Wales Dessert Great British Menu

Three of Wales's elite chefs are waging war to cook at a show-stopping Olympic feast.

In yesterday's main course, former champion Stephen Terry raised the stakes with an ambitious dish.

-Time-wise, how are you looking?

-I haven't got a clue.

-I suggest maybe you do.

-But he pulled it off.

-Are you on time?

-I believe I am, Angela.

-Winning him a stonking nine!

Now he's a point ahead of his old rival James Sommerin

with Richard Davies half a point behind James in third.

-A point and a half in it.

-Very close.

Tonight, it's desserts and with Stephen sticking to classics...

-Nearly everybody has had lemon meringue pie and trifle.

-Not my lemon meringue pie and my trifle.

..can James or Richard destroy his fragile lead?

-There's nothing safe about this.

-Come on, Willy Wonka!

-Whoever fails today will be going home.

-I'm just a bit nervous at the moment.

With the scores so close, there's no room for error.

I want to get them perfect. I've done so much work for the competition.

It would be a real kick in the teeth not to be here tomorrow.

This year's chefs are aspiring to Olympian heights

as they strive to cook ground-breaking dishes, worthy of our sporting heroes.

The key is to give it everything, the same in the kitchen.

Tonight, Angela Hartnett's scores will send just two of Wales's contenders through to the judges.

There's very little points between all of them.

One of them will go home if they don't really pull it out of the bag.

With a hair's breadth between them, they need to fight to survive.

-Look at those scores. You couldn't have got it any closer.

-No.

It goes to show either we're all doing it right or we're not.

Tricky one today with the dessert. Lots of science involved, lot of things can go wrong.

Yeah, and it always seems to be the course that can catch a chef out, but let's see how it goes.

After a disappointing start to the week,

former champion Stephen redeemed himself yesterday with an impressive nine for his main,

but leading by a single point, he can take nothing for granted.

Today will be a tense day. There's lots that could go wrong. We're neck and neck, so it's anyone's race.

-All the best.

-Richard.

-Good luck. May the best man win, I suppose.

-Yeah.

-Good morning.

-Morning, Steve. How are you?

-Very well.

-What's the name of your dish?

-Bronze, silver or gold?

I've created three small desserts that will all be covered over with a little mini cloche.

One of them will have gold leaf, one silver leaf and one copper leaf cos you can't get bronze leaf.

-Do you get bronze, silver or gold? It's just a bit of fun.

-A bit of fun on the table.

-So the desserts are a beautiful chocolate mousse, quite a simple strawberry trifle.

-Right.

Obviously, lovely strawberries, jelly and the custard.

-I want the custard to taste like custard does taste.

-Old-fashioned custard.

Then one of my favourite desserts - lemon meringue pie, a lemon tart mix in a little ring on some shortbread.

-On top of that we've got some Italian meringue which we'll blow-torch.

-What's unique about them?

It's gold, silver, bronze. Isn't that what every athlete ultimately is aiming for?

-Good luck. Last day, Steve.

-Thank you.

Once again, Stephen has gone for Olympic-inspired presentation,

but does his dish fall short of ground-breaking gastronomy?

With Stephen's dessert, there's no innovation in the cooking side.

We've all made those things. Our mums have made those dishes.

Is he relying a bit on gimmick? Yeah, he is, so he has to make sure every element is spot-on.

Next up is second-timer Richard who failed to reach the judging chamber last time around

and despite his best efforts, he's in third place once again.

I'm desperate to be here tomorrow. I'd love to cook for the judges and get to the final banquet.

I can only do that by getting a great score today.

-So what's the name of your dessert?

-It's a passion fruit cream and gel with a bitter chocolate sorbet.

Why will this dessert be unique and ground-breaking?

-We've got some weird and wonderful...

-What's that gum?

-This is a guar gum from a guar bean.

It's a thickening agent. We're using that together with carrageenan to set our gel,

then we'll make a passion fruit cream with the creme fraiche, mascarpone...

-And the chocolate sorbet?

-We're using 70% chocolate

with water and sugar

-and some gold leaf as well.

-Oh, yeah.

I'm going to wrap the balls of sorbet in the gold.

-What are you nervous about?

-Well, the gel is quite technical. It's a little bit complicated.

Also I want to completely cover the sorbet in gold

and as soon as you even look at it, it starts to blow away, so yeah, it's quite difficult.

-Good luck. Looking forward to eating it.

-Thank you.

Richard is using yet more technical tricks

in his bid to break culinary boundaries,

but he needs to show Angela he has the skill to pull it off.

He's using lots of products and he's stretching himself as a chef.

His difficulty is he's setting these chocolate sorbet balls and wrapping it in gold leaf.

He has to make sure it wraps, it doesn't unfreeze or melt.

It could look a total mess or it could look absolutely stunning.

Michelin-starred James dropped into second place yesterday

with a disappointing main course, but it hasn't dulled his fighting spirit.

Today is my last chance and I really want to smash this one in.

I don't know what the other two boys are doing, but it had better be good to compete with mine.

-James, morning.

-Good morning.

-What is your dessert?

-Raspberry and lemon cheesecake.

Ah! But judging by the box, there are more complications than just a raspberry and lemon cheesecake.

We've got raspberry sorbet, a cheesecake snow,

then we've got raspberry gels, raspberry and lemon sherbet meringues.

-What are you doing with the pistachios?

-I'm making a biscotti.

But the whole dish is about all the senses -

taste, temperature, texture and aroma.

-So where's the aroma coming from?

-I'm going to use different essences of lemon and raspberry.

-OK.

-I've just got a little surprise.

-No pressure, guys. Out to surprise us!

-So anything you're feeling nervous about?

-Making sure I get it up on time.

There's a lot of elements to do, a lot to pull off, but if I can nail it, the nine will be mine today.

-He's very confident, this one, today.

-It sounds very, very tricky.

So James has some surprises in store with his deconstructed cheesecake.

He's aiming high and has given himself a mountain to climb.

He's got lots of technical things to get right. He's making this snow.

He's got to set a jelly. He's using stuff to give you aromas.

Lots of chemistry there, so he has to get every element right and it's a big risk at this stage.

All three chefs know this course is make-or-break. With Stephen currently narrowly in front,

his rivals are wasting no time questioning his simple dessert.

So, Stephen, obviously, nearly everybody has had lemon meringue pie and strawberry trifle.

-Not my lemon meringue pie and not my strawberry trifle.

-Is that why it's a real Olympic dish?

These people's lives, every day, it's a huge challenge - practice, practice, practice.

For me, food doesn't have to be challenging. It can be comforting.

It is a concern that my food's not quite as ground-breaking as the other boys,

but that's how I interpreted the brief. I will not change what I do because that's what I believe in.

In last place, Richard has the most to prove.

He's making a passion fruit gel using hi-tech setting agents,

but it's the chocolate part of his dish that has his rivals' attention.

-That looks a dirty job. Is it mud?

-Chocolate soil, looks like mud.

-How did you do that?

-It's just cocoa powder,

sugar, flour and a bit of butter.

-Just like a really dry cake mix?

-Yeah, exactly.

-Any little carrots sticking out through the top?

It's very close between Richard and myself. He's bound to be gunning for me.

But it's passion fruit and chocolate. It had better be special to try and beat my dessert.

Richard wants perfect presentation, serving a passion fruit cream in delicate chocolate tubes.

-OK, Richard, what are you up to?

-Here, I'm doing a bit of a messy job.

-I'm piping my chocolate into the cylinders which is going to...

-Hold the passion fruit.

-Yeah, exactly.

-And you tempered this chocolate?

-To a degree.

-What do you mean, "to a degree"?

-I'm doing like a quick temper

which is basically two-thirds melted chocolate and one third of chopped chocolate added at the end,

stir that in to hopefully give me the same effect.

The reason you temper chocolate is to get the crunchiness when you bite into it. That's what he's after.

If he doesn't temper it right, it could be too soft when he pipes in his passion fruit.

Across the kitchen, Stephen is making his trifle base with cubes of Genoise sponge, fresh strawberries

and strawberry juice set with gelatine, but his trifle topping has got Angela's attention.

-So, making your custard?

-Yeah.

-Custard powder, no?

-I like it.

For me, trifle has proper custard in it. You don't make trifle with cheffy custard.

I had to look on the packet how to make it.

Steve's making custard. Well, he's opened a packet and he's pouring hot milk on it.

In its day, yeah, custard ready-made powder was ground-breaking

and I like the flavour and the taste, but he's hardly stretching himself with that.

Stephen's long-time rival James has set himself a much tougher challenge.

He's making pistachio biscotti, just one of eight elements in his complex dish,

but rival Richard is already using the oven to bake his chocolate soil.

-How long have you got left?

-Get it in.

-Yeah?

-Just give us a tenner.

Give you a tenner?

The biscuits will provide the crunch in James's ambitious deconstructed lemon and raspberry cheesecake,

which includes a cheesecake snow and raspberry and lemon meringues.

The idea of deconstruction is quite in the fashion, one could say.

If he pulls it off, he'll have a stunning dessert

because it will make your mind and your palate work, it wants your senses to work.

James is still keeping everyone guessing when it comes to one aspect of his dish.

-How are you looking, James?

-Yeah, good.

-Do they know what the surprise is yet?

-No, they don't.

-Have you not tried to guess?

-He won't give anything away.

Holding his cards close to his chest.

To make sure his Olympian menu goes out with a bang,

James has been exploring some radical presentation ideas at his restaurant near Monmouth.

-Hello, Peter.

-Pleased to meet you.

-And yourself.

Peter Edwards, a professor of chemistry from Cardiff University,

has come to show him some visually spectacular effects and he's starting big.

-Gee whizz!

-There we are.

Luckily, Peter has some more banquet-friendly ideas

in his box of tricks, including some liquid nitrogen.

This is about minus 200 degrees.

Let me show you what that means. I've got a flower here, a nice chrysanthemum.

And we'll cool that in the liquid nitrogen.

Cor, flipping heck!

James has a vision of serving his dessert wreathed in fragrant smoke,

so Peter has brought some dry ice.

If we take some cold water into the beaker...

-..and very carefully add this to the water... and we have smoke.

-Yeah.

But we can increase the amount of smoke by using hot water, rather than cold water.

That's quite amazing. There's a massive difference on that.

To get the fragrance he's after, James is experimenting with raspberry and lemon essences.

Oh! Oh, an amazing smell!

-Fantastic.

-I'm getting more lemon than...

-A bit more lemon than raspberry.

-Yeah.

I don't know whether it needs...

I very much doubt that any of the other competitors in my region will be doing this sort of thing.

It's fantastic. I could play with it all day.

Fired up by these new ideas, James is assembling his whole dish for the first time.

They work really well together.

-That works for me.

-If this doesn't blow them away and knock them back in their seats, nothing will.

To create a dish like this, get it on the banquet, it would be the pinnacle of my career so far.

It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for the Olympics to come to Britain.

To be able to represent Wales and bring it home, it would just be ultimate for me.

With the final scores fast approaching,

James's rivals are desperate to hear what he has up his sleeve.

So, James, what is this surprise then?

I wanted to try and get my dish to have a real smell and a real effect,

-so we're going to do dry ice in a box.

-OK.

We flavour it with essences.

-Has that got you worried, Richard?

-I believe in my dish. You believe in yours. We're not judging it.

Yesterday, I got knocked down for not pushing myself enough. There's certainly nothing safe about this.

James has used a bit of innovation on the dish,

but you can't eat dry ice, so does it add anything to the dish apart from a visual impact? I don't know.

Determined to fight back from last place,

Richard has begun the delicate operation of covering his chocolate sorbet in sheets of gold leaf.

I suppose that's encapsulating the gold theme for the Olympics which I think is very good,

but I wouldn't say it's mind-blowing.

To ensure he serves two perfect examples, Richard is making several attempts.

So what are you doing, Richard?

Just wrapping the chocolate sorbet in the gold leaf.

Trying to be... You know, as gently as we can.

But as he puts his latest effort in the blast chiller, he realises he's made a serious mistake.

It's blown off now.

The air in the chiller is blowing the fragile gold leaf off and now he must try and rescue the situation.

I just want to get them perfect.

It makes sense to put it in the freezer because you don't have that blast chilling.

Yeah, there's no point going to this effort for it to get blown off.

Unlike his competitors, front-runner Stephen is sticking to time-honoured classics.

His lemon meringue pie has a tricky Italian meringue topping

which means carefully heating sugar and glucose.

-This is your meringue, yeah?

-This is for the meringue.

-Italian meringue.

-What do you take it up to? 121?

-No, it's, uh...

-116...

-OK, so slightly less.

-It's nearly there.

Stephen, although his dish sounds very simple, he's got to get every element right.

The lemon curd mustn't be overset. He must cook the meringue properly.

Just because they sound simple doesn't mean that they haven't got their risks and complications.

Across the kitchen, James is making a chocolate cone to hold his cheesecake snow,

but his use of liquid nitrogen to create his freeze-dried raspberry garnish is turning heads.

-So what are you doing here, James?

-If I freeze them really quick, there's no cell breakdown.

-Right.

When you freeze and start to defrost, the cells break down.

-Ooh!

-Minus 192 degrees.

Let's just stand here and watch. Come on, Willy Wonka, let's go!

He's the Willy Wonka of the kitchen today. I'm half a point behind James, so I'm hoping for a slip-up.

But Richard is under pressure now as he is first to the pass today.

He decorates his platter with gold, adds piles of chocolate soil and cubes of passion fruit gel,

then carefully unwraps his chocolate tubes filled with passion fruit cream.

Finally, he adds his gold-covered sorbet and decorative passion fruit glass and Richard can do no more.

-So, well done, four courses. How are you feeling, Richard?

-Good.

-Awe-inspiring?

-I hope so.

OK, let's go and try it.

Richard has used cutting-edge techniques to create a refined, elegant dessert,

but is it a trail-blazing dish?

So are you happy with the texture and the flavour of the gel?

It's not a jelly. It just kind of... bursts more than melts and...

I think it's really exciting to eat.

-You can taste the passion fruit.

-Why the fuss with the powders? You could do that with gelatine.

-The quick tempering way, are you happy with how it turned out?

-Yeah. It is a method I've used before.

-The chocolate hasn't got that real crisp snap.

-It's more of a vessel, isn't it?

So the sorbet worked for you, consistency-wise?

Yeah, I think it's really smooth. You can have quite a grainy chocolate sorbet.

-What's this underneath the passion fruit?

-Chocolate soil.

-Chocolate SOIL?

I'm not mad about that soil. It coats the inside of your mouth straight away.

It's like licking cocoa powder. I'd say it has spoilt the dish, for me.

And the gold leaf, it was hard to set it round there?

I certainly wouldn't take that element away. It is hard work, but it will be worth all the effort.

The gold ties in with the Olympic theme.

Far be it from me to say "Mr Safe", but it's not ground-breaking if that's what he wants to achieve.

What makes it unique, what makes it Olympian?

-The technique that's gone into the gel.

-Yeah.

-The cylinder.

Richard is a very good chef and he's technically very good at his pastry work.

He even says that himself and I was expecting a little bit more.

Everything was as I wanted and for me, I really love that dish.

I've put everything into it. You know, I would give it, you know, top marks, but I'm not judging it.

Now it's Stephen who is feeling the heat. He carefully stacks his lemon custard on top of his shortbread,

then adds a cocoa bean biscuit to the slate and tops it with chocolate mousse.

His Italian meringue coloured with a blowtorch, it's time for the silver, bronze and gold leaf.

Finally, Stephen's trio of desserts are hidden under cloches.

How will his quirky game go down with Angela?

-What do you reckon? Where's the gold?

-I reckon it's that end.

-This end?

-Yeah.

-Well, we'll start at this end.

Bronze.

Too-doo!

Hooray!

The proof is in the pudding, as they say, so have fun. Guess the gold.

Stephen's Olympic-themed menu has finished with a flourish,

but has he pushed his three classics to unprecedented heights?

-It's fun, isn't it? It's playful.

-That's the point of the dish. It's a bit of fun.

-Tuck in.

-Where shall we start? Trifle?

-Yeah.

I'm not really into this silver and gold leaf myself.

You went with the powdered custard, old school. It's worked for you?

For me, custard and trifle is that type of custard.

-It's reminiscent of my gran's trifle in a way, using custard powder.

-Yeah.

-I wouldn't say it's brilliant.

-No.

-I was thinking it might have more acidity. It's quite sweet.

Maybe he should have put bronze on that.

The biscuit base on the meringue pie, that's the right crunch and texture for you?

Absolutely. I really wanted that crunchy mouthful,

so between the crunch, the zest and the sweetness, it's a great marriage.

There's a lot of biscuit for the size of the dessert. It could have been thinner.

-With the chocolate mousse, you've added no cream. You want that soft texture?

-When you add cream,

the fat content just takes things up.

I wanted an aerated mousse. It's almost more chewy than it is fluffy.

It's the best chocolate mousse I've ever tasted.

-The base could have done with a little bit more cooking.

-It's a bit sticky, a bit chewy.

Is this dish gastronomically ground-breaking?

My brief, to me, is about providing something that totally encapsulates the whole Olympic spirit.

I'm very happy with this. I think I'm in with a reasonably good chance.

The desserts are quite simple

and it has to be the best trifle, the best lemon meringue and the best chocolate mousse.

It's not...the best I've had.

Well, I think that went quite well.

I was a bit nervous this morning, seeing what the boys were doing, but I think I've got a good chance now.

Last but not least is James who's got his work cut out creating his smoky special effect.

All eyes are on him as he fills Chinese tea boxes with the dry ice.

I love being watched(!)

I'm just a bit nervous at the moment, a bit flighty.

He adds his chilled cheesecake mix and the raspberry gel, then arranges his meringues,

fresh and freeze-dried raspberries and the crumbled pistachio biscotti.

A scoop of raspberry sorbet, then his cheesecake snow goes into chocolate cones,

then it's time for the finishing touch.

Whee!

Look at that! And you smell the aroma.

It looks fantastic, James.

-For me, this is what the Olympics is about.

-It looks like it's floating.

-It does, doesn't it?

-It's like the Thriller video.

-Let's go and eat it, James. I'll get you to carry it.

-Enjoy.

James has gone for dramatic, theatrical presentation,

but does deconstructed cheesecake hit the mark for gastronomy?

-Did you get everything to the level you wanted?

-Yes, I think so.

I've got to get the balance right to call it a cheesecake.

This is a cheesecake, isn't it? Or...sort of.

It's not amazingly cheesy for a cheesecake.

-The dried elements have all worked for you?

-Yeah, I think so. My biscuit worked really nice.

The meringues were just a little, playful, sweety sort of theme.

I don't see the relevance of a pistachio biscotti on a dish that celebrates raspberries and lemon.

What about the balance of lemon to raspberry? Have you got too much raspberry, not enough lemon?

No, because you've got lemon in the cheesecake and there's actually lemon on the fresh raspberries.

The lemon's there. Um...

What's that in there? It's like a snow.

-I think that's the cream cheese snow.

-There we go.

-It's quite tangy, isn't it?

-Hmm.

-It's got a little bit of savouriness.

-Yeah.

So, cheesecake snow, you've achieved what you wanted?

Yeah, definitely.

It's an element of fun.

It's certainly got a cheesecake flavour.

And it's just different.

I just wanted to push my own boundaries.

-I think the cone's a bit thick for me.

-Yeah.

-And I don't think it's a great chocolate.

We've got the fun part of it. Gastronomically, will the flavours all work for an Olympic banquet?

I think so. Gastronomically, there's lots of tastes and textures.

Everything about it is quite modern.

What you must do is imagine eating this dish without the dry ice.

Take that "wow", that theatre away, what are you left with?

If you take it away, then you're left with maybe a little bit disappointed.

Well, all done.

-Well done.

-All right? I'm a bit nervous now.

-I think we all are.

There's one and a half points in it.

I think there'll only be one point in it at the end. I think it'll be close again.

-Yeah, I think Wales has got a lot to be proud of.

-Yeah, quite right.

We've really given our all and that's all you can ask.

-We've got to wait for the photo cos it's a photo finish. You can't split it at the moment.

-No.

It's time for the final showdown.

Don't look so nervous.

So, Richard, yours was a passion fruit cream and gel, bitter chocolate sorbet.

I thought it was a very accomplished dish.

I thought it was executed well, I thought the chocolate sorbet was perfect, lovely texture.

The passion fruit gel was good. It wasn't too tart, which it could have been.

You probably needed bigger gold leaves to wrap your sorbet.

You were struggling with that. To really give it that polished finish, you needed it the whole way round.

I mean, it was a good dish, but I don't think it was an exceptional dish.

Stephen, yours was the bronze, silver and gold.

It was fun presentation, lots of quirkiness in that respect.

I thought your lemon meringue was delicious. The strawberry came through well on the trifle.

And all the desserts stood quite independently of each other.

I didn't particularly like the chocolate mousse. It could be firmer, I didn't like the texture.

And you needed more of that gruau biscuit underneath.

It wasn't gastronomically inventive. You know that, we know that.

James, yours was the raspberry and lemon cheesecake. Lots of fun, lots of theatre without doubt,

using all the latest techniques with dry ice, dehydrated raspberries, all the snow.

I liked the raspberry aroma. I thought that really worked well at the end.

Deconstructing something, you want to do blind-tasting to see if you get the full effect, and you did,

but I felt I was eating a cheesecake.

Your chocolate cone needed to be much better tempered and less thick.

I thought it was maybe superfluous to the dish and you needed more lemon through the dish.

No-one is safe with Stephen on 21, James on 20 and Richard on 19½.

Unfortunately, only two of you can go through to tomorrow to cook for the judges.

So with a score of seven for their dessert putting them through to the judges is...

..Stephen Terry.

So that leaves you, Richard, and you, James.

So, James, for your raspberry and lemon cheesecake...

..I'm giving you eight points.

Richard, for your passion fruit and chocolate dish,

I'm giving you...

..eight points.

Which means, James, you go to cook tomorrow.

-Well done, James.

-Richard, huge commiserations. I think you did exceptionally well.

Well done, Stephen, well done, James, and good luck tomorrow.

-Well done, James.

-Good luck for tomorrow.

-Good luck for tomorrow. Well done.

-Cheers.

So, with 28, James is getting a fresh stab at the final

and goes through to the judges level-pegging with his old rival Stephen.

Sadly, Richard is runner-up once again.

I can't believe I missed out by half a point. It was close all week.

Hugely disappointing, but I wish the other two chefs the best of luck for the rest of the competition.

Hopefully, we'll see a Welsh dish at the banquet.

Ecstatic, absolutely fantastic. A great result.

I absolutely will be nervous because I really want this.

For me, this time round, I've got to do it. I came so close before.

This would be the icing on the cake for my career, I think.

To do this for the Olympics, I would be absolutely over the moon.

Tomorrow, it's every man for himself...

A bit of drama. What a pain in the backside!

..as Stephen and James brave the judges...

-This is delicious.

-A bit of gold leaf. What's wrong with a bit of gastro bling?

-..to fight for that one place in the final.

-I'm hugely competitive.

I'm really confident and I'll make sure he knows that.

-You've got a lot going on.

-Mate, this is my Achilles heel when it comes to timing.

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