Original subtitles

It's the battle for the ultimate culinary prize.

WHIMPERING

60 of the country's best home cooks....

I need to stop shaking.

..all with their heart set...

Not really sure what I'm doing.

Flaming brilliant.

..on the coveted MasterChef trophy.

This is the sort of stuff that dreams are made of.

That is a cracker of a job.

This is absolutely banging.

Yes! Each week, 12 extraordinary amateur talents...

GASPING

..battle for a place...

Yum, yum, yum. Oh, wow. That's hot.

..in the quarterfinal. I think it's delicious.

This is a revelation. Congratulations.

But only the best can earn their passports

to the ultimate cookery showdown.

A British culinary icon is just

about to enter the MasterChef kitchen.

Are we ready for this?

Concentrate. I cannot stand it!

I like it. I love it.

21 years of MasterChef.

And every year, our expectations get higher and higher.

Light the stoves, get yourself a clean apron.

Let's find some talent.

These six passionate home cooks all think they've got what it takes

to become MasterChef champion.

But at the end of today's heat,

only three will make it through to this week's quarterfinal.

To be in the MasterChef competition is really like

a dream come true for me.

It just feels surreal to be here, finally.

I'm here to see if I am as good

a cook as everyone's been telling me I am.

I'll be very upset if I find out today that I actually can't cook.

I feel like I need to do about ten star jumps before I go in,

but once we get in there, we'll be good.

Welcome to the MasterChef kitchen.

Your job is to cook like an absolute superstar,

and our job is to discover talent.

This round we call Basic To Brilliant.

We've asked you to take

an everyday ingredient and elevate it to

the absolutely fantastic.

At the end of this, Gregg and I will choose our two favourite dishes

and the people who cook those will get themselves a MasterChef apron.

That does mean there'll be four

of you who will have to cook again for the last two remaining aprons.

Ladies and gentlemen, one hour and 20 minutes.

Let's cook.

24-year-old Elisha lives with his family

in Kingston upon Thames

and currently works as a delivery dispatcher,

but hopes to open his own Mexican street food pop-up restaurant.

Food means the world to me.

I grew up in Zimbabwe and we grew a lot of corn, sugar cane,

a lot of vegetables,

so I really gained an appreciation for ingredients that way.

Elisha, what is your humble ingredient?

Pasta.

So my dish is a raviolo single

of watercress with mascarpone,

and a egg yolk in the middle.

And I've got a celeriac puree with a fricassee of wild mushrooms,

some crispy parsnips and some Tenderstem broccoli.

Fabulous. And what do you want from this experience, my friend?

What I want is to showcase to a lot of young men that cooking is fun.

Raviolo, a singular large parcel of pasta.

We need pasta to be nice and thin.

Egg yolk ravioli, notoriously, into a pot of boiling water

bounce into each other, they explode. And if they explode,

he doesn't have a pasta parcel at all.

He's got scrambled-egg water.

London-based vegetarian Sophie works

in post-production for film and television.

She dreams of one day creating recipes

and writing her own cookbook celebrating

the plant-based food foods she loves.

When I was younger, I used to beg my parents to stay up

and watch MasterChef,

and my dad would always cave in and go, "Oh, go ahead."

I lost my dad about seven years ago.

He's definitely a big part of the reason why I'm doing this today.

Sophie... Mm? ..what is your basic ingredient

you hope to take to brilliant? Mushrooms.

These are my staple. I don't have steak or chicken,

I have oyster mushrooms instead. So what dish are you making, please?

A wild mushroom tortellini with a mushroom and cashew puree,

white wine and cream foam, with a chive oil.

What are you hoping for from MasterChef?

I'm just hoping to push myself.

I love cooking, I love dancing and making some good food.

Sophie's going completely plant-based,

and she is even making her pasta dough without any eggs.

It's just semolina, which is quite a thick flour.

She's also got plain flour and water and salt. That's it.

Now, this will be interesting to see if this holds together.

NHS worker Yen now resides in Cumbria

after growing up in Southeast Asia

with her Vietnamese mother and Thai father.

She likes to cook the food of her heritage

and combine it with the best of her local ingredients.

My strength in the kitchen is probably time management,

so she says!

Here is the first step of hopefully transitioning from

a home cook to doing this more professionally.

Yen's basic ingredient is crab.

The white meat, she's taking the claws

and she's going to dip them in a tempura batter and deep fry them.

All the brown meat she's going to make into a custard mixture,

and she's going to steam that in the shell.

That's going to be served with a broth, which is rich

with crab shells and prawn shells and pork.

We're also going to get prawns and sliced belly pork,

all wrapped together with shiso leaf

and lettuce leaf, inside a little wrap.

Yen has around about 35 different ingredients on her bench.

If she can't take something

from basic to brilliant with 35 ingredients,

then there's going to be an issue.

How many places in the world have you lived?

God. OK, so born in Vietnam. My dad is Thai.

Laos, Cambodia, Macau, Singapore.

How did you go from Hanoi to Cumbria?

Well, by my husband.

We worked together in Singapore for about eight years.

And then we decided sort of four years ago to move back here.

It's nice to get started.

Trying to ignore everybody else and everything else.

Chartered surveyor Mark was inspired

to cook at a young age by his parents.

Having lost his wife suddenly in 2022,

his ambition is to help other people who need to learn to cook

for themselves by launching

a cooking platform for other widowers.

She would be very proud.

Losing Jane is the only reason that I am here.

I would not be here were it not for the fact that I lost her.

What is your basic ingredient, please, sir?

My basic ingredient today is rice. I am making nasi goreng.

Nasi goreng is Indonesian for fried rice,

with prawn and spicy chicken, a cucumber

Indonesian salad, and an omelette on the top.

Where have you learnt Asian cookery, Mark?

Well, it was my father that taught me, as he spent

a lot of time in the Far East at

the back end of the Second World War,

because he was a pilot over there, and he had his own recipe book,

which he created and I now have,

with the original nasi goreng recipe.

That's an extraordinary story.

Nasi goreng is a dry fried rice.

It doesn't have a sauce in it as such,

but it needs something with it to make it lovely and saucy.

He's using satay sauce.

Grilled chicken on the side, which has got lots of spice,

including huge amounts of turmeric, garlic and chilli.

He's taken the skin off the chicken,

so it needs to be still nice and moist.

Gosh, time just disappears, doesn't it?

It sounds quite simple,

but there's lots and lots

of different processes going on here.

25 minutes left.

32-year-old tax adviser Gabriele grew up in Genoa,

Northern Italy, and was taught to cook by his grandmothers.

I hope I have the opportunity to show my Italian heritage,

taking the judges to the place where I was born,

using a traditional Italian food.

What is your basic ingredient? It's mussels,

because when I was super young, my grandma always cooked mussels.

Have you got one of Nonna's recipes now?

Correct. Yeah. It's tortelli filled with mussels

in a cannellini beans broth, with tomatoes confit

and roasted broccoli. How much cooking do you do?

Basically every single day

because my wife doesn't like cooking, so...

Does your wife think you are a very good cook?

Actually, I haven't got a ten on ten from her.

The pasta needs to be nice and thin,

and then it needs to be cooked all the way through.

Mussels, tomatoes, beans - lovely combination.

But in a pasta dish? This is unusual.

Mortgage broker Hannah spends most

of her time in the kitchen cooking for her three-year-old son, Albert.

Her dream is to create her own online cooking brand

and share recipes with her followers.

Cooking is how I express myself.

So if I cook for you,

then I love you.

Hannah, what's your basic ingredient, please?

My basic ingredient is sugar.

So I'm making a spiced apple sponge cake,

whisky caramel and vanilla ice cream.

And a praline tuile.

You're the only person doing a dessert.

I've always been quite confident with sweet dishes.

I make a lot of cakes for birthdays and things like that,

so I thought I'll stick to my strengths today.

Any cooks in your family? My mum's a very good cook.

She was a dinner lady at my school,

which was mortifying when I was growing up.

Hannah's using sugar in many different ways here.

She is making for us a praline tuile,

which is made from sugar. She's making a whisky caramel sauce,

which is made from sugar.

She's making us an apple spice cake, which has got sugar in it.

I hope nothing goes wrong for Hannah because it sounds fantastic.

Everything's coming together how it should.

I'm cautiously optimistic.

You have just five minutes, please. Get it on a plate.

What's left to go on there? So we've got foam, mushrooms...

You've got about 60 seconds. I would do it right now.

Everything right now, if I was you. Everything right now, got it.

That's it. Everybody stop!

SHE SIGHS

Delivery dispatcher Elisha's basic to brilliant ingredient was pasta.

He's made spinach, mascarpone and egg yolk raviolo

with a wild mushroom fricassee, Tenderstem broccoli,

celeriac puree, parsnip crisp

and a mushroom and watercress foam.

The pasta is cooked nicely.

And inside there you've got

the creamy mascarpone and you've got the iron-rich spinach there,

and the egg yolk is enriching it.

And that's worked absolutely brilliantly well.

But I'm not convinced it all goes together as one dish.

This very pretty ensemble on the side here,

I'm not sure it's an accompaniment for the raviolo.

You've got fantastic crisp parsnip crisps.

You've got really lovely smooth celeriac puree.

Mushrooms cooked beautifully, broccoli seasoned very,

very well. I like what you're doing, but this doesn't work together.

They were impressed by the cooking techniques and everything.

It's just two separate meals, which is quite disappointing.

Assistant colourist Sophie is showcasing mushrooms and has made

a plant-based dish of wild mushroom tortellini

with cashew and mushroom puree,

and a white wine foam, split with chive oil.

Very good use of the mushroom. Really well-made pasta.

I'm getting really nice flavours throughout this of woody mushroom.

There's a little bit of acidity that's coming from your foam,

because it's got the white wine, and it's showing

a fair amount of process and skill.

The cashew nut puree is quite rich and very, very thick.

I think you've done a very good job. I think it's a really pretty dish.

Good on you, Sophie. Thank you.

I think I've done well, but everyone's looked so good,

so we'll just see.

Combining her upbringing

in Southeast Asia and her Cumbrian home,

Yen has used her basic ingredient of Cumbrian brown crab to make

crab, tomato and pork belly noodle broth,

tempura crab claws,

a set crab custard with tofu,

and a pork and prawn spring roll.

You've raised expectation incredibly with this presentation.

Your crab custard, there's a little bit of graininess coming from

the brown crab meat and the tofu, but seasoned well,

that's a wonderful thing. The broth is good, but it's very,

very subtle.

I love your tempura.

I think you've made those brilliantly well.

This little spring roll with the chewy pork,

with the firm prawn, I love that. And that shiso.

But I'm not sure about all these rocks and sticks,

and I think I'd rather you focused on food.

I wanted to make a good impression

in terms of the presentation,

and perhaps I might have overdone it.

Chartered surveyor Mark has used his basic ingredient

of rice to make a nasi goreng -

Indonesian fried rice with prawns and chicken,

topped with an omelette,

served with cucumber salad and a satay sauce.

These prawns don't look cooked,

and I think the undercooked prawns are going to be joined... Oh, no.

..by a bit of undercooked chicken.

The rice, smoky with turmeric, sweet red onions,

good amount of chilli - that's really, really good.

And then a nice omelette across the top.

It's just a shame the rest of it is not cooked enough.

The issue isn't one of lack of cookery skill.

It might be the lack of a wristwatch.

MARK CHUCKLES

I've never done anything quite so stressful in my life.

The very fact that I'm probably going to have to cook again,

I'm not fazed by at all. In fact, I'll enjoy it.

Tax adviser Gabriele is showcasing mussels,

and has made garlic mussel-filled tortelli,

confit baby plum tomatoes,

and chilli-roasted broccoli,

served in a mussel and cannellini broth, split with herb oil.

I really like that broth, subtle with the flavour of mussels.

A little bit of mealiness coming from those cannellini beans,

a little bit of herb oil running through it.

I really didn't expect

those flavours from that little innocent-looking broth.

I really like that a lot.

The mussels are naturally sweet and naturally salty,

and you can clearly taste them inside that pasta.

I find the pasta too thick. I can also clearly see

white lines across the edges there of uncooked flour. Thank you.

I don't have any regrets,

but obviously there's room for improvement.

Mortgage broker Hannah, who wanted to hero sugar,

has made spiced apple cake,

topped with a whisky caramel sauce,

almond praline tuile,

and diced apples, served with a vanilla ice cream.

I'm really, really enjoying this.

That's a nice sponge.

A moist sponge with a crust around the outside.

There's a little bit of cinnamon, a little bit of nutmeg.

That whisky sauce is phenomenal.

I like it a lot.

Ice cream - fantastic. Smooth as silk,

rich with vanilla. Great tuile on the side.

You've used sugar everywhere except for the apples.

I think it's very, very good indeed. Thank you.

Oh, God!

SHE SIGHS

Never expected to get feedback that good.

Thank you very much for all your hard work.

We have chosen our favourite dishes

and those cooks are grabbing an apron.

Our first contestant getting an apron is...

..Hannah.

The second contestant getting an apron is...

..Sophie.

Congratulations. Oh, my gosh! Thank you.

The pair of you, get your aprons. Well deserved!

Oh! Oh, my God!

I can't believe it.

Oh, God!

That's amazing.

Apart from my son being born, that was, like,

the best moment of my entire life.

I'm absolutely buzzing.

I've got my white apron on, so I guess it's go time now.

Put any disappointment behind you.

You now have a job to do,

and that is to grab yourself one of these aprons.

This is the mystery box round.

In front of you all there is a box.

And inside that box there are three common ingredients.

Could you please all reveal your ingredients?

Coffee, chocolate and plums.

And what we'd like you to do for us, please, is cook for us a dish

using any one, two or three of those ingredients.

But whatever you use needs to be the star of the show.

Alongside whatever ingredients you choose,

you can use whatever you like from the larder over there.

There are only two aprons up for grabs, and that does mean

at the end of this, two of you will be going home.

45 minutes. We want two portions of your dish.

Let's cook.

My thoughts are, uh, we'll see how we go.

Erm, not decided yet.

But just sort of taking it all in.

In this round, they have to plan.

They can't just chuck it in a pot, and stir and hope for the best.

Coffee, chocolate and plums together in a pot is not going to work.

I'm just trying to see how they actually come together.

If I use one element well enough, it could work.

What are you going to use from the box?

I'm going to use the plums.

I'm making a deconstructed cheesecake

with poached plums, pureed,

with a blackberry compote,

a hazelnut tuile, as well.

I'm kind of winging it, but...

Mate, you are risking everything here.

A deconstructed cheesecake?

I don't know why we don't just have cheesecake.

I suppose with deconstructed, you can get more presentation.

Can he make this a coherent plate of food?

Mystery box - what ingredients are you going to use?

So, plum in two ways.

One is a sauce.

The other one, the slice of plum, duck breast.

Anything else going with it, any starch or anything?

Uh, no.

Cos, uh, if it's cooked well, then I will be satisfied.

Gabriele is doing a duck breast with a plum sauce.

Great, that works.

But with what? That's only half a dish.

25 minutes gone, everybody.

I'm using the coffee and, indeed, the plums.

So, tell us what your dish is.

It's a lemon coffee posset.

And then on the side you've got a fruit salad?

And there may be something else as well, if I can figure out

what else to do with them.

You haven't quite worked out the dish, have you?

I'm not a puddings person, I've got to admit.

So I'm learning fast.

I've never had a lemon coffee posset before.

The coffee posset works and it sets, fantastic.

Fridge?

But Mark is making up the recipe as he is going.

So, I'm going to use the chocolate and the espresso powder.

I love both, and I think they will be great in any dessert.

Brilliant. What are you making?

So, I'm making one of my favourite desserts,

which is the mille-feuille.

Beautiful, beautiful.

Where did you learn to do this?

Uh, from books!

I really enjoy baking since I came here,

so it's kind of a new-found hobby.

Puff pastry has got to be cool before she assembles

the whole thing - that's the important bit.

Otherwise, the warm puff pastry will melt the cream.

Sorry, how long left?

Two minutes left. Two minutes, guys.

Uh...

A bit softer than I would have liked it,

but it will work.

Uh, I think this is the right point,

75 maximum temperature inside, so...

Should be good enough, hopefully.

That's it, your time's up. Stop, everybody, please.

Well done. Well done, everybody.

Gabriele chose the plums from the mystery box.

He's made sliced cooked plums,

a plum peppercorn sauce,

and a blueberry and red onion reduction,

served with pan-roasted duck breast.

You've cooked the duck flesh very well,

and the plum is a really good addition to it.

You've got lovely sharp sliced plums underneath,

which have got a bitterness coming from the skin.

You've got a sweeter plum sauce,

which is slightly spiced with peppercorn.

It's a very small portion.

So I thought there might be something else on the plate,

showing more skill.

I found the invention test quite challenging.

They told me that I should do something more.

I think that it was fair.

Mark has used all three ingredients to make a lemon and espresso posset,

with a plum fruit salad,

raspberry coulis, and chocolate shavings.

Lemon and coffee is an interesting combination.

It tastes odd.

However, your raspberry sauce, which is quite sweet and sour,

with the coffee, is good.

That is really good creamy-but-thick texture.

But the lemon and the coffee is a tough one to take.

I'm relieved that it's over.

But, nevertheless, I got something for them to critique -

and that's fine - instead of nothing at all,

which was a possibility at one point.

Elisha chose the plums.

He's made a deconstructed cheesecake,

with a vanilla mascarpone cream, plum puree,

salted biscuit base,

and fresh plums and blackberries soaked in an amaretto liqueur.

I've got that tang of the cheese,

I've got sweetness of sugar and vanilla,

I can taste the plum throughout as well.

And you have got a crumbly biscuit buttery base in there

with a little hint of salt.

Yes.

Good use of the ingredients, plums in different ways,

different spicing, different textures, different flavourings.

Yeah, it's good. Thank you.

It would mean a lot for me to get that apron, so I can show

how much potential I have throughout the competition.

Yen has used the coffee and dark chocolate to make a mille-feuille,

with chocolate ganache, a Marsala mascarpone cream,

fresh raspberries and blueberries layered between puff pastry,

and a coffee creme diplomat sauce.

Yen, I think you've done a pretty good job here.

Your chocolate underneath, that's really bitter.

And in the cream diplomat, again, coffee is bitter.

So, the whole thing for me could be a little bit sweeter.

But I admire all the work.

I like your use of the chocolate and the coffee.

You've got some decent ideas.

I'm intrigued by you.

I feel all right, actually. I think the comments are fair.

So, yeah, I'm really glad.

Two of them are going to get aprons and join Sophie and Hannah

in the next round, and two of them are going to go home.

Elisha had what he called a deconstructed cheesecake.

It had the tang of cheese, it had vanilla.

It was great.

It tasted good.

Let's put Elisha through.

Mark made us a lemon posset, flavoured with coffee.

I'm not convinced.

It just didn't quite work.

Gabriele - we did get good duck flesh.

I thought the use of the plums was good.

John, it was a minuscule little plate.

Was a small dish, and I would have liked to have seen something else

from him to show me a little bit more skill.

Yen, huge amount of work.

It probably could have just been a bit sweeter.

A puff pastry mille-feuille, that is ambitious.

Getting an apron, I think it will make me feel incredibly proud.

I hope I've done enough.

Obviously I really want that white apron.

But I think that apron is a destination -

I really enjoy the journey.

I would be disappointed if I were to go home now,

and I think I would only improve if I were to progress.

We only have two aprons, which does mean, sadly,

two of you will be going home.

Our first contestant getting a MasterChef apron is...

..Elisha. Congratulations.

Second contestant getting an apron is...

..Yen.

Mark, Gabriele, you are leaving us.

Thank you very much indeed. Thanks very much, gentlemen.

Thank you. Great to meet you. Take care. Thank you.

It was a great experience, an amazing journey,

and I enjoy every single second in the MasterChef kitchen.

So I will miss it.

Life is all about experiences,

and what an experience this has been,

leading up to it and being part of it.

Wonderful.

Elisha, Yen, come up and get yourselves an apron.

Congratulations. Very well done.

Thank you.

Oh, I worked so hard for this.

This is a great beginning,

and I really hope to be able to go as far as I could.

I will just give it my best each time.

I've got the cooking bug right now.

I just want to go again, and again, and again, and again.

This is a big challenge.

You are going to be presenting your food today, not just to us,

but to guests who know all about this competition,

because they were in it.

The winner and runner-up from 2021,

that's Tom Rhodes and Alexina Anatole.

And you've got the winner from 2018, Kenny Tutt.

There are just three quarterfinal places up for grabs.

That does mean, sadly, one of you will be going home.

Ladies and gentlemen, two courses in an hour and 15 minutes.

Let's cook.

Getting an apron in the first round, I thought I'd be quite chilled.

But I am not chill, and I'm really excited,

and I just want to keep going.

What are you making, Sophie?

Tarte tatin.

And I've got baby leeks with some chamomile,

some agave and plant-based feta cream.

For my main, a Middle Eastern-style stew.

It's charred aubergine and blistered tomatoes,

with pulled oyster mushrooms,

and that'll be on a bed of whipped tahini.

What do you want the dining room to think of it?

I want them to think that it's creative and it's taking some,

like, basic plant-based ingredients

and just elevating them with loads of punchy flavours.

This leek tarte tatin intrigues me.

The leeks, I mean, they're a hardy little vegetable.

They've got to cook down.

If not, they're going to be really, really chewy,

and they need to be slippery.

She's also got agave, which is like a honey. I get that.

The one I'm not sure about is the camomile.

That's a powerful flavour.

Main course, we've got what she calls a stew.

If we've got aubergines, which are wet,

tomatoes when they cook down, which are wet,

tahini, which is sesame seed paste, which is wet,

the whole thing could be a little bit too wet.

So, today I'm making a mushroom spring roll

with truffle honey, blue cheese sauce for starter.

And then, for mains, I'm making risotto with pho spice.

Pho is a Vietnamese broth.

It's got cinnamon, you've got black cardamom, you've got fennel,

coriander seeds, cloves as well.

Usually it goes with a kind of rice noodle.

I'm serving it with beef marinated in pho spice,

Asian herb dressing and pea sauce.

This is very fusion, Yen.

Yes, Vietnamese is my roots,

and Italian is something that I really love.

Yen's two courses sound really fascinating to me.

They really are fusion.

Those spring rolls need to be really crispy on the outside,

the filling needs to be ample.

Honey and blue cheese sauce?

Truffle blue cheese?

All together, that's a lot going on.

Main course, we've got a piece of steak flavoured with pho spice.

Then she's got risotto, which is the flavours of pho.

And around it all, a sweet pea and mint sauce.

This is very eclectic flavourings.

This is risky, in the sense that if I'm not doing a dish that has been

tried and tested in the kitchen,

I hope people will enjoy it as much as I did.

Getting an apron is a feeling I will never forget.

I'll remember it forever.

I'm nowhere near ready to leave the competition.

I have a lot more to show.

What are your two courses?

So, my starter is a sweet potato chaat,

some tamarind chutney, mint chutney, sweetened yoghurt,

and a papri.

It's almost like a cracker.

For the main course, we've got a black pepper chicken fry.

So, it's a curry from South India.

Paired with that, we've got a basmati rice.

In the last couple of rounds, you've cooked predominantly,

really, European-style dishes.

So, I like to do, like, a world tour of food.

So, what I'd like to do for you guys is give you a world tour

of different cuisines.

His first course, he's doing sweet potato chaat -

a chaat being a street food snack - with different types of chutneys.

He needs soft sweet potatoes, but not mushy.

And on the side of that, he's making a crispy piece of bread as well,

something he calls a papri.

I've never had a papri before.

He says he's going to fry it. I hope it's not greasy in any way.

For his main course, got a Keralan pepper-fried chicken.

That has got to be moist chicken, that has got to be a spiced sauce,

and that rice has got to be light, fluffy and perfect.

I really want to show my son that it's never too late

to follow your dreams.

I'm hoping that, one day, you know, when your friends sort of talk about

your mum's cooking, he can be like, "Well, my mum was on MasterChef!"

I'm doing cod poached in curry sauce

and fragrant rice, with pineapple pickle,

tamarind chutney and a coriander chutney.

How many times in your life have you had cod and pineapple?

I just discovered it.

And I have pickled pineapple on everything at the moment.

And it does go really well, I think.

That fish has got to fall apart in thick, slippery, almost slices,

without cutting, comes away in flakes.

Pickled pineapple on the side?

It's like someone stuck a kipper in me pina colada,

and I'm not quite convinced.

We saw a great dessert from you in that last round.

Have we got more dessert?

You do.

I'm doing deconstructed lemon and ginger cheesecake.

So, I've got lemon and ginger syrup on the bottom,

and then I'm making a cheesecake cream,

Chantilly cream, lemon curd,

a biscuit crumb and a tuile.

The beauty of a cheesecake is you go from the top,

which is lovely and creamy, into the bottom,

which is nice and crunchy.

And when you eat it, those two textures come together.

Deconstructing it and making it more crumbly,

you don't get that elegance.

Going to be really sharp.

Yep.

Oh...

You've had 25 minutes, Sophie.

You've got 35 minutes on your first course.

Always such a joy to be back at MasterChef.

Certainly a lot more relaxing and more enjoyable

on this side of the table.

It's so easy to try and over-impress in this round.

This is a round to nail the flavours, keep it simple,

and do a few things really, really well.

There's nerves, there's exhilaration.

Sweating, sometimes crying, sometimes laughing.

Good to be back. Always.

At the end of the day, just carry on.

Keep calm and carry on cooking.

Cheers. Cheers. Yeah, lovely to see you. Thank you very much.

You have got nine minutes on your first course.

OK?

I'm on time. I'm on...

I'm telling myself I'm on time.

Sophie's starter is baby leek tarte tatin,

with camomile and agave.

The thing I'm slightly unsure about is the chamomile and the agave.

I'm like, I'm not sure whether we need more sweetness,

cos the leeks are inherently sweet.

And the camomile, I'm like, oh, is that going to add something?

Are we going to be able to taste it?

Hey! Yay!

Come on. Three more.

At least with the feta cream, you're going to get that sort of seasoning

that's quite salty.

Maybe it needs that just to sort of lift the dish

and give that seasoning naturally.

Happy with that? I'm happy.

You sure you've got everything on it? All good.

Great. Off you go.

Thanks, guys.

She did well.

Hiya! Hello.

Hi, Sophie.

Hiya. How are you guys?

Good. Very well. Looking forward to this.

I've made a leek tarte tatin.

It's topped with pistachios,

and that's finished with a feta cream.

Thank you. Enjoy. Thank you, Sophie. Cheers.

Beautifully cooked pastry.

You can see it flaking all over the plate,

which is what I absolutely love.

The camomile, it is complementary flavour.

There's lovely sweetness coming through the dish,

but it's not too sweet overall.

That feta cream really does help to sort of bring it back.

Sophie's really balanced this well.

It's really, really tasty, and I would definitely finish it.

It's got a good balance of the sour sharpness of the cheese,

the butteriness of the puff pastry,

and also that lovely bite of those leeks.

Flavours are good, I really, really like them.

Right, 15 minutes for this Middle Eastern stew.

Right? Let's go.

Sophie's main course is a Middle Eastern-inspired stew,

with charred aubergine, blistered tomatoes

and pulled oyster mushrooms, on a bed of whipped tahini,

served with za'atar and sumac flatbreads.

There's not a lot of texture within the stew, so I want a flatbread

that's going to add a little bit of textural contrast.

Is a stew enough for this round of MasterChef?

How do you make a stew look beautiful?

Ooh, nice. That looks good.

Well done, you. Off you go. Thank you.

Hello. Hello. I'm back.

Thank you.

I have made for you a Middle Eastern-style stew

on a bed of whipped tahini.

And we've got some za'atar and sumac flatbreads to go with it.

Enjoy, guys.

Looks great.

I feel overwhelmed, but I got them out.

Well, I'm going to start with the flatbreads, cos I loved those.

They are pillowy soft,

delicious with za'atar and the sumac over them,

they've got a nice char.

So Sophie really nailed that.

The mushroom, the pulled oyster mushroom, such a meaty texture.

Then you've got that warmth coming through there as well.

I really like the tahini, adds that sort of creaminess.

It's super smooth as well.

Absolutely delicious, spectacular,

beautiful plant-based food.

It's stew-like in texture.

But it's not wet in any way.

And that sauce is not bleeding into that tahini.

It's holding itself really nicely.

This bread's cooked.

This is nice.

Really nice.

Yen's starter is mushroom spring rolls with black truffle,

truffle honey and a blue cheese dipping sauce.

Spring rolls, which obviously is a Southeast Asian element,

but then we have truffle, which is in a lot of Italian cuisine,

and we have the blue cheese dipping sauce,

which is kind of reminding me of the US.

Are they going to come together?

Are you happy? I am, yes.

Well done, Yen. Looks great.

Go, Yen. Well done, you.

Fusion express on its way.

Hello.

Hey. Hello.

I've made you mushroom spring rolls, with truffle,

drizzle of honey with truffle.

I know it sounds like a lot of truffle.

And then you got the blue cheese dipping on the side.

Thank you.

The filling is pretty nice, I think.

You get a good umami richness from the mushrooms.

The blue cheese, I don't think it really adds anything.

And the truffle, I just don't think they sort of work too well

together in harmony.

Nobody can say that Yen didn't pack in the flavour.

I'm just trying to decide whether or not I would order it again.

This is playing with flavours.

This is like one of those really funky packs of crisps you get.

Blue cheese, vinegar, beef and honey.

No.

You've got 15 minutes. Yep.

OK? Yep.

Yen's main course is pho-spiced risotto,

with marinated pho-spiced ribeye steak.

I'm really interested to see how she blends those Vietnamese flavours

with kind of what seems like more-Italian-based cooking

with the risotto.

But give me a perfect risotto, give me a perfect steak, I'm happy.

Yen, she's a real fusion cook.

It's exciting, I can't wait to try it,

but it also makes me a little bit nervous.

Let's go, let's go, let's go.

Hello. Hi again. Hello again.

So, for the mains, I've made you risotto in pho broth,

with steak marinated in pho spice.

And I promised pea veloute, but it's more of a pea sauce.

Thank you. Well done. Thank you so much, Yen. Well done.

It wasn't perfect, but I hope the guest judges would appreciate

what I am trying to do.

I hope people get what I'm trying to do.

The steak, I thought, was cooked really, really nice

and had a nice seasoning.

I love pho, and it's usually a beautifully clean light broth.

And we've put it in a risotto.

There's some dairy in there, and it all feels kind of muddied.

And, for me, the rice is a little undercooked,

so it's still a little chalky.

The veloute is pretty nice,

it's got a nice pea and mint flavour.

But I don't think these three things go together.

The rice is obviously undercooked.

The pea sauce itself is too liquid.

And the steak is undercooked.

Fusion food should be big, bold flavours from different parts,

that have come together as a marriage -

and this doesn't.

Going all right.

I'm going to blowtorch.

Two minutes on your first course, please.

So, Elisha's starter is a sweet potato chaat, with tamarind chutney,

mint chutney and sweetened yoghurt, with papri.

Chaat is a delicious thing.

It usually has a wonderful combination of sweet and sour

and tangy and salty flavours.

Which I'm hoping we're going to get those all through really clearly.

I love a condiment, so the fact that we've not got just one,

two, but three condiments here, I'm very, very happy.

I love those colours.

Done? Done. Here you go.

Hooray!

Come on. Go, go, go.

That's it. Well done, you.

Hi. Hello, hi. Hello. How are you?

Good, thank you.

There you go. Thank you.

So, I've made for you a sweet potato chaat with tamarind chutney,

coriander and mint chutney,

sweetened yoghurt and some little crackers -

they're called papri.

Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you.

Wow, does it pack a punch!

You've got that sweet, sour tamarind,

real kick with that coriander chutney,

the kind of yoghurt kind of brings it back down.

The sweet potato's cooked really well.

It's soft and sweet,

but then you've also got a bit of char on it, which is nice,

that knocks back the sweetness.

When you put this on a little bit of the papri,

you get that lovely little sort of street food snack that you're after.

So, yeah, I think he's done a really good job.

Just delicious. I mean, you look down at that bowl

and you don't expect very much,

and what it delivers is just way above expectation.

He's delivering everything he said he was going to deliver.

Right, you ready? 15 minutes.

You've got to get that chicken on sharpish.

Yes, I will. Yeah.

So, Elisha's main is Keralan chicken pepper fry

with basmati rice and an Indian salad.

With the time you've got,

it's about how you're going to get that spicing into the chicken.

I mean, is it just that little bit of coating around the outside,

or has he managed to sort of penetrate the meat?

With basmati rice, we want it beautifully fragrant,

nice and fluffy, separated grains.

Hooray! Perfect. Good.

Go, Elisha. Good work. Well done.

Hello.

Right, so, I've made for you a chicken pepper fry

with fragrant basmati rice and an Indian salad. Enjoy.

Yes, I'm feeling quite happy with myself.

I got eight plates done.

HE SIGHS

Oh, my God.

Nothing like I've ever done before in my life, ever.

This guy is not scared of flavour,

and I am a fan, because there are whole spices in there.

Lovely, moist chicken thigh.

Perfectly cooked rice,

nice and fluffy. I think this is a very successful dish.

Then you notice little bits, like his little tomato concasse,

his knife skills with the onion.

There's a chef here.

That's a proper, proper spicy gravy wrapped around that chicken.

I'd be very, very happy to pay for that.

Nothing's in the oven, but it is on.

Hannah's main course is cod fillet poached in curry sauce,

fragrant rice.

How long have I got? Two minutes.

Poaching a piece of cod,

cod can dry out really quick and go like cotton wool.

Just needs to just sort of be just done and fall apart.

I really like the pickled pineapple.

The tamarind date chutney should be giving you nice sweet-and-sour

vibes, little pops of flavour.

Let's go, let's go, let's go. Looks good. That's great.

Hi! Hello. Hello.

Thank you.

So, today, I've made for you a cod poached in curry sauce

with a fragrant rice, pickled pineapple,

a tamarind chutney and a coriander chutney.

I hope you enjoy. Thank you. Cheers.

My fish is just about cooked.

The sauce is really nice.

It's really fragrant, coconutty and gentle.

The rice is nicely cooked. I love the little green chutney

and I love those elements of pickled pineapple.

To have that kind of sing through

that kind of rich, creamy curry sauce is great.

I really applaud all the hard graft that's gone into the dish,

but it's just the cod, which is the star of the show,

hasn't quite hit the mark.

The fish could do with a little bit more cooking.

It is just done.

That pineapple actually works for me because it's got a sharpness to it,

which is nice.

You've got two minutes, Hannah. Yeah.

Hannah's dessert is a deconstructed lemon and ginger cheesecake

with Chantilly cream and a tuile.

We've all had a cheesecake, right,

but let's just hope, being MasterChef,

there's just a little bit more to it.

How are they going to elevate it to the next level?

JOHN: It's got to go.

You did it all. Come on.

Hi! Hello. All right?

Thank you. So, I have made you

a deconstructed lemon and ginger cheesecake.

I hope you enjoy. Awesome. Thank you very much. Cheers.

I'm so relieved that is over.

I really hope I've impressed the guest judges

and that I've done enough to stay.

I really like the flavours of this.

There's this lovely little syrup in the bottom that's really punchy

with ginger and a bit of lemon. The crumb is also yummy.

I get the real warmth of ginger through that.

And I really love the fact that the lemon is, like, super-lemony.

It's really, really tangy. Perfectly elegant leaf tuile.

Really nice, light, refreshing dessert

with every element executed perfectly.

I'm enjoying the flavours.

Curd's delicious. Sharp lemon - that's really good.

The cream rich with vanilla - that's great.

The cream cheese mixture - slightly sweetened.

That is fantastic.

Some very good cooking, some unusual combinations,

and the odd little mistake, right?

The dining room's cook of the day was Elisha, and we agree.

We started off with a sweet potato chaat.

It delivered in flavour on bucket-loads.

That chicken pepper fry, absolutely delicious.

Mate, he's a star. Elisha has got himself a quarterfinal place.

There's also another star in the room for me,

and that is Sophie.

That tarte tatin with the baby leeks in,

with the vegetarian feta, we liked. But it was the stew.

I think it was a marvellous Middle Eastern-themed dish.

Good dishes and we all enjoyed them.

Sophie's going through.

Conversation now about Yen and about Hannah.

Yen cooked for us a fusion of ideas.

Spring roll in filo pastry with four types of mushrooms,

truffle honey across the top, and a blue cheese dip.

I couldn't quite get on with it.

That risotto needed a bit more cooking.

The steak needed a little bit more cooking.

For me, didn't taste like it was a fusion dish.

Hannah - there is a slight issue with the cooking of that cod.

We would have all liked it cooked a little bit more.

Good flavours nonetheless.

The dessert - the vanilla through the cream,

the lemon through the curd, the ginger through the biscuit,

the flavours were perfect.

Now that I'm here and I've experienced it,

I just want to keep cooking.

To cook in that kitchen is just amazing, yeah.

I hope that I've done enough to get myself a place in the quarterfinal,

but let's see.

We've got a decision to make.

Who's joining Elisha and Sophie in the quarterfinal?

Who's going home?

We only have three quarterfinal places.

That does mean, sadly, one of you will be going home.

We have made a decision.

The person leaving us is...

..Yen.

Thank you so much. Thank you. It's been really memorable.

Thank you so much. Well done.

I have absolutely no regret.

I think all the dishes that I did were dishes

that I really enjoy cooking, I enjoy creating,

so it's all good.

Elisha, Sophie, Hannah, do you know what you are?

You are MasterChef quarterfinalists! Congratulations.

THEY COO AND EXCLAIM

Well done, well done.

I couldn't have wished for a better feedback or response.

It's a dream come true.

It's been really tough, but it's all worth it.

The rush that you get afterwards is so good.

I'm gobsmacked. A quarterfinalist!

I did not think in my wildest dreams that this would happen.

Next time, it's the quarterfinal, and Hannah, Elisha and Sophie...

Uh-oh!

..will be joining Naomi, Michael and Victoria,

cooking for one of the UK's top restaurant critics.

Ooh! The stress!

The flavours are big. They're enticing.

You've done a great job here.