In one of the most emotional farewells this season, it was elbow bumps all round for a devastated Jess Liemantara as she left the MasterChef kitchen.
Tonight’s elimination challenge was all about weird and wonderful flavour combinations, with an ice cream challenge first up. The contestants had 75 minutes to create a dish comprised of two scoops of unusual flavours.
Holding immunity, Reynold and Emelia watched on from the gantry.
For Khanh, his vanilla cardamom ice cream paired with smoked rhubarb ice cream saw the judges blown away leaving him safe from round two.
However, for Brendan, Jess, Callum, Simon and Poh, their dishes failed to impress seeing them head to the second round.
Waiting for them were five cloches with five unusual flavour pairings: lamb and coffee, basil and peanut butter, dark chocolate and soy, mustard and mint, carrot and raspberry. With full use of the pantry and garden, the contestants had to make sure the flavour pair they chose was front and centre in the dish.
The judges were most impressed with Poh’s Tortelli Di Zucca using mint and mustard flavours and Callum’s roasted cauliflower with a dhal mustard and a mint and ginger salsa.
Simon found himself in the bottom two alongside Jess with his chosen pairing of coffee and lamb. Choosing to make hibachi lamb with a coffee jus and a coffee biscuit, Jock baulked at the idea of a biscuit on a savoury dish seeing Simon swiftly drop the idea for an unusual coffee crumb.
Jess pulled out all the stops with a mulled wine raspberry sorbet, a chocolate cremeax, cumquat orange jam and carrot jelly. But with 5-6 different elements to complete, it was a lot to get done in sixty minutes.
The judges felt Simon’s lamb was so overpowered with coffee but cooked perfectly, while Jess’s mulled wine raspberry sorbet with carrot jelly did not hero the carrot and raspberry enough.
After final deliberations, Jess’s dish was deemed least impressive and she was eliminated from the competition.
