After a disastrous performance in the team relay challenge, Amy, John, Fiona, Georgia and captain Jarrod faced elimination on what was Marco Pierre White’s last day in the kitchen.
When the judges revealed that the contestants would dine with them, tasting their own food, they were encouraged to revisit everything they had learnt from Marco throughout the week including flavour, balance and technique.
With a lot at stake, the five contestants had 90 minutes to produce five plates of food, with consistency the key. This would be someone’s last supper in the MasterChef Australia kitchen.
Jarrod started confidently, determined to serve a dish the judges would enjoy. He decided on Mexican gazpacho with crunchy fish croquettes, to be served with aioli and apple.
Amy opted for an ambitious quail tortellini, while Fiona went for a classic chicken and leek pie. Georgia decided on panko and sesame crusted prawns and John worked methodically on a chicken roulade, stuffed with mushroom and spinach, with a madeira sauce and cauliflower done three ways.
With less than 10 minutes to go, disaster struck for Jarrod. While rushing to prepare his aioli, he knocked over his tray of croquettes and sent them flying all over the floor. A devastated Jarrod didn’t know if he could salvage enough for the judges. His aioli was ditched to concentrate on plating a dish close to what he had envisaged.
John’s dish was applauded by the judges despite its many elements. Amy was congratulated for serving 25 perfect tortellini, but her burnt butter sauce was not up to scratch. The judges loved Georgia’s perfectly cooked and deliciously crunchy prawns, and she received high praise.
The decision came down to Fiona and Jarrod. Jarrod’s gazpacho was unbalanced and his croquettes were deemedtasteless. Marco suggested he should not have cooked the fish before deep-frying it and George said the gazpacho was missing vinegar.
While Fiona’s pastry was inconsistent and undercooked, her tasty pie filling was enough to salvage the dish and meant that it was Jarrod’s time to leave the competition in an emotional elimination.
Since leaving the MasterChef Australia kitchen, Jarrod has taken classes in using native ingredients and foraging. He is planning seasonal dinners featuring food sourced only from his garden.
