Episode 2 MasterChef: The Professionals

Only an elite group of chefs holds two Michelin stars.

Michel Roux Junior is one of them.

-Ca marche! Two Saint-Jacques au passe now!

-Oui!

Now he and MasterChef judge Gregg Wallace are on the hunt for Britain's next culinary superstar,

a professional with the talent to cut it in the world's top kitchens.

Perfect.

Ten professional chefs have faced their first challenge to prove to Monica Galetti

that they can cook at the highest level.

Now they've been split into two groups.

Today, five of them will face the final test

to decide who is good enough to cook for Michel Roux Junior.

At the end of it, one of them will be going home.

I am probably the most excited man you have here. I want to go through.

You can't imagine. I want to make a dish that has been judged,

even if he destroys it, by Michel Roux.

I'm quite philosophical about it.

I messed up badly the other day.

I don't want to go home because I messed up in every situation.

I've seen what everyone else is doing.

I can do better. I can be MasterChef champion and I'm in it to win it.

This is the skills test.

-I love it.

-I want to see them make three caramel decorations and use them to decorate these panna cottas.

OK, let's see how it's done.

First of all, I'm going to make the caramel.

I'm going for a dry caramel which is just sugar.

-I bet that burns easy.

-It does.

They need to be able to control that temperature of the sugar. Excuse me, Gregg. Very hot!

How do you know when to take it off the heat?

A professional chef should know when to stop it. You can see it starting to caramelise.

Depending on how far you want to take the colour of the sugar, that is when you should stop.

The first decoration I'll make is a nest of caramel.

I'm criss-crossing, back and forwards, then you want to go in the opposite direction.

-So that sugar sets as soon as it hits that ladle?

-That's right.

-Wahey!

-That's one done.

I'll do another one. You need to be able to work the sugar.

If it sets, put it back on the heat and bring it back to the right consistency.

That's what's hard. It's knowing exactly what consistency the caramel has to be for each discipline.

That's the hard bit.

Just back and forth.

You know what that is? That's edible art.

Then all I want to do is then grab that and I'm going to make a little ball with it.

And that's it. That's going to sit right there.

Lovely. That's two. What's the third one?

I'm going to make a spiral. With the coldness of the steel, that will set even more.

You're just pulling the sugar as you go along.

There you have it. Ta-da!

Hey!

And there you have it - my three decorations.

Let's get them in.

34-year-old Dan teaches cookery at a prison. In the previous challenge,

he failed to impress with his overcooked duck.

I'm here to prove to myself and to everyone that I know that I can cook and I can cook at this level.

This is a skills test.

-What we've got there is three panna cottas. We want you to decorate those panna cottas with caramel.

-OK.

-We're going to give you just ten minutes.

-OK. All right then, I'll give it a go.

-Dan, good luck.

-I'll need it.

-Getting there, Dan?

-Slowly, yeah.

You've got five minutes left.

You've got 60 seconds left. You're going to have to move yourself.

You started off with the decoration, a swipe, a drizzle.

However, the caramel had not quite cooked enough and you can see there's still grains through that.

And it's just about crystallised.

The same thing when you tried the last part. Was it a caramel sauce?

That was the idea, yeah.

It was more of a syrup than a caramel sauce.

Dan, if it came up to me, I'd be OK, I think, apart from the one with the shard.

The shard is awful. I thought your spun sugar work was getting there.

Disappointed. I didn't do particularly well, but it couldn't have been a worse challenge,

especially when I needed to pull something out of the bag.

French-born Sebastien moved to the UK six years ago to pursue his dream.

His first dish of cinnamon and leek duck showed some promise.

It's very important for me to stay in the competition because I'm a self-trained man.

I used to be a banker five years ago, so I want to show that I can do it properly.

Ten minutes, chef. Off you go.

-Halfway. You've got five minutes left.

-Thank you.

You've got a minute left, so get your decoration on.

-OK, finished.

-Thank you.

Have you made caramel before?

-Yes.

-Decorations as well?

-No.

-Ah!

OK. I think you did a great job of trying to do your spun sugar,

but had you flicked a bit more with the wrist, there would be less of the grains going through your sugar.

You made two decorations, one of them very good.

The other decoration, the shards, it just looks too amateurish. You could have done so much more.

I like the idea of three different textures on each panna cotta.

But I'm wondering why, as a customer, my plate looks so messy.

I think that was pretty messy.

It's great fun, but not something I was expecting, so...

You can always do better.

Cornwall-based chef Ben learnt to cook at the age of seven.

Except for too much sauce, his duck dish was one of the highlights of the day.

I'm nervous about seeing Monica again

but I want to go in there full steam ahead, give 100% and hopefully come out on top.

OK, chef, down to you. Off you go. Ten minutes.

You've got just over five minutes left, OK?

-Your time's up.

-OK.

-Your time's up.

Ben, as a customer, as a punter, you have no idea what's going on behind the kitchen wall.

If I was sat down and this came up to me, Ben, I'm really sorry, I would probably giggle.

I love the spiral. This brooch affair is massive.

And there's no decoration on the third.

It took too long because you just kept adding and adding more sugar.

The more sugar you add, the more liquid you add, the longer it's going to take to cook.

It's a shame because had you more time to concentrate on these decorations,

I bet they'd be a hundred times better than what you managed today.

-Ben, thank you very much. Off you go.

-Thank you.

Pressure-wise, it was pretty tough.

We only had ten minutes to produce three sugar decorations.

I've worked with sugar a couple of times before,

but given a ten-minute deadline, it really put the pressure on today.

25-year-old Steve has been a chef for six years.

His duck and confit leek dish was well cooked, but lacked imagination.

I became a chef by accident.

I was a waiter and they needed help in the kitchen, so I got on with it.

Now I'm a head chef. To win MasterChef will be so difficult.

I've only been here for Heat Two and the amount of pressure that it puts on everybody

and the amount of work that we have to put in to get there, it's going to be hard.

It's do or die now.

You've got ten minutes, chef. Off you go.

You've got a minute left. Don't ruin it now. Come on.

Wahey!

-All done?

-Done.

Looking at your plate, Steve, I can say two of those decorations are spot-on and very well done.

Your cage, obviously, the caramel was still too hot, too runny when you started that,

but your spiral is perfectly done and your spun sugar is wonderful.

I think you've got great skills. Well done.

Thank you very much. Well done.

It went quite well. I got some good remarks.

There was room for improvement again, but I got some really good remarks, so I'm pleased.

Last up is Oli who has been working in high-end kitchens for the last seven years.

His duck dish reflected strong technical ability, but the presentation didn't.

When I moved to London, I did my training in Claridge's Hotel,

so I got a lot of my classical cookery skills and knowledge from there.

Cooking is my life, my passion. I'm in the kitchen early in the morning till late at night.

You have to enjoy it if you're doing it for a career.

Ten minutes, Oli. Off you go.

-You've got five minutes left, Oli.

-Yeah.

-You've got ten seconds. You haven't got time to make another one.

-Yeah.

-All right?

I've never seen a hot caramel poured over a set panna cotta before.

For me, that's just madness. You can see it's set solid now.

This basket may prove you do have the skill,

but the other two panna cottas, no, that's not right.

I wouldn't be very happy as a customer. I wouldn't be very happy paying for it.

I'm gutted that I messed up. It wasn't what I was expecting and it didn't go too brilliantly.

I've not really done sugar work before, so I did the best I could do.

Very rarely do any of these, even the winners, get off to a flying start. They get nervous.

One really stood out for me today and that was Steve.

He made us a basket and he made us a really nice spiral. Very impressive guy.

The only thing that let Steve down was his cage decoration which was too thick. The caramel was too hot.

But the other two decorations were wonderful.

-He's got to go through, Monica. He's the best one.

-He has to go through.

I like Sebastien. I think his technical know-how is pretty good.

His final presentation, though, is a bit lacking.

I like the fact that Sebastien, who's never made caramel decorations before, did not give up

and he gave us two different caramels.

Oli gave us a comedy moment where he poured the hot caramel on to the panna cotta and melted it,

but his basket was very, very good.

Oli made a great caramel, but this is where it ends. None of those decorations were complete.

-I have issues with him.

-But is he the weakest here? I don't think so. Has he got promise? I think he has.

Ben made a decoration and a perfect spiral on another panna cotta.

He managed to make a spiral and a big decoration, but that decoration was too large.

Because it took so long to make the damn caramel, he ran out of time.

Dan got a bit nervous. His caramel never got to the right colour,

but he did manage to decorate all three panna cottas which is more than some of them did.

He tried to make a decoration when the caramel wasn't cooked properly.

It started to crystallise. If he had just relaxed a bit and moulded that nicely, it would have been fine.

OK, they were all nervous, it wasn't perfect, but who deserves to go home?

-I think I know who's going home.

-Good.

Very tough for Monica and I. We have made a decision.

The person who's leaving us today is...

..Dan.

Cheers.

I'm absolutely gutted that I won't get to cook for Michel,

but I've not earned the place to be there, I don't deserve to be there,

so that's my problem, I have to live with it.

Guys, you're going through to cook for my boss. You need to up your game a bit.

You've had two chances. Third one out.

There are classics that should be part of every professional chef's repertoire.

And Michel Roux Junior is looking for chefs who aspire to cook them at his two Michelin star level.

Today, I'd like the chefs to prepare a starter of mackerel three ways,

using classical techniques and the ingredients I'm going to give them.

Mackerel is such a versatile fish, it's a beautiful fish to work with.

It has a delicate flavour, yet can take strong accompaniments.

This dish will be made up of an escabeche,

mackerel that is marinated and cooked in the same sauce,

a sashimi and a tartare.

They will allow Michel to test the chef's knife skills, palate and presentation.

First of all, filleting the mackerel, going down

and straight across.

Very easy. Beautiful fillets.

And there should be hardly any meat left on the bone.

So now I've got my two fillets for the tartare, one for the escabeche and one for the sushi.

Now...a little bit of coarse sea salt,

sprinkled on top.

The sea salt will extract the moisture from the fish and obviously season it.

The next step is to prepare the marinade for the sashimi and I use a bit of ginger,

and then equal quantities of mirin and rice vinegar.

So we go back to the sashimi and this fillet of mackerel now is sopping wet.

The salt has extracted all the moisture, all the water from the mackerel. It's firmed up the flesh.

And it goes into...the marinade.

So now I'll prepare the escabeche. Often marinades will get thrown away after the cooking process,

but in an escabeche, it is an integral part of the dish and should be served.

So I'm going to be pan-frying the mackerel, skin side down only,

so that it gets that wonderful, golden, intense colour with the flavour,

and then poaching it in the marinade

which will have dry white wine, carrot and shallot and a hint of coriander.

Once we've got that lovely colour on the skin, it goes into the marinade.

The third element of this dish, the final part, is the tartare.

Tartare has to be done at the very last second.

As soon as you season it, I think you've got about ten minutes before it can be served,

otherwise it will be ruined.

I will look to see how the chefs chop up their tartare.

It has to be fine, but not a paste.

A touch of salt, a squeeze of lemon juice...

pepper and taste.

Perfect.

So for the garnish, we've got green apple. I want super-fine matchsticks, super-fine juliennes.

Attention to detail at this level is so important.

Now for the assembly of the dish.

That is it - three mackerel starters,

classic recipes,

involving all the skills you need to be a true chef.

Given the opportunity to cook for Michel Roux Junior is absolutely fantastic.

There's no better chef to be judged by.

I'm very happy to have got through to cook for Michel, but obviously, I'm still very nervous.

We have two tests for you now, two classic recipe tests.

And at the end of this, one of you will be leaving the competition.

Now we really expect you to deliver.

Your first test is to cook one of my classic dishes - mackerel three ways.

The dish is three different starters made with mackerel,

but they have to be singing in unison together.

You have got an hour and ten minutes.

You know what's at stake here. Good luck.

It's pressurised cooking for someone with two Michelin stars because they obviously do know their stuff.

It's about getting it right on the day and making sure it is exactly how they want it.

-In the last round, you did the best out of everybody. Can you keep it up?

-Hopefully. Only time will tell.

-Steve, have you had classic training?

-No, none whatsoever.

This is my biggest weak point, so I'll have to really try harder.

-What training have you had? On the job?

-Just on the job. Absolutely on the job.

I was a waiter, then I moved up from working as a waiter into the kitchen and loved it, so stayed there.

-Interesting how they say, "I was a waiter and I moved UP."

-I was thinking that.

I thought, "No, don't be offensive, Gregg. Don't say anything!"

Steve has had no formal classical training and he is looking a bit nervous,

so I hope he has read the recipe properly and adheres to it or it will be a disaster.

The pressure's going to start because cooking for Michel, it's what I was dreaming of,

so this pressure is the pressure I would like to have every day.

-Hi, Sebastien.

-Hello.

-Do you understand the recipe?

Yes. I like escabeche. Tuna escabeche from Marseille, it's classic. My mum used to do it when I was a kid.

-I understand the sense of the dish, the idea behind it.

-Good. You're feeling very confident?

I'm feeling as confident as I can.

I have to deliver the highest standard I've delivered because I'm cooking for you,

so I want to make sure I give it the best to show you that I can cook the best.

What is it that you want to show right here?

I trust my palate and I would love to have somebody that can see there is something in me

and take me to the next level because I do believe I can be a good chef.

Sebastien understands the recipe thoroughly.

He's from France. He knows what an escabeche is.

He loves Asian food, so he's done sashimi and sushi before. He should nail this.

Chefs, you've had 30 minutes already.

Half an hour gone.

I'm glad to have got past Monica. I made a few mistakes, so there were a few critical points,

but she thinks I'm good enough to cook for Michel Roux. Pressure!

-How confident are you on the classics?

-Fairly.

I've done each of these elements before, just not together.

What would be a terrific outcome?

For today, just to get this dish perfect and nail it perfectly and to show you what I can do.

In the long run, to get as far as I can in the competition.

Do you feel you've a point to prove or you just want to keep going?

I've definitely got a point to prove. I've slipped up on tasks.

I haven't quite got the finished product how it should have been. It's time to show what I can do.

Oli is the only one of our chefs with some formal, classical training and he looks very confident.

What style do you like, Ben? What would you like to eventually do?

The style I like and what I do at home in my own restaurant is I use a lot of coastal cuisine,

a lot of fish and shellfish.

-Where on the coast are you?

-Cornwall. We're right on the coast.

We get our fish straight from the harbour, so quite lucky really.

-So you've worked with mackerel before?

-Absolutely. Mackerel's quite a big thing where we are.

-No stranger to mackerel.

-We've got high hopes for you, Ben. Good luck.

Ben is the head chef of a fish restaurant in Cornwall. He's got to be able to do this.

Your last 60 seconds.

That's it. Finished. Stop. Stop!

I asked you to prepare a trio de maquereaux - mackerel three ways.

A starter with finesse and elegance.

The escabeche, classic French cooking. Golden skin, poached in white wine with aromates.

It should be soft, tender and cooked through.

A sashimi. Marinated in coarse sea salt and then a mirin marinade.

It should be sweet, tender, very fresh and glistening.

And, finally, a tartare. The secret to the tartare is in the texture and the seasoning.

Oli, we'll start with you.

Oli, it's very well presented. I can see that you have a good eye. Very neat, which I really enjoy.

I like your sashimi. I like your tartare as well. Well flavoured.

But there is a flavour lacking from your escabeche - acidity, sharpness.

Your escabeche is well cooked. Again, lacking a bit of seasoning.

I don't get that punchy sharpness from the white wine or coriander seeds,

pepper... It's lacking in seasoning.

'I thought it went quite well. Good comments.'

I enjoyed the positives and I'm going to work on the seasoning.

Steve, your turn.

Your sashimi... has been cut and then re-assembled. Then you've taken the skin off.

It almost looks like it was chewed up and then put back on the plate.

It does not look appetising.

Your tartare could have had some decoration on top.

You've chosen to give me a quarter of an apple there. Beautifully cut,

but does not belong on this dish.

OK, let's taste.

Your sashimi, although it doesn't look nice at all,

it's beautifully seasoned and the texture is just right.

The escabeche is dry.

The tartare...love the texture.

Love the seasoning. I think you have very good taste buds, a good palate.

Everything on this plate tastes exactly how it should taste,

but problems with execution and presentation.

I really like your sashimi.

Really like the flavouring there.

But I don't know what happened with your escabeche.

'Never cooked an escabeche before.'

Was a little bit unsure about the whole cooking method. I don't think I've done that badly.

I did have some good points, but have they shown through?

Sebastien.

Sebastien, this is really top presentation.

It's small, light. It is a starter.

Each component is individual, yet harmonious.

The sashimi is beautiful. You can see it's raw, but it's firm.

It's been long enough in the salt to extract the moisture.

Lacking just a hint of acidity. Possibly you overdid it on the mirin

and could have a bit more rice wine vinegar. Very good escabeche. Your grandmother would be pleased.

The tartare, again, very good seasoning. Beautifully cut mackerel.

At the level we're looking for, you really are not far off.

Mmm.

The star there is your tartare, which is just lovely.

Absolutely lovely. There's a bit of acidity, a bit of sweetness and a bit of heat from horseradish.

That is absolutely lovely.

I know that my palate is right, but I wanted to hear it from somebody and I hear it from him,

from Michel Roux Junior. Nothing better could happen to me today.

Now for Ben.

Ben, it's slightly too big. There's a lot of mackerel there to eat.

You work with fish on a daily basis and it shows. Your filleting and pin boning...

..is perfect.

The tartare, very well seasoned, but it's sloppy.

The texture is not right.

There's great flavour everywhere. Ben, your issue is texture.

I'm chewing too much on a rubbery skin on your sashimi.

And your tartare, which tastes beautiful, you've made it into a mush.

I almost want to spread it on a piece of toast.

'I certainly think'

that the bar has been raised now.

I definitely think we've got to push and work a lot harder to meet the standards Michel's looking for.

You've now cooked my classical recipe. You now have to cook your own classical recipe.

It's your last chance. You've got an hour to cook a classic,

to impress us. Off you go.

I'm feeling really excited about the classic dish challenge.

We get a chance to cook our own food now. We get to show off our skills

and what we're really made of. Really looking forward to it.

-Tell us your dish, Ben.

-The dish I'm doing is classic Beef Wellington

in a really good red wine sauce and I might do some braised shallots.

Listen, I'm not a pro chef, but I'm worried about that in an hour.

-Me, too!

-What skills are you going to be showing off?

I'm going to show I can cook a great piece of beef to perfection,

I can get the balance of my sauce right - consistency, thickness.

-Mate, it's a dish I love and many people love, but it's got to be bang on.

-I'll try my best, Gregg.

I worry for Ben. Beef Wellington in an hour will be very difficult.

One good thing is that he has wrapped the beef in a pancake, which should absorb the moisture

and let the puff pastry rise and become crisp.

Oli, what classic dish are you cooking for us?

Today I'm cooking trout hollandaise served with green and white asparagus and new potatoes.

That's a great French classic sauce. What's the key to a great hollandaise?

Obviously not to cook it too quickly, the right amount of clarified butter

and just the right sharpness with the reduction. Not too sharp.

-Mm.

-And if one part of this is going to go wrong, what'll it be?

My hollandaise could split. I could overcook the fish. Many things, if I'm not concentrating.

-Will it be good enough to see you through?

-I hope so!

-My seasoning needs to be perfect. I'll show you that I can cook.

-Looking forward to it.

Oli is doing a lovely trout with asparagus and hollandaise and turned potatoes,

but he has given himself double the amount of work of the others. It's whether he can get it done.

'I need to cook the fish perfect'

and if I season it perfect and everything is good, it'll be a very well done dish.

For my own classic, what I need to do is deliver every ingredient as good as I know I can do it.

But I have much more pressure now to deliver at least as good, if not better, as what I have done.

-Right, Sebastien, what classic dish are you going to cook for us?

-I've chosen an English classic dish.

It is the poached smoked haddock with mashed potato, spinach, poached eggs and hollandaise sauce.

When you read it, it looks simple, but when you actually break it down, there's a lot of skills there

and a lot of places where it could go terribly wrong.

After Michel's recipe, what do you want to prove?

That I can do it on more than one dish. That I can deliver great textures and great flavour.

Sebastien is doing smoked haddock on mashed potato, poached egg, spinach and hollandaise.

It's not the most refined dish, so Sebastien's flavours have got to be perfect.

Guys, you have just 20 minutes left.

I'm going to have to execute it perfectly. It's quite a simple dish,

so it has to be perfect, it has to taste amazing. Or I'm out.

-Right, Steve, what great classical dish are you going to show off?

-A fish pie.

-A fish pie?

-I stuck to what I know best. That's what Mum cooked for me. That's as classic as it gets.

-So it's Mum's recipe?

-Almost!

-How are you going to guarantee the utmost flavour?

-I've been saving everything that I'm cooking.

I steamed the mussels, saved the wine. I roasted off the shells from the prawns. I'll get that in.

-What are those crisps doing there?

-They're going to be game chips, but I'll attempt at the last minute

-to do some little salted crisps just to go with it.

-For me, it's a great idea.

It's going to be down to your execution and your palate now

to see if you can take it up to that really... Take it to the pinnacle of the fish pie level.

-No shame in serving a fish pie, but it has to be...

-Perfect.

-Yes.

Steve has got some beautiful ingredients in his fish pie. Wonderful tiger prawns, scallops,

salmon, haddock. I'm worried, though. Is this going to prove to us

and show off skills that mean he goes through to the next round?

One minute, guys. Plate up, come on. One minute left.

Stop. Time's up. That's it. Stop!

For his classic, Oli has made trout hollandaise with green and white asparagus and turned new potatoes.

Very classical presentation.

Starch on one side, vegetables the other and the protein in the middle of the plate.

That fish is perfectly cooked. It's very moist, tender.

It's not easy to cook trout properly. That's been done very well, I must say.

The hollandaise has enough acidity in it. It's light, creamy. Perfect accompaniment.

I think your classic dish has achieved, in many respects, the required standard.

Mmm. Mmm.

Oli, that is delicious. That is absolutely delicious.

You've got creamy, creamy sauce, but the flesh is just moist, well seasoned,

the potatoes are soft and well seasoned. Absolutely lovely, Oli. Absolutely lovely.

I feel chuffed just to get those comments from Michel Roux Junior.

An icon of the industry told me he loved my food and I nailed it. Perfect.

Ben's classic dish is a Beef Wellington, served with braised shallots and a red wine sauce.

It's not easy to present Beef Wellington in a beautiful way, but one thing that I do think is

we should be able to see the meat. You've covered it up here with albeit beautiful roast shallot

and some onion rings. So it's a shame that way.

The flavours are lovely. It's well seasoned. I like the little mustard around the beef.

It gives a little bit of a kick. The beef is cooked, I think, beautifully.

It's medium rare, which is lovely. Your sauce, a little too powerful,

of rosemary in there and thyme. It's overpowering. It's taking over the taste of the beef

and of the red wine sauce.

You've surprised me that you got this done in time. I'm really impressed,

but this sauce is too strong with rosemary.

I tried my best. I gave it 100%. And I feel like I did reasonably well.

Steve has made fish pie with a mix of prawns, mussels, smoked haddock and monkfish,

served with game chips.

There's not much we can say about presentation. It is big, it's huge.

It's bold. It's a fish pie. Game chips - not sure.

Not really sure that chips of any sort should go with a potato-based pie.

Your mashed potato is very heavy.

It's dense, the texture is very dense, in fact.

I think that's probably from the cheese and not putting enough milk and cream in the potato

to lighten it up and fluff it up.

Your fish is beautifully cooked. You've not overcooked it.

That takes some doing, so well done.

I find it ever so slightly...

one-dimensional in flavour.

It's lovely. There's good seasoning in there, that fish is really soft. There's a sweetness to the fish.

You've tried to get real flavour in and it's great.

I'd eat your fish pie.

And I'd order another one tomorrow.

But would it ever show your skills in their best light?

I really do think that I'm at the bottom. I do believe I'm the weakest link in the chain at the moment,

so I'm quite sure I'll be the one going home.

Sebastien has served smoked haddock with hollandaise sauce,

mashed potato and sauteed spinach, topped with a poached egg.

There's not much you can say about presentation. It is what it is.

Presentation-wise, in fact, I don't think you could really embellish it.

The beauty of this dish is in the eating.

One thing missing. Just one.

Mm. Hmm.

A lovely big slice of bread to dunk in there.

Absolutely delicious. The fish is cooked perfectly.

It's translucent. The overall combination is excellent.

It's a classic for a reason.

Yeah, that's lovely. That is lovely, lovely, lovely.

You can't use too much seasoning because you've got the fish.

Rich egg yolk covering the lot. Really nice creamy hollandaise.

Really buttery, soft mashed potato and the prominent flavour still, the star of the show,

is the strength of that really nicely-cooked fish. Very yummy.

'I have to say that today'

I have cooked this dish, which I have done a hundred times.

The flavours I've put through my mash, the fish, even the spinach, are probably the best I have done.

So it happened that it's today that I nailed the perfect dish, which I needed to do. I'm really happy.

I enjoyed that, the classics. I've eaten well.

I'm going to leave a stone heavier, but nowhere nearer a decision.

They're good chefs. They proved to me today that they have the skills

and they have the knowledge of classic cooking.

Sebastien had a decent round today. He made a very good fist of your classic recipe,

of the mackerel dishes. I thought that Sebastien's mackerel tartare was outstanding,

by far the best of the four.

Sebastien's choice of classic, I thought it was an accomplished dish.

I definitely think he's done enough to go through. He's shown the required skills.

Oli seemed to grow in stature from one round to the next.

He did OK with your mackerel, but just OK. But that trout dish...

That was by far the best thing I ate today. Really, really good.

Those potatoes were soft and the fish was still moist and the hollandaise...

It was a delicious plate of food!

It's very difficult to cook a trout to that degree of perfection. And he nailed it.

I think he should go through.

Coming into this, Steve was the strongest contestant.

He did the best job with his caramel sugar work, by far.

Steve's interpretation of my mackerel three ways wasn't entirely right. His sashimi was hacked.

It certainly didn't look nice, but it tasted great.

And he had a quarter of an apple on the plate, which was just not right.

As for his fish pie, he did a very good job of cooking that fish

and that is very difficult, to get the fish still slightly underdone.

He should never have put those game chips on that tray, though. Chips and mashed potato don't work.

To be sent home after the classic food would be the worst because I haven't shown what I can do.

Ben had really good presentation, very good presentation skills when he did your mackerel dish,

but he made a big mistake with the tartare. The texture was like pate. I wanted to spread it on toast.

It was chopped up to a pulp and had far too much cream in it.

So it wasn't very nice to eat, but the seasoning was very good.

He made a very good Beef Wellington, but his rosemary in his sauce was far too strong.

It certainly wasn't a red wine sauce that should be served with beef.

Hopefully I've done enough. It's down to the judges.

I respect their decision. And the decision's final.

-Aargh! What are you going to do?

-I've seen a very good level today,

but I do feel there is one that's slightly behind the others.

I've seen some good cooking today. It wasn't totally fault-free, but it was difficult to choose.

The chef leaving today is...

Steve.

A little bit disappointed, as I said,

that I didn't get to go further.

I just don't feel... To go out after doing classics, there's a lot more I could have done,

but that's part of the game.

You're through. You're going through to the next round. Well done. It won't get any easier!

It means so much to be in the quarter-finals. I've entered to win,

so it means a lot to just keep progressing.

Getting through today has given me a huge boost to my confidence. They can see the potential in me.

Hopefully I can go all the way.

It's been a long day, it's been a stressful day, but it's been a great day.

And it ends with qualifying to the quarter-finals. Absolutely brilliant.

Tomorrow, the five remaining chefs are back to be tested...

It's not a plate I'd like my boss to see.

..before Michel Roux Junior sets them their first classic recipe.

I hope our chefs will be able to recreate this dish properly.

Now we expect you to really raise your game.

You've shown a lot of skill today. That's exactly how it should be.

Subtitles by Subtext for Red Bee Media Ltd - 2011

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