Episode 3 MasterChef

It's the first MasterChef quarterfinal

and this week's best amateurs are back.

I've caught the bug. This is highly infectious.

I really want to progress to the semifinals.

I'm not coping with the pressure very well at all.

It's not getting easier.

Yeah, the stakes are high, but let's see what happens.

Tonight they will face just one challenge -

to cook an exceptional dish

from a brief set by renowned restaurant critic Tracey MacLeod.

Our cooks today are really talented.

We haven't had a disaster amongst them.

I need some spoons, quickly, please! Two spoons, please!

They've got to keep focused. They've got to keep on fighting.

They can't rest on their laurels.

Quarterfinal day means we bring in a critic.

Tracey MacLeod has given you a task

to make one exceptional dish centred on one ingredient.

That ingredient is cheese.

At the end of this, we will take the best cooks with us.

No numbers.

Just the best cooks.

Ladies and gentlemen, 90 minutes.

Let's cook.

I think the challenge for the contestants today

will be elevating something that they cook every day at home with

into something a bit special, a bit spectacular.

It's kind of my desert island food and you can do anything with it.

You can melt it, you can bake with it,

you can whip it into a souffle or a mousse.

We all cook with it at home and yet I don't think

I've ever been served it as a main ingredient on MasterChef.

What's wrong with cheese? I want to see some cheese.

Natasha we know cooks great sweet food.

She puts a smile on your face, doesn't she, Mr Pudding Man?

I'll be really impressed today

if Natasha can turn a cheese round into a cheesy dessert round.

I'm really nervous about cooking for Tracey MacLeod.

It would mean so much if she likes my food. I might cry.

I probably will cry.

I hope I don't cry.

How do you feel about working with cheese?

I like cheese, so cheese is good.

I'm looking down at what you've got.

-Are you going to turn cheese into something sweet?

-Yeah.

I thought you might. What are you making?

I'm making deep-fried ricotta balls with orange syrup,

-honey and mascarpone ice cream.

-Wow!

-Yeah.

-I think you're terribly brave,

but you and I have got a sweet tooth,

-so I wish you the best of luck.

-Thank you very much.

Natasha has got to make sure that ice cream is set and,

as long as those ricotta balls are light like a beignet

or like a little doughnut, it could be a lovely, lovely thing.

I've got no room to work.

Too many ingredients.

Chris has definitely got imagination and he has a certain style.

I think the guy could be surprising.

I don't cook with a lot of cheese.

I love cheese but it's going to be challenging.

How cheesy do you make it, you know? As cheesy as one of Gregg's jokes?

I took some cheese from an angry Welshman once.

-Do you know how I did it?

-No, go on.

-Caerphilly.

Oh, that's a good one. I didn't have that one on my list.

So I'm doing a bit of a cheese overload. It might be too much.

We'll see.

Chris, how many cheeses are you cooking with?

A variety of cheeses. I mean, I love cheese.

Ideally I'd have plated a cheese board

and wandered around for 85 minutes sabotaging everybody else.

But unfortunately I don't think that would have got me

through to the next round so I'm just doing a take on a cheese board.

I'm making a ciabatta with a blue cheese butter,

mozzarella croquettes, pecorino spinach frittata

and I am doing some home-made nettle ricotta.

I want the cheese to be the star but I want everything around it

to lift the cheese and make the cheese even better.

Right now, how much do you want the bloke in front of you

-with the bald head and glasses to go away?

-More than anything.

No offence!

Chris is doing a huge amount of work

and I just hope for his sake he gets it all done.

He's got frittata, he's got biscuits,

he's got bread, he's got butter.

I mean, it is just this huge cacophony of stuff.

I just hope it works.

You've had 20 minutes. 20 minutes.

Cae is putting things together which are unusual but they work.

The guy likes to take a risk and I like a risky cook in MasterChef.

Did you expect to be here, Cae, MasterChef quarterfinal?

I'm pleased to be here more than anything else.

I'm doing something that I love, cooking.

What about cooking for Tracey MacLeod?

Look, there was elements on each of the plates that I produced

in the last round that had mistakes.

Today, I will not let a single mistake go onto the plate.

Fantastic. What's your dish?

Gorgonzola ice cream with a modern and a classic tarte tatin,

apple tarte tatin

with salted caramel sauce and whipped hazelnut cream.

We've had some Gorgonzola ice cream on MasterChef before.

-I'm scared to tell you how it turned out.

-OK.

Well, hopefully this will excite things and turn you round.

What I can't get my head around is the presentation of the dish.

We've got a round disc of classic tarte tatin and then we've got

this deconstructed apple thing going on, plus Gorgonzola ice cream.

Where's it all going? How's it all coming together?

In my mind I know how this dish is going to look

and if it's anything less, I'll be unhappy.

So, like an artist, I've just got to paint that dish on a plate.

Mike has got technical ability. He's got know-how.

He's also got very good presentation skills.

The boy can cook.

We love cheese at home.

My wife is the kind of girl that sacrifices chocolate for cheese.

She's a cheese-and-crisp kind of girl, you know.

There's so much you can do with cheese, I think.

It's a big thing to deal with

and it opens up a world of possibilities, cheese.

Now, if I know you, you've probably got a lot to do

and you're calling it simple.

It's not too bad today, actually.

There's only four or five elements in the dish.

I'm making goat's cheese ravioli with a Spanish romesco sauce

and then doing a walnut, black olive honey crumb.

I'm still an amateur.

It's a case of getting the combinations right in the dish

-I'm going to do and make sure the flavours sing.

-Go on, son!

Mike thinks that he's paring his dish back and he's not putting

so many things on one plate.

Wow!

I just hope that goat's cheese survives amongst the strong flavours

of smoked peppers, paprika, honey and black olives.

It's an interesting combination.

I hope it's not odd.

You got half an hour left.

And you know what cheese you use to disguise a horse, don't you?

Mask-a-pony!

-Are you wanting this to burn, Cae?

-No, it was a mistake.

-Huh?

-Yeah, I caught it too late.

-Too late.

-I caught it too late.

I just took my eyes off it.

I was too concentrating on the Gorgonzola ice cream.

It just caught and burnt. I'll just have to start again.

Julie cooks for her family and Julie really does understand flavours.

However, her portions are huge and her food is untidy.

It's a strange situation, actually, cooking for a critic

because they've actually criticised Michelin-starred restaurant owners,

and so forth, so you just think,

"Oh, I wonder where I'm going to fit in the scale here?"

-What are you making?

-I'm doing a twist on a ploughman's lunch.

A quiche with strong cheddar cheese and ham

and then I'm serving it with an onion chutney.

Then I'm doing a salad of puy lentils, walnuts,

apple and Stilton cheese on top of that.

-Will you be able to make it look pretty?

-Yes, I've been practising.

-How much quiche has your husband had to eat over the last few days?

-Lots.

Lots.

And cheese, and our house is still full of cheese,

so even after this competition, we'll still be eating cheese.

Julie's inspiration is that of a ploughman's lunch, traditionally

a board of pickled onions and cheese served in a pub with a pint.

But it's quiche and lentils.

How is she going to make a quiche and lentils look sexy?

The tart looks prettier than the last one you made, doesn't it?

-I took your advice and used a rolling pin.

-There you go, see.

You proved a point, yes.

I'm never too old to learn.

Katie's food really stood out for you and I.

I'm very interested to see

whether she can build on her good start because she's very good.

Getting through to this stage, yeah, I'd say I have got a bit more

confidence but you just can't help question yourself

constantly and you think, was it luck? Was it a fluke?

Is the next one going to be as good?

You're always asking is it good enough?

Katie, I've never seen anything like that before. What on earth is that?

This is pasta with a porcini powdered through it.

Fabulous.

-Fabulous!

-A really deep earthy feeling.

-What are you making?

I am making Stilton tortellini with a pesto and a red wine sauce

and some little cheese cranberry bites to add a bit of texture.

You've got tortellini with two sauces and deep-fried cheese balls?

-Yes.

-Does that work, Katie?

-They do. Yes.

You'll see.

Mushrooms and blue cheese together is a strong, strong flavour,

especially porcini mushrooms cos it's smoky and woody and earthy.

Coming together, I hope they survive each other.

Ten minutes left.

CRASH

Drop as much as you want. Just do it within ten minutes(!)

-How long is that going to take to cook?

-Ten minutes.

-Ten minutes?

I think Cae's in trouble.

What a mess!

He's burnt two lots of sugar. He's burnt some sliced apples.

He's struggling away.

Told you he's in trouble.

Come on, heat up!

-Hey, those edges look a lot better than your lemon tart.

-I know.

Thank you.

This sauce is just to warm back through, now it's been passed.

Ravioli to go in in a couple of minutes.

A bit frantic, but nearly there.

I'm on time, so I'm fairly happy, believe it or not.

Five minutes, guys. Five minutes.

Stuff should be getting on plates.

No!

I need some spoons, quickly, please! Two spoons, please!

60 seconds left.

Final 45 seconds.

OK, stop. Stop.

-How did you do, bud?

-Bad.

-It should be fine. Don't worry.

-No, no, no, no, no.

-Time?

Everything just messed up.

I don't know where that hour-and-a-half went.

Ladies and gentlemen...

can I introduce you to Tracey MacLeod.

Hello.

Cae, up you come, please, sir.

University professor Cae has served two tarte tatins.

One classic and one deconstructed,

alongside a Gorgonzola ice cream,

whipped hazelnut cream

and a salted caramel sauce.

You had a bit of a mare, didn't you, Cae?

It's a million miles away from what I wanted to present.

I set myself too much to do, and it concertinaed, and ran out of time.

My brief was cheese,

and there isn't a huge amount of cheesiness about anything there.

The ice cream, to me, it worked.

You know, if you didn't know it had cheese in it,

you might just think it's a really strong clotted cream.

But I think it was probably a mistake to serve the very

undercooked tarte tatin.

You know that lots of things have gone wrong here, Cae, and I'm sorry for you.

What I do like are those sliced apples inside the sticky toffee sauce,

really sort of stick to your teeth.

As for the rest of it, sorry, it hasn't worked for you.

I've never enjoyed Gorgonzola ice cream until now. I like yours.

However, it is impossible to ignore the mistakes,

but that's going to come if you run out of time.

Oh, terrible. That was disastrous.

So many things went wrong.

Juggling too many plates and they came crashing down towards the end,

resulting in me running around like a lunatic.

Julie, your turn, please.

Ward sister Julie's take on a ploughman's includes

cheddar and ham quiche baked in a Parmesan and chive crust,

accompanied by a puy lentil, walnut, Stilton and apple salad,

with caramelised onion chutney, cherry tomatoes

and half a pint of bitter.

I like the look of the tart a lot.

But I'm never really sure about eating off a board, to be honest.

But I can appreciate you've done it to make it look a bit more special.

Well done with your quiche, it's a really nice little quiche.

Lovely flavour in the... With the ham and the chives coming through,

and I like your take on...

-It's kind of like a lentilly Waldorf salad, isn't it?

-Yes.

It's a really lovely, kind of pub lunch.

That is absolutely delicious.

In my opinion, you are so getting there,

and your food remains, as it started, delicious.

Pastry made with cheese, cheese filling inside the quiche,

a salad with cheese.

You've really taken bits and pieces and thought about it.

I'd eat the whole lot. And I'd probably order a proper beer,

rather than that brown, warm stuff.

I-I'm gobsmacked, absolutely gobsmacked.

And I wanted something that was just going to say, "Cheese, I'm here."

And it certainly has, it's whacked them

in the face with the taste of cheese, it's whacked them with the taste of Parmesan,

with the cheddar and the Stilton. And that was the brief,

cheese, and I've given them cheese.

Mike, up you come, please.

Avionics engineer Mike has made ravioli with goat's cheese

and spinach, with a romesco red pepper sauce,

basil oil and a walnut, black olive crumb.

That's a very pretty dish.

The main star of the show is that goat's cheese.

It's a very sour, salty flavour that you've got from the olive

and from the cheese.

Mix in a bit of the romesco sauce, which is lovely,

and that grassy basil oil, and it all makes sense.

-GREGG:

-I agree with Tracey, but when I ran out of sauce,

all I had was the tangy goat's cheese.

But I think that combination of the sweetness in your romesco

and that goat's cheese is lovely.

What's really nice, though, Mike, is you've got a plate of food that people want to eat.

-Thank you very much.

-And it's got flavour.

-That means a lot.

It's good. More romesco, mate.

There was some minor problems, I think, but overall,

I think that's the best comments I've had. So, yeah, super chuffed.

Katie, up you come, please.

Debt adviser Katie's porcini tortellini have been stuffed

with ricotta, Stilton and mascarpone,

and served on a bed of rocket, with deep-fried Stilton

and cranberry bites, a walnut pesto and a red wine sauce.

-What do you think?

-I think it's not a bowl of pasta as I know it.

It looks a little strange.

Well done on those pasta parcels.

I think it probably was an either-or with them

and the little fried cheese things that you've done,

but overall, some lovely flavours,

and I like the way you've approached the task with a bit of originality.

-Thank you.

-I feel there's just too much going on on the plate.

And the overriding thing for me is it's all too salty.

Because you've got the salty blue cheese,

and then really quite salty pesto,

and I feel like I've been kicked around the head with salt and cheese.

I'm very different to John on this one.

Those tortellini, which has got blue cheese in it,

so there's so much salt, but

when you put it into that red sweet sauce, I find it a beautiful thing.

So I love your flavours, I really do.

Your presentation, I think you've messed it up. You've messed it up.

Not massively pleased with the comments. A mixed reception, so...

But, yeah, relieved to have got it out.

Chris, up you come, please.

Altitude trainer Chris's cheese board includes nettle ricotta,

a spinach and pecorino frittata,

mozzarella croquettes with a red pepper sauce,

figs stuffed with goat's cheese, ciabatta with blue cheese butter,

black pepper crackers and a red onion chutney.

I admire the work, I really do.

However, it hasn't resulted in anything spectacular.

The croquettes need seasoning, the frittata needs seasoning.

Your ricotta, the nettles, I think, need seasoning.

My favourite thing on that board is the bread

and the blue cheese butter, I think that's lovely.

I'm going to nick that idea, I think it's a great idea.

-TRACEY:

-Obviously you've got loads of skills,

but I think I would have liked to have tried something that

showed me a bit more about how you combined flavours.

This feels like an audition piece, rather than a performance.

I knew that I was never going to smash all the elements,

because, just in the time constraint, so, we'll see.

Natasha, could you bring your cheesy dish up, please?

Deputy publishing director Natasha's sweet take on the brief

includes ricotta fritters and mascarpone ice cream with honeycomb,

whipped goat's cheese and mascarpone and an orange syrup.

I like the idea and the concept.

I was hoping for more from the presentation.

The orange here with honeycomb

and a little bit of mascarpone is a delight.

Cheese and orange is not a combination I would even go near,

even dream of going anywhere near, yet you make it delicious.

-TRACEY:

-I love those little ricotta balls.

Like little doughnuts, kissed by orange

and dragged through that syrup, absolutely sublime.

I'm not a big fan of orange, and as Gregg says, "What, orange

"and cheese together? Really?" It works, fantastically.

We've now eaten it and all gone, "Oooh!"

When it first turned up, all three of us had a collective, "Uh."

And you've got to get rid of that "uh". And emphasise the "oooh!"

-What have you got to do?

-Emphasise the "oooh!"

-And get rid of the...?

-"Uh".

-OK, good.

THEY LAUGH

Really, really happy. Felt myself getting a bit emotional.

-CHRIS:

-Good on you, girl.

-MIKE:

-High-five.

What a quarterfinal.

Your bit is now over, the tough bit for us is just about to start.

Thank you very much indeed.

I thought that was a brilliant, brilliant challenge.

Well, good luck with choosing who goes through. Thanks, bye.

Thanks, Tracey.

I don't think I've ever eaten so much cheese. I really don't.

Some of our contestants, obviously, were more successful than others.

Natasha gave us a dessert, and we all criticised

the way in which it was presented, but all three of us

were united in one thing, and that was that it tasted great.

-Mike made us ravioli.

-That dish had style, good flavour combination.

However, I wasn't happy that we ran out of sauce.

It's now a point where I think, well, hang about, I'm not too bad

-at this, I can actually cook...ish.

-HE LAUGHS

So, if it carries on, then brilliant, yeah, I mean, I'd love it.

Katie divided the crowd today.

You and I didn't agree over the flavour combinations.

However, we both agreed that the dish was not right,

it didn't look right.

I'm desperate to go through to the next round, it would just be brilliant.

Especially because I don't feel that that was perfect.

I want to go to the next round so I can show them something awesome.

Cae fell down today. I mean, that big,

big timing issue resulted in a bit of a car crash on a plate.

I really want to progress.

Having a day like today has just knocked me for six.

Julie did a good job. She met the cheese brief, absolutely.

-Her food tastes amazing.

-Chris made us a board full of cheesy bits.

And all of them OK.

But nothing spectacular.

You've got to hope there's enough positives to get

you through, and they've seen enough in me over the previous rounds

as well to go, "You know what, this boy can cook.

"Let's give him another chance."

So, what are we going to do?

Who's got the potential?

Who's got the talent?

Gregg and I have decided that three of you are going through

to knockout week.

The first person through...

..is Julie.

The second person through to knockout week...

..is Natasha.

The third person going through...

..is Mike.

-CHRIS:

-Congratulations.

-MIKE:

-Thank you very much.

Katie, Chris and Cae, so very sorry, thank you very much indeed.

Thank you.

Majorly deflated. Kicking myself.

I've got nobody else to blame but myself.

A bit of a letdown to go at this stage, but, you know, that's...

I'm sure I'll look back at this and think, "Wow."

I'm going to have a couple of weeks off cheese.

Absolutely guarantee that, I'm sick of cheese.

HE LAUGHS

'Baffled, if I'm honest.'

Yeah, a little bit sort of shellshocked, but, yeah, amazing.

Brilliant.

'I think it is going to take a few days to sink in'

and then more hard work.

SHE LAUGHS

This has just been dipping my toe in the water.

Now I'm actually going to run, take a jump and make a big splash,

I hope.

Julie, Mike and Natasha will be back for knockout week.

Next week, ten new contestants battle it out to join them.

-Cheers.

-Cheers, ladies.

-Get it on a plate now.

-It's not working.

It is working. I'm panicking.

It's got all the Friday fun bits on the plate.

That smells so good.