Favourite Mindy Woods has a passion for connecting people through food that is undeniable, but a chaotic chocolatey challenge saw her MasterChef Australia: Fans & Favourites experience come to an end.
In Tuesday night’s episode, it was a feared pressure test in the MasterChef kitchen, and following their mystery box performance yesterday Julie, Billie and Mindy arrived for what might be their final cook.
Melissa revealed that the pressure test would be set by one of Australia’s most celebrated pastry chefs and chocolatiers, Kirsten Tibballs. Kirsten presented her “Cherry On Top” dessert, which consisted of multiple impressive layers and was finished off with a beautiful black chocolate velvet spray.
Jock announced that Julie, Billy and Mindy would have three hours and 15 minutes to recreate Kirsten’s dish, and as the clock started they raced to their benches to begin reading through the lengthy recipe.
Billie was first to present her cake and she knew it had minor flaws, but when the judges and Kirsten sliced through they were all impressed with the wonderful layers. Jock said it was fairly close to the original, and none of the layers were too thick with each reflecting clear and discernible flavours. Andy said the mousse was light and airy, and the texture of the jelly was great.
Mindy was next and she was proud of her final dish. Kirsten said she could see that in pushing too hard on her layers it had affected the jelly and layers throughout. The pain de genes was overly thick, and the cherry gel was firm and grainy, which left Kirsten wondering if it had undissolved sugar.
Julie was last to the tasting room and she was disappointed not to be presenting a perfect replica of Kirsten’s dessert. The judges said that visually it was the roughest of the day, but the velvet spray was the best of the day, and when they cut it open it looked so much better on the inside than it did on the outside. Kirsten said the flavours couldn’t be faulted.
As Jock delivered the verdict, he said that three remarkable women and three superb cooks stood in front of the judges. While Mindy’s cake looked brilliant, inside there were too many issues to ignore, and she was announced as the eighteenth contestant eliminated from the MasterChef kitchen.
