We start with a recap of the season. Jock says they started with home cooks but now they have evolved into cooks who use complex techniques and make world class food. So clearly this doesn’t apply to Kishwar who can make the most basic food in a finale and still get a perfect 30.
Now they are recapping some of their biggest mistakes – like
eliminating Depinder, Tommy etc.
This third round is a pressure test – Kishwar gets in a cry for
good luck before the chef even walks in.
Today the pressure test will be set by Aussie food legend
(and incidentally the person who set the first ever Finale pressure test) Peter
Gilmour. He enters with a genial smile on his face carrying TWO cloches.
They have to make both dishes simultaneously. There is a
savoury and a sweet dish – this is a legit big, finale worthy challenge.
The savoury dish is shaved squid with koji butter emulsion,
chawanmushi custard and a lot of small delicate garnishes. The dessert is
called golden crackle which looks amazing. It has potato starch golden dome,
with individually coated rice crisps and a a further 6 years below that.
Peter says the hardest part of this is to keep shuttling
between sweet and savoury. They have 5 hours to cook and another 25 minutes to finish
and plate up. Mel announces that they will score the 2 dishes separately – so there
are 80 points up for grabs! This is insane. This one pressure test is worth
more than both previous rounds put together.
I generally don’t like such rounds, since you screw up once,
and it hits you twice. The same issue happened with the first round in Season 10
– where Ben had a bad first cook which meant he fell 16 points behind since
there were 60 points up for grabs. It made the second round utterly meaningless.
Similarly it hardly matters what they’ve done in the first 2 rounds, with 80
points up for grabs, things could swing wildly here.
Everyone is on their way. Pete says his strategy is to work
hard and work at a steady pace. Kishwar has already made a mistake and melted
down the wrong type of chocolate for the mousse. Luckily she hadn’t mixed
anything yet – so she can save it.
Justin has decided to go blindly follow the recipe to the T
even though he doesn’t understand why he has to use anything. Solid strategy –
this is what wins you pressure tests.
Pete has made a mistake on his mousse and he can’t
figure out what he did wrong. (He has
not mixed his chocolate with the egg yolks before putting in the cream).
After a few excruciating minutes, he has finally figured it
out. Justin and Pete are encouraging each other – which is really wholesome to
watch.
Justin is going well and is in good humour. Andy for once is
giving good advice to not get complacent as he will need time up his sleeve if
something goes wrong.
Now Peter Gilmour is roaming around and checking on people’s
mousse – he is quite happy with Justin and Kishwar’s mousse.
Side note: Is anyone else finding it super weird that Justin’s
dad is calling him mate?
Kishwar can see Justin has moved ahead – but she seems to be
going well and has got her cake in the oven.
Pete seems to be the slowest so far. Jock is coaching Pete
who has just got his mousse done. He has also done his caramel. He is done with
his cake as well – it is in the oven.
Justin has gone ahead and removed his membrane for the first
of his three squid. So has Kishwar. Pete is on to cleaning his squid now. He
has done this super quickly. He is making up time here like anything.
Justin is taking very long with the squid. He can see that Pete has caught up. He is
struggling to get the membrane off without damaging the squid. He’s got one
done - but other two are taking forever.
Pete has already sliced his squid – he is in the lead now.
Justin has got it now (with some coaching from Pete Gilmour
and some encouragement from his dad on the gantry). He’s gotten both membranes off.
Kishwar is still struggling – she is using only 2 pieces of squid and not 3.
She gets the 80 grams of squid she needs – not sure why the recipe asked to
make 3 in that case?!
Pete is done with his prune jam. Now he is on to his
ganache. Justin is weighing everything – very organized. Pete and Justin are
neck and neck. But Pete’s done only one mould
at a time instead of 3 as per the recipe. So he is going to do just the one and
hope it works. Super risky move.
Kishwar is well behind (as expected) and has now used single
cream instead of double cream in her caramel -
which Peter Gilmour asks her about after very stealthily watching her
make the mistake. She doesn’t have any more caramel. She is now mixing whatever
is in her tray with double cream – so it will be a bit diluted.
90 minutes to go now.
Pete is done with his aioli. Now Justin is on to his
fermented shitake custard – as is Pete. Justin and Pete have both have got
their custard into the steamer. Now they are on to their potato starch dome.
Pete only has one good circle to use for the golden
dome - he is blowtorching it now. It
looks very nice –Andy comes over for a hug for some reflected glory. And then
wraps it up with gold leaf.
Jock feels left out and goes and hugs Justin when he gets
done with his dome.
Mel is waiting to hug Kishwar – but this doesn’t make the
episode.
Now they are on 40 mins left – and Peter Gilmour says there
is no way they’ll make all the rice puffs. So he says do the caramel one and then
try to make 2 more. But Justin is going for all 4 as he has the time and is
pushing himself to get it done.
Pete didn’t add his chocolate one teaspoon at a time – his
crisps look a bit lumpy. So now he has to do this again. Very costly mistake at
this stage. Pete has done 2 of his rice crisps – and his custard seems to be
wobbly.
Pete is overwhelmed – but Andy has come and told him with 4
minutes to go that he should try to get one more chocolate rice crisp done as
the others have done more. Pete is now going fully by instinct and trying to
get one more done in this insane timeframe. Somehow he has got his crisps done.
Andy is shocked and amazed to find that Justin got
everything done including all 4 rice crisps. He is in with a genuine chance
since he is the only one who has got every single element on the plate.
Mel’s screwing over of Pete on the allegedly undercooked
quail which was magically perfect for the other two – might end up being the
deciding factor.
Plating and tasting
Kishwar:
Her dessert has turned out okay. As she is making her koji
butter – but the butter splits. She is hoping it re-emulsifies when the whole
dish comes together.
She gets in one last cry for good measure before the judges
taste.
Peter says all the flavours are there in the savoury dish.
Cook on the noodles was perfect. The koji butter was split but they are
claiming it has re-emulsified and there was no flavour difference. Jock says it
reemulsified to a point and there is a flavour difference.
On the dessert, Andy says it was very solid effort. Mel says
the mousse was done right. Peter Gilmour says her caramel was diluted. Jock
says she’s in with a chance for some reason despite both dishes having flaws.
Pete:
He has only one mousse dome – no back ups. Thankfully it comes
out of the mould quite well – he has got his rice crsips on. As he gets his
golden dome out, he has dropped it – but it somehow doesn’t break. He has successfully
given everyone an heart attack. Now he has got on to the koji butter sauce. He
is using the steamer basket to try to fix his custard. One of his custards has
set! 2 mins to go and he is assembling everything.
The judges are stressed more than Pete - Jock can’t look and
neither can Peter. Somehow Pete seems to have gotten out everything and
finished his dishes.
On the savoury dish, Jock says that was 95% of the way to
Peters. Noodles cooked perfectly. The custard was maybe 10 seconds overcooked.
Peter says the sauce was properly emulsified and the squid was spot on – Mel
says the two dishes were nearly indistinguishable.
On the dessert - the golden dome cracks nicely. The overall
dome looks a bit soft but Peter is super impressed – he says all the components
were pretty close and done right. He may have rushed the layering a bit, but
the flavours are all there. Even the crackle (including his 4 minuute rice crisp)
is perfect. Again the judges say the flavour profile was very, very close to
Peters.
Justin:
He has got through his dessert nicely. He has done his
squid. He seems to be done nicely in time.
He is ignoring all the judges who are telling him to move faster – just going
at his steady pace. He is done well in time.
He is in the strongest position to win this – 3 points is
nothing to make up in an 80 point challenge. Billie beat Georgia in Season 7 by
making up a 4 point deficit in a 40
point challenge. Justin has done all elements, and he was the most
comfortable of the lot throughout the cook.
Peter says the savoury dish looks perfect from a
presentation point of view. Peter says if he had to describe it in one word he would
say “Perfect”. Every element is right, the flavour intensity and the balance is
perfect.
On the dessert everyone commends him for doing all the 4 rice
crisps. The layers look pretty good as well. The flavours and textures of everything
is fantastic. Peter says the balance was incredibly enjoyable – all the
textures were perfect. All the rice crisps being there made a big difference to
the mouth feel. Jock says the cake at the bottom is slightly undercooked so
that is one flaw that suddenly makes his home run a bit wobbly for Justin.
Results
A lot of the past winners and some marquee contestants are here - can see Emilia, Laura, Emma, Julia, Larissa
, Diana, Brent.
Savoury dish:
Kishwar gets 8 from all judges for a total of 32. That puts
her at 83 points.
Pete gets 9 from all judges for a total of 36. That puts him
at 89 points.
Justin gets a perfect 10 from all four judges – so that
takes him up to 90. One point lead over Pete.
Dessert
Kishwar gets 8 from Andy, Jock and Mel and 7 from Peter.
That takes her total up to 114.
Pete gets 9 from all judges except for Mel (who seems to be
determined to see him lose) – and ends with a total of 124.
Justin gets 8 from Jock and 9 from the others and ends up
with a total of 125 points.
Justin wins!
It did come down to the allegedly under quail – and Mel
favouring Justin over Pete. Sad to see Pete lose after deserving to win through
the season.
That said, I am not surprised that they went for the better
story than the better cook – Justin’s trajectory was sharper and they kept
saying how he has improved so much and how he is the underdog here. Also can’t
blame these judges much either – Matt, Gary and George have also been guilty of
going for story over substance on at least 2 occasions before - in S8 (Diana
over Ben) and S11 (Larissa over Tessa).
All said and done, happy for Justin. In fairness, he did
pull through and did perform the best on the pressure test. And he was also
screwed over by the judges in the first round – so it’s good to see him come
back from that.
Also, given that after Pete and Depinder – my third
favourite contestant i.e. Anyone-But-Kishwar won, I’m quite satisfied with the
result.
So that’s the end of this season, and also of this blog.
To my loyal, regular readers, I’d like to thank both of you
for your continued support. See you next year.
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