Sarah, Diana, Callan, Sam, Nicole, Tamara, Michelle, Karlie and Eloise faced a deceptive elimination challenge, marking the finale of Heston Week.
The challenge was to create something that was not what it seemed. The contestants had 75 minutes to create a dish that was delicious, but also deceptive.
Michelle elected to make a spherical dessert, a frozen cream cheese parfait encased in a coconut coating. She also planned to make rich butter domes and freeze the butter in moulds.
Sam wanted to create something sweet. He decided to use blackberries, hoping to create a giant blackberry made from small chocolate spheres. Heston was concerned he would not complete the dish in time and he changed it to a rosemary and vanilla semifreddo apple.
Nicole made a popcorn bucket with chocolate parfait, while Sarah created a charred barbecue corn with Mexican flavours. Inspired by an oversized pumpkin and the tale of Cinderella, Callan wanted to create an open chocolate bar, made from pumpkin. Eloise was keen to make her dish as deceptive as possible, plating pate with layers of peanut butter, raspberry and chocolate mousse topped with a jelly.
With the cook near completion, Michelle took her crumbed frozen butter domes and dropped them in oil to deep fry them. One by one, they started to fall apart in the oil, butter oozing out. She was devastated and after ruining two, wondered if she would have anything left to plate up. Michelle was visibly upset but Gary suggested she put the remaining butter sphere into the blast chiller, giving her the opportunity to flash fry it at the end of the cook. When she took out her parfait she was also concerned it was quite hard and the cream cheese may have affected the consistency.
In the end, the judges decided that her fallen coconut had fallen short. With a rock-hard parfait and with too many flaws, it was enough to send her home. Michelle is enjoying work experience at Vue De Monde and Burch & Purchese. She is now planning the opening of her dessert bar, Golden.
