MasterChef Australia - S13E36 - Crayfish Crayfish everywhere

 The contestants seem to be by the seaside and today’s challenge seems to be all about crayfish.

Andy is already putting pressure on Sabina which means she is bound to mess things up today.

Before they begin, Jock is going to teach everyone how to break down a crayfish. He shows everyone new and disgusting parts of the crayfish they never knew existed. For some reason he finds all these parts beautiful – like lobster tripe – which looks like solidified puke.  

Anyway, they will compete in teams of 2 and have to make 2 dishes. One has to be familiar and one has to be inventive. This could be interesting.

The bottom 2 teams go to elimination tomorrow. ANOTHER elimination? WTF? 

Minoli is excited she’s teamed up with Sabina i.e. the best fish cook here. What could go wrong?  

Amir seems super excited and is running towards the pantry yelling “winning” for some reason.  Amir is making pasta, and tripe salad with the ovaries as vinaigrette. Linda is teamed up with him and is doing a south east Asian salad and using a couple of things from the crayfish there. Seems like a reach for an inventive dish.

Aaron is grilling crayfish and Elise is doing trippa alla romana with the disgusting lobster tripe. Jock comes over and says this is not exactly “lobster tripe” – it’s just something he calls lobster tripe. He openly tells them that this dish will land them in the bottom two so now Elise is rethinking the entire dish. Now she’s using the legs and making gamba alla romana.

Brent is going familiar and cooking cajun crayfish, while Scott is going inventive and making lobster filled choux pastry.  

Sabina is making barbecue crayfish with compound butter while Minoli is working on crayfish doughnuts with an ovary aioli.  

Kishwar unsurprisingly is going for the non-inventive dish and is making a (shock and awe!) a curry.

Thankfully she is teamed with Tommy – who is going super inventive. He is making a bun riu where he will make a patty like a consommé raft. 

Poor Depinder is stuck with Justin so clearly the aim for her today is to simply survive. Justin is making garlic butter crayfish and Depinder is doing a Lobster kathi roll. This is a simple protein substitution – doesn’t seem all that inventive. It’s not like she has to do anything different at all with the rest of the dish.  

Pete is doing creative – he is using the meat from legs and serving with fennel which will be wrapped in blanched onion skin. He wants them to look like onions. This is another insanely weird dish from Pete – so as always its either going to be amazing or utter garbage. Nothing in the middle.

Maja is doing a safe hibachi crayfish with a soy emulsion.  

Tommy’s patties have not worked, so now he is using the raft to make an omelette as a part of his bun riu.

Jock says “don’t want to rock the boat” and announces the time left on the cook. He then ruins this by asking Andy if he understood the joke. #facepalm

Minoli’s aioli is not emulsifying - Andy and Mel are stuffing their faces with the doughnuts – and complaining about the aioli while Minoli and Sabina are trying to fix it.

Mel comes to eat some more and then gives the profoundly valuable input – “That needs work” – while both of them are exclusively working on the aioli. She says that the judges have been sold on the aioli so now they HAVE to make a good one. Because no one has changed dishes in this kitchen ever. They ignore this advice and now their aioli is a dipping sauce.  

Tasting

Maja and Pete: Maja’s cray is beautifully cooked. Pete’s crayfish onion is described by Jock as “Ethereal”. He says its delicious, amazing and very clever cooking. Andy also says the dish is “ethereal” and for some reason Mel takes credit for him knowing the a big word.

Elise and Aaron: Elise is worried they are not hitting the brief. But Aaron’s grilled lobster tail in compound butter is perfectly cooked. And Jock (and less importantly Mel) loves her gamba alla romana. Aaron graciously praises her -and she takes full credit adding that Aaron also did a few things well.

Depinder and Justin: Justin’s crayfish is perfectly cooked. Depinder’s kathi roll is super delicious and Jock says it needs to come to Australia.  

Brent and Scott: Both their dishes are great and don’t get much coverage.

Amir and Linda: Ami’s butter poached crayfish and linguine is perfectly cooked, but Jock says felt like 2 dishes and the linguine was not required. Mel also thinks the sauce was thin and insipid – should have just focused on the crayfish. Linda’s salad doesn’t have enough lobster flavour, Jock agrees and says they should have used the whole crayfish.  

Sabina and Minoli: Sabina’s Barbecued Cray in compound butter is nice with beautiful flavours but Andy says his piece was slightly overcooked. Jock and Mel got good pieces, and Jock says its probably an uneven coals issue.

Minoli’s dipping sauce has split and she has successfully dragged Sabina down. Jock says it was conceptually great but the dipping sauce was terrible.

Tommy and Kishwar: Super nice guy Tommy is worried about pushing Kishwar into elimination. Her Crayfish malai curry is beautiful and the lobster is well cooked. Tommy’s bun riu is really good as usual.

The results are quite clear – only 2 bad dishes today. Amir, Linda , Sabina and Minoli are in the elimination tomorrow.