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MasterChef Australia - S13E51 - Uluru Team Challenge

 Today the contestants are heading to the Northern Territory – they are literally at Uluru today. Truly spectacular setting.

Today is a service challenge – 2 teams have to cook a 3 course fine dining meal for 50 diners.

There is a lot of local produce in the pantry today – and naturally they are expected to go Full “Aussie Pride” with this one.

They continue the random colours for the teams – today they are orange and yellow.

Pete Depinder Tommy Kishwar are in the Orange team; and Justin Linda Sabina and Elise are in the Yellow team.

Justin has decided to captain the yellow team and wants all dishes to look simple but be complex and fine dining. They are starting with a beetroot dish by Linda (with a beetroot broth), their main is a pepper crusted Australian Steak with Onion Rings and their dessert is a native ingredient inspired tiramisu which Elise is working on.

Justin is doing nothing and is concentrating all his energies on trolling and trash talking Pete – who is the captain of the other team.

Pete is too classy to trash talk (for now at least). The Orange team is making a sweet potato and carrot banksia (which Kishwar is working on), Tommy is on the main – making a Kangaroo dish with an emu consommé (inspired by the Australian coat of arms) and Depinder is making a native ingredient panna cotta.

Linda explains that she has chosen beetroot because the colour resembles Uluru – surely there were other better red things to make than beetroot!

The judges (mostly Jock) are concerned about the onion ring. Says its pub food, not fine dining. So now Sabina is making an oniony gel with a local vinegar to fine dining it up.

Over at the other team, Jock suggests they blitz the emu for the consommé.  Depinder knows that panna cotta is super risky if it doesn’t set – so she has put titanium gelatin to ensure her panna cotta works. This seems risky – why not just make a less risky dessert?  

The teams are mostly done with their entrees and are setting up the pass. Jock times the Orange team’s super elaborate entrée and finds that they are taking 2 mins per plate. Which means they will just be serving entrée for the next 2 hours. So they need to get their act together.  You’d think they would have figured this shit out 50 episodes in.

Entrée tasting:

Yellow team – Andy is worried about the dish having just the 2 elements, but the beetroot is absolutely perfect. Not just that the broth is actually very complex.

Orange team – Jock says that was a delicious plate of food. Mel says its neck and neck. Jock is glad they didn’t compromise on the dish after he told them to get their shit together. Nothing to separate the two so far.

Back in the kitchens for the mains prep. Sabina has taken over in terms of giving instructions. She is focusing on the meat as some of the beef still hasn’t cooked in the centre.  Sabina knows the meat is inconsistent but she is sure the flavours are there

 

Tommy has never cooked kangaroo before – that’s a big pressure point. So he is super super stressed about this kangaroo.

Mains Tasting

Yellow Team – Jock says the sauce was fantastic, the crust was nice because of lots of types of pepper; but the dish lacked care and finesse. On top of that, Mel’s steak was a bit under.   

Orange Team -  Jock says visually stunning, broth was super fragrant and aromatic. Jock says cook on the kangaroo was perfect for him. Andy says this is all finesse.

Back in the kitchen now, Pete and Justin are trolling each other and confidentally telling the other that they are losing. Elise’s jam is super thick and now everyone in the team is trying to get the jam through a sieve. Elise doesn’t think the dessert looks fine dining – but the flavours might be there. Depinder’s panna cottas are set, so she is relieved.  

Dessert tasting

Yellow Team – Jock says the dish was super delicious and has a lot of positives. Jock says it was not heavy, it was rich. Mel is also super impressed.  Andy also says the dish knocked him for six.

Orange Team -  The Panna cotta is too set. Depinder has put way too much gelatin in there, and other than the visual look of the dish, it is terrible. Nothing good about it.

The Orange team duly loses this challenge - sadly because of Depinder’s dessert.  She is super guilty about this – and I worry for tomorrow’s elimination.

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