What’s worse – egg that doesn’t run, egg that is filled with horrid seafood, or overcooked custard? One popular contestant finds out the hard way.
Have you heard of TikTok? Apparently it’s quite “cool” with the youths of today. As always, MasterChef is a slave to fashion, and therefore tonight the kitchen has been TikToked.
When the amateurs arrive, they are confronted by a giant fake phone, inside which is a happy woman in a yellow beret. Everyone bursts into applause and cheers because they apparently know who the happy woman is. In fact she is Miki Terasaki, a social media sensation who has gained fame for doing unnatural things with food. Everyone watches as, still imprisoned within the dystopian giant phone, the woman makes a… thing. The thing looks like a small yellow pillow, but when she cuts it open, out oozes a bunch of yellow brains, the favourite food of zombies, which is what TikTok turns people into. It all makes sense! The dish is officially known as “omurice”, which is Japanese for “brain-omelette”.
Anyway, inspired by Miki, the amateurs are now required to cook a dish that “uses eggs in a clever way”, although surely the cleverest way to use an egg is as a vessel for the creation of life as our lord God intended it. But no, they’re all going to crack the poor eggs open and fling the yolks about all over the place.
The judges discuss what they want to see. Poh doesn’t want to see a perfectly boiled egg sitting in broth. It is her greatest fear. Every night she wakes in a cold sweat after dreaming about perfectly boiled eggs in broth. The judges agree that eggs are very versatile, and it will be interesting to see whether contestants stick to chicken eggs or get creative with other eggs, like quail, duck, swan, crocodile, frog, bee, platypus etc.
Poh asks Australian Josh what he’s making. He tells her he’s making a cheese souffle. Poh laughs long and loud at his madness and tells him that a souffle is a good way to go down in flames. Josh thanks her for her positivity. Meanwhile Steve is feeling confident —he knows he can cook with eggs because he used to drive airboats, which is basically the same thing.
There’s a wide variety of dishes being cooked. Darrsh is making a Bombe Alaska, the only dessert known to be named after official Russian government policy. Lachlan is making a stuffed egg, which should be easy: most MasterChef contestants have found it easy, once in the kitchen, to stuff their dishes completely. Nat is making small balls in green liquid, which in the future will be all that humans have to eat. It’s a challenging recipe, but luckily Nat has
a lot of alcohol on hand to keep a steady keel.
On the balcony, David stalks back and forth, chuckling to himself in a very immune way. Sav, who is cooking in her mother’s memory and daring the judges to send her home after an emotional montage, is using a Japanese technique to create a perfectly even custard, not realising you can just buy custard at Coles. Meanwhile, Sumeet is cooking a Dr Seuss story, which is very problematic and could get her dish banned from school libraries. Also, Sue is here.
“We’ve got high expectations,” shouts Sofia. Did she pronounce it like “eggs-pectations”? Can’t be sure, but there’s grounds for a royal commission to investigate.
Lachlan is flustered as he mixes various seafood preparatory to sticking it inside an egg. Andy and Sofia watch like vultures from the sidelines, barely containing their excitement at the prospect of seeing Lachlan fail. Meanwhile Australian Josh looks in the oven and notices that his souffle hasn’t risen, which is both a bad sign and a powerfully apt metaphor.
Time is running out. Nat refuses to give in. She has produced a plate of yellow strings and two cups of green slime and couldn’t be happier. “I’m definitely not using my immunity pin,” she declares (foreshadowing?). Alex pops up to claim, “I’m a bit of a madman”, but with Josh’s souffle and Lachlan’s stuffed egg in this kitchen, it’s all relative. Meanwhile, Steve’s backup egg has broken, which is a tragedy but nothing he can’t handle, as when you drive airboats in the NT backup eggs break all the time. Sofia drops by to tell Steve that everything is screwed and he has no hope. Steve thanks her for her help.
“We’ve got high expectations,” shouts Sofia. Did she pronounce it like “eggs-pectations”? Can’t be sure, but there’s grounds for a royal commission to investigate. With two minutes left, Nat runs into the garden, but discovers the gates locked, so she has to come back in and pretends she was just out there to pick flowers.
Time is up, and the judges brace themselves. Sav serves her steamed egg curry. Though she is unhappy with the plating, the judges love it, proving that sometimes, how food tastes can be more important than what the plate looks like. Rarely, but sometimes.
Australian Josh serves what, in theory, could possibly be a cheese souffle, but in practice looks like a kind of waterlogged pikelet. Jean-Christophe tells Josh that he admires him for having the courage to make such an abomination in public.
American Josh serves fried donuts, and as this is the first we’ve seen of him, he’s safe. Sue serves a lemon and egg chicken soup, but the judges forgive her. Gill serves “egg cha”, which is tasty, but she also says “eggs-ample”, so she might get sent home just for that. Harry serves a tuna and egg tartare, which sounds as gross as it looks, but as always, the judges award extra points for grossness.
And now back to the people who have actually been in this episode. Nat serves a plate of green stuff that looks like it’s been through at least one digestive system already. What a surprise, the judges love it.
Now it’s crunch time for Lachlan’s stuffed egg, which he’s already pretty much given up on. He has served the egg in a Moreton Bay bug shell, creating the overall impression of a dead crustacean that has been left on the beach for a month. Poh tells him she loves the sauce, as a way of gently breaking the news that everything else is terrible. The judges are scathing about Lachlan’s hubris: he has flown too close to the sun and will be punished.
Mimi comes and goes very quickly. So does Sumeet. Alex has overcooked her custard and Poh is worried about her. Darrsh brings forward his Bombe Alaska and is quickly worshipped as a god.
And then comes Steve, with his airboat-inspired tempura eggs. He doesn’t know if the yolk is runny. The tension is so high that Sofia explodes in a fireball and we have to watch some ads to calm down. When we return, she cuts the egg, the yolk doesn’t run and everyone agrees that Steve has sinned against God and nature. But then the second one is runny! But then the third one isn’t! It’s all so confusing! Eggs are complicated, man. Andy is sad, because if it weren’t for the eggs, Steve’s eggs would have been great.
Sav is declared to have made the dish of the day. “Food is made of memories,” says Sofia, wildly unscientifically. More importantly, the worst dishes of the day were Steve’s, Lachlan’s and Alex’s. What is worse: egg that doesn’t run, egg that is filled with horrid seafood, or overcooked custard? The answer, as it turns out, is the non-runny egg.
Gloomy silence envelops the room as Steve leaves the kitchen, to pursue his food dreams or possibly to start a reptile farm. He will be missed. It’s been a fun day, but nobody feels like cracking any yolks now.
Tune in Wednesday, when Miki Terasaki continues to beg for freedom.
