very well cooked and his sauce is delicious. But his eggplant is soggy – so that’s ruined the dish. Why put it on the plate – it is a fish challenge! Stupid decision making.

Minoli’s 2^nd take on the Sri Lankan Cod Curry is epic – Mel says just go up to the gantry because we cannot possible eat another version of the same dish – the memes would skewer us.

Now we have Pete, Amir, and Dan in Round 3.  

Pete has only one dish in mind which means it is going to be something super weird and out there – but hopefully he makes it good. He is poaching the fish again and serving with cod stock and mushroom juice.

Dan is going laksa with prawn and fish. Not sure how such a mixed sea-food sou[y dish is going to feature the one specific fish.  

Amir is going back to his roots and making middle eastern fish dumplings, capsicum jam and broth. He says he has never done this with fish – so hope this works for him.

Pete now wants to blanche the skin and then torch it before serving. Andy is totally bamboozled and has no clue what the hell this guy is doing. Jock pleads with him to try it before putting it on the plate.  

Pete says this is a risky dish because he has not tried it before – so much for going with familiar stuff that he knows he can do. Scott is saying this is insane – and this is a huge risk.

Dan is thinking what to do with the fish – he’s stuck. He is now chucking things on the pan to fry the fish. Brent says he should be using the collar since that’s the best piece he has.

Tasting – Round 3

Pete is happy he has ended on this dish that he’s proud of. Andy says the dish is super weird and asks the other judges for validation that he is right about this. No one responds. But it seems like he has pulled this off – Mel is very happy with the dish. Josh also says it’s a knockout.

Dan knows the dish looks very confused but he hopes the flavours will save him. Josh also says he should have used the collar. Andy says the broth is nice – but it wasn’t supposed to be the hero of the dish. Josh says its “just a laksa” and that it is not great but is perfectly fine.

Amir’s lemon sauce is interesting, but it’s not balanced and too acidic. The jam was too sweet. Josh says the dumplings needed more filling, and needed to be more fish forward. So literally every element of his dish is bad.

Results

Pete is surely safe and is asked to join the others. Justin offers a fist bump which Pete ignores completely. 

For some reason, despite getting ALL elements on his dish wrong and not balanced, Amir is safe and Dan is gone because he “left the best cuts of cod in the tray”. This seems like an idiotic reason to eliminate someone.

But by now, we know that these judges seem to have some totally different agenda about who stays in the competition.

This is the second time Amir has survived and another guy has done home on what seemed like a stronger dish.