Original subtitles

It's the battle for the ultimate culinary prize. Oh-h-h!

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.

Yay! Each week, 12 extraordinary amateur talents... Oh!

..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.

I think this year has been an absolutely brilliant competition.

We've found some amazing cooks so far,

but we're looking for a few more.

These passionate home cooks

all think they've got what it takes to become

the next MasterChef champion.

But at the end of today's heat,

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

It feels really overwhelming. I'm anxious,

I'm emotional.

Oh, I feel...just everything! SHE LAUGHS

I'm very competitive. I don't like to lose.

It's going to take me out of my comfort zone,

but I just want to get on with it and show what I can do.

The pressure of being

in the MasterChef kitchen hasn't entirely kicked in.

If they have anything positive to say about my food,

I'll be flying.

Welcome to the MasterChef kitchen. We now know the standard

of this year's contestants is pretty high.

But that's not to say you can't match it.

Who knows? Maybe even better it.

This round, we call Basic To Brilliant.

Taking an ingredient from the everyday

and the ordinary and making it brilliant.

At the end of this, Gregg and I

will choose our two favourite dishes.

Mm. The people who've cooked those dishes will get themselves

a MasterChef apron and go straight through to the next round.

The rest of you will need to cook again

for the last two MasterChef aprons.

Ladies and gentlemen, 1 hour, 20 minutes. Let's cook.

Pasta making.

HE GRUNTS

Henry, a 32-year-old retail business manager from London,

discovered his passion for cooking at university,

and draws inspiration

from his collection of over 100 cookery books.

I've got a ridiculous amount of cookbooks.

I get quite bored if I just do one cuisine.

I watch a lot of MasterChef. I really like chopping,

and I really like my chopping to be lined up with music.

DANCE MUSIC SYNCOPATES WITH CHOPPING

Henry, you look like a bit of a cook to me.

Are you? Yeah, I really enjoy cooking.

I think the apron probably makes me look more professional than I am.

But, yeah, I love it. I find it really enjoyable.

What is it about cooking that appeals to you?

What do you love? Ironically, I find it really relaxing normally,

so... Yeah, it's obviously pretty stressful in here.

Any other hobbies? I've also tried some comedy before,

last year. It went OK, just, like, open-mic stuff.

But, ultimately, I got too nervous.

What is your basic ingredient?

My basic ingredient is spinach.

I think it's quite versatile. So I'm doing a spinach

and ricotta cappelletti with a tomato and pancetta base.

It's going to be striped pasta. It's a pretty cool look,

if it works.

Henry is showing off. He's going

to make us cappelletti - round in shape,

but has a little point on it, like a bishop's hat.

But his cappelletti's not going to be ordinary cappelletti.

He's using striped pasta - half plain white pasta,

half of it spinach, so it looks really, really beautiful.

I'm pleased with these, yeah, they're looking good.

The filling is made from ricotta and spinach.

If he doesn't drain his spinach properly,

the pasta will go soggy. Happy with the filling.

Just going to pipe them in here,

then close them, and then cook them off.

He's going to serve that with a tomato and pancetta sauce.

It should be a pretty plate. The question is, for Henry,

can he get it all done in the time? OK.

30-year-old business development consultant

Gabi grew up in Lithuania, and has

a passion for cooking French classics,

taking immense pride in presenting her dishes with elegance.

I am a feeder through and through.

There's probably little things

in life that bring me more joy than

when I give somebody a plate of food and they love it.

What is your basic ingredient, please, Gabi?

So it's the humble mushroom.

My fondest memories of my childhood is going foraging

with my grandparents, picking out of the woods the porcini.

What a lovely memory. Yeah. So what is your style of cookery?

So my style of cookery is pretty classic.

I love French cuisine, I love British cuisine,

but I really love fine dining.

So what's inspired this love of fine dining?

To be honest, it was my partner. The first year we were together,

he took me for a five-course tasting menu,

and ever since then, that's what we try to do as much as we can.

What's your dish, please?

So my dish is a mushroom and ricotta-filled tortellini

with a mushroom consomme and a mushroom tuile.

Ooh!

Gabi's using mushrooms in many different ways.

She is making mushroom tortellini.

I think the pasta is a bit too sticky,

but I don't have time to make another dough, so...

Inside the filling,

we've got ricotta and more mushrooms.

That's going to be served in a mushroom consomme, should end

up with an absolute crystal-clear mushroom soup.

Oh, my God! It's different than your own kitchen,

I'll tell you that much.

This sounds fantastic,

but is Gabi able to give us different flavours

and textures of a mushroom by making this dish?

If she can, we're talking about something magical here.

I think I'm OK.

Famous last words, right?

SHE LAUGHS

30 minutes are gone.

I'm under control, which is the most important thing.

51-year-old Dan, from Cornwall, enjoys creating dishes

at home for his family, especially his number-one fan,

his 12-year-old son.

My family are super-proud that I've made it to MasterChef.

This is an amazing opportunity,

a whole new experience for me.

Dan, what do you do for a living? I'm an education welfare officer.

Any burning desire to teach children to cook?

Do you know, I used to work with kids with behavioural problems?

The favourite thing to do with them was light a fire

and sizzle some sausages.

Never got any bad behaviour.

HE CHUCKLES

What is your basic ingredient, please?

Chicken breast. Chicken breast? Why a chicken breast?

Well, chicken breast is something

that, as a family, we cook with every week.

It's a staple of our shopping basket.

It's very versatile. Goujons for

the kids, chicken curry for us as adults,

or we all enjoy the same dish together.

Great. What's your dish, please, Dan?

My dish today is a tarragon

and Marsala chicken breast,

served with crispy skin,

mashed potato and chicken, tarragon and Marsala sauce.

I just think the Marsala and tarragon is

a marriage made in heaven.

Dan, he's taking a chicken breast,

and he's going to roast that, but if he's taking the skin off it,

this means there's no fat on it,

so that chicken breast could go dry.

Being served mashed potato,

I'm hoping free from lumps. And also we've got fondant leeks.

Leeks cooked with lots and lots of butter.

Not cooked enough, and they're crunchy.

He's then going to finish the whole thing off with

a classic tarragon cream chicken sauce.

How's that sauce, Chef? It's good, it's really good.

He looks very well-practised, but can he get himself an apron?

25 minutes left, please.

I'm still getting used to everything.

But other than that, it's all right for now.

39-year-old Michael, from Shrewsbury,

enjoys merging his Nigerian food heritage with British cuisine,

and hopes to one day become a full-time online food creator.

I'm very calm when I'm in the kitchen,

only in the sense if things are going the way I need to go.

SIGHS: Oh, gosh, this is stressful.

I want to show them my authentic cuisines of my culture.

Michael, what do you do for a living, please?

I work in housing licensing,

but I did acting for a little bit.

I was in Tarzan. I played the animated gorilla character.

Brilliant!

HE LAUGHS

What's your basic ingredient, please?

The bell peppers and Scotch bonnet.

My culture's Nigerian, so I'm doing jollof rice.

I think it's a celebration food. Everybody knows it.

It's in every wedding, every birthday,

every christening that we have in our culture.

And, yeah, it's just a celebrative dish.

And I'm doing a cuisine called efo.

It's all, like, vegetable spinach stew

with mix of bell peppers and different seasoning inside.

We've got jollof rice, a rice dish which is really fragrant.

He's using a pepper which is very long and thin,

which is not spicy at all, but quite smoky,

and he's using the really fierce Scotch bonnet.

Then he's making a special stew which is particular to Nigeria,

called efo, made from bell pepper and spinach.

Then he's pan-frying a piece of chicken thigh. That's got

to be cooked all the way through and nice and moist.

Pretty confident, I'm pretty confident.

And then we've got some deep-fried chicken skin.

He needs to make sure it's crispy and not greasy.

Tch, tch, tch, tch. Ah!

28-year-old money-laundering investigator Anjeza,

originally from Albania, aspires to introduce the nation

to the traditional flavours from her homeland.

I've been watching MasterChef for a long time,

and every year, I wonder, like,

"Oh, is there going to be an Albanian contestant?

"I'd love to see some Albanian food on the show."

And there hasn't been, so here I am.

SHE LAUGHS

So, hopefully, I can show some Albanian kind

of, like, influence and just make everyone at home proud.

Anjeza, what's your basic ingredient, please?

Erm, beans. Beans are, like,

very commonly used in Albanian cuisine.

Do you know the Albanian word for beans?

Fasule. Fasule? Yeah. It's very similar to Italian.

Yeah, I imagine so, yeah.

So I'm taking butterbeans cooked in iberico ham,

and, like, a butter sauce.

And then I've got a bean puree with, like, some roasted garlic

and anchovies, and then sea bass to kind of tie it all together.

I think it works. OK. Yeah.

Listen, you have an important job.

Do you have a cookery dream or cookery ambition?

I do. Look, I love my career, I love my job,

but food has always been

the one thing that has been, like, a secret kind of, like, passion.

I never used to really, like, talk about it much,

but in recent years, I've been kind

of, like, showcasing my food a lot more.

And, like, the more I show people, like, posting online,

like, the food I make, the more I'm, like, "You know what?

"I actually do really love this." What's that say on your apron?

Is that Albanian? Yes, it is.

It just says, "Buke, kripe e zemer," which means,

"Bread, salt and heart," It's, like, sharing everything

you have, even if it's nothing.

Anjeza's ingredient of choice is beans,

and she's using two types of beans. She's got butterbeans,

which she's stewing with iberico ham in a sauce with parsley and butter.

OK. We've also got classic cannellini puree,

warmed-up beans with olive oil, and then anchovies,

and it goes really smooth. Like the texture of hummus,

it should be rich, it should be opulent, it should be delicious.

Yeah, perfect.

With that, we're getting a bit of sea bass.

Fish needs to be cooked perfectly all the way through.

Scared to actually fry the fish. SHE CHUCKLES

It smells great.

I'm hoping it delivers on flavour and it's beautiful.

How are we doing for time? Two minutes, please!

I'm happy, yeah.

Wow! Wow, that's hot.

We've got some good food in here.

That's it. Your time's up. Stop! Well done, everybody.

SHE SIGHS

Guys, this is a tough round.

WHISPERS: Cool down.

Henry, we would like you to join us, please.

Retail business manager Henry's basic ingredient was spinach.

He's cooked spinach-striped cappelletti pasta filled

with spinach and ricotta, served with a tomato,

pancetta and basil sauce, topped

with fried breadcrumbs and crispy sage leaves.

It's well-made pasta. It's thin and it's held together.

Inside, you've got the creamy tartness of ricotta,

you have the green freshness of spinach,

and of course it's making up the stripes of your pasta

as well, so it does feature very heavily.

It's a fine dish.

Your sauce is rich with tomatoes, and then the flavour of basil.

So you've got the flavours of Italy, absolutely.

I like the originality. Doing striped pasta

in the MasterChef kitchen and holding your nerve, Henry, good job.

CLAPPING

DAN: Well done, Henry, really good.

I had a lot of fun in there.

And the fact I managed to do it

that's like the way I wanted it to look,

and so, yeah, I'm pleased I got that done.

Business development consultant Gabi's ingredient was mushrooms,

and she's made a mushroom tortellini filled

with wild mushrooms and ricotta, served with a mushroom

and feta cheese tuile, and a mushroom consomme.

I take my hat off to you. The talent here...

Pasta, filling, tuile. The tuile looks amazing.

There's nothing else but mushrooms here?

You like a mushroom.

Very well-made pasta. You've managed

to get mushrooms through that as well.

Your filling is creamy, but perhaps an inclusion of

a herb like tarragon may have given it another dimension.

Your consomme is lovely and clear, a smoky

mushroom flavour going through the whole thing.

And then you've got a woody

mushroom through your tuile with the saltiness from feta cheese.

You got a huge amount done. It's good.

LAUGHS: Thank you so much!

CLAPPING

SHE EXHALES

I'm feeling absolutely elated.

Well done. Looks fantastic.

I'm away with the fairies.

LAUGHS: I'm flying...somewhere, I don't know where.

Housing enforcement officer

Michael's basic ingredient was peppers.

He's cooked jollof rice flavoured with pointed peppers,

Scotch bonnet and garlic,

efo, a Nigerian spinach, and red and yellow pepper stew,

a tomato and pepper puree,

chicken thighs, and crispy chicken skin.

Your chicken skin isn't quite crispy enough... Yeah.

..but I think your chicken is cooked beautifully.

That rice is cooked really well. There is a natural sweetness

coming from the peppers and a hint of smokiness.

This stew is sweet with spinach and peppers.

I like this tomato, pepper puree,

I think that's really, really good.

But this needs more Scotch bonnet.

Yeah. We've eaten lots of food from Nigeria.

This is a little bit apologetic. It needs more heat, yeah. All right.

I'm satisfied, I'd say.

I think next time I will add in a bit of punch and heat.

I'll definitely take it on forward.

Yeah, it's very tough.

Education welfare officer Dan's basic ingredient

was chicken breast that he's roasted and served with mashed potato,

crispy chicken skin and kale, a leek fondant,

star anise-glazed baby carrots,

and a chicken, Marsala and tarragon sauce.

Your chicken breast, sadly, has gone dry.

The leeks, they need to be in lots of butter.

They should be wonderful and moist.

But aniseed in your carrots, carrots cooked really well,

they're sweet. Crispy chicken skin, seasoned well.

Mashed potato, lovely and creamy.

Your sauce - chicken stock,

put tarragon in there, giving it an aniseed flavour,

and that Marsala sweetness, absolutely divine.

Your chicken breast, again, a little dry,

but I'm absolutely convinced you cook.

There are a few sort of silly mistakes

that I made that annoyed me a little bit.

WHISPERS: Wow! Cheers! Happy? Yeah.

But I'm feeling really positive.

Last up is Albanian-born Anjeza.

WHISPERS: Hello.

SHE LAUGHS

Her basic ingredient was beans.

She's made pan-fried sea bass on a white bean

and anchovy puree, served with butterbeans cooked in chilli,

tarragon and iberico ham, and a chive oil.

Your fish is cooked beautifully. The puree underneath, wonderful

and smooth, and saltiness

of those anchovies coming through at the last minute goes,

"Whoa! I'm here, stand up and look at me."

That very simple-looking pile of beans,

the flavour is sweet and salty.

Spanish ham, tarragon,

giving that aniseed flavour, and then chilli at the finish.

It delivers a flavour punch way above its rustic look.

Well done, you. Thank you so much.

I can't believe I just got those comments!

SHE LAUGHS

CLAPPING

Oh, my God! That was brilliant.

I feel amazing. I feel like I'm on top of the world.

WHISPERS: Oh, my God!

From me, a great, big heartfelt thank you very much.

A fantastic and exciting round.

The start of this, we did say

Gregg and I would choose our two favourite dishes,

and the people who cooked those would get themselves an apron.

The first person getting a MasterChef apron...

..Anjeza. Congratulations.

SHE CLAPS

Amazing what you can do with

an everyday ingredient and a bit of skill.

Good on you. Thank you.

Second contestant getting an apron...

..is Henry. Congratulations.

Technique, skill and flavour,

that's what it's all about.

Please, come forward, get your well-deserved aprons.

Well done.

Well done! Well done!

SHE LAUGHS

I just feel like I could fly.

This feels like the greatest achievement of my absolute life.

And it's only round one, it's crazy!

To be sat here in the apron,

I don't feel like it's real. Emotionally, it felt like I wasn't

going to get it, but I feel really good, yeah, yeah, really good.

Woo!

Shrug off any disappointment, you have now got a job to do.

There are two aprons here up for grabs.

On your bench in front of you, there is a Mystery Box.

Could you please reveal your ingredients?

There you have it. A poussin, small chicken, mixed

peppers, and some apples.

What we'd like you to do for us is to cook us a dish.

You can use one, two, or all three

of those ingredients to make your dish.

Whatever ingredients you choose from your Mystery Box must be

the star of the show.

You can also use anything you like from our wonderful larder.

This is where you're going to have to think on your feet,

cos you've only got 45 minutes to cook.

MICHAEL: Whoa.

Two aprons up for grabs.

That does mean at the end of this, one of you will be going home.

Ladies and gentlemen, let's cook!

Right now, our contestants are about

to realise how important it is to make a plan.

Something sweet-savoury, I'd say. SIGHS: Yeah.

I want to see a little bit of finesse, John, it's the MasterChef

kitchen. I want to see more than a midweek

"stick it in a pot and stir it".

I've got an idea of what I want to do now.

Really keen on getting the apron.

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.

Gabi, were you disappointed not to get an apron?

I was disappointed,

but I'm also really pleased with the first dish that I've put out.

So I think the comments were great.

And I think the competition is just really, really strong.

And, yeah, happy to cook for you again.

What are you making? Stick with the classics,

stick to what I know.

I'm going to do a pan-fried poussin breast

with a pomme puree, honey-roasted carrots,

and creamy white wine sauce.

Gabi, you've got a plan, make sure you get it all done on time.

Yes. Thank you.

She is going to cook the breast. What?

She's also got some crispy salted chicken skin.

Don't forget about the chicken skin, don't forget about the chicken skin.

She's going to make a pomme puree.

She's got a piping bag out now. Oh!

So we're going to get a posh mash, if you like.

It's fiddly, this.

She's making white wine sauce. That has to be beautiful,

because if that sauce is too thin,

then we may have a problem.

Oh!

Dan, how are you feeling about this round?

Apprehensive, to say the least.

Why is that? Well, I was really scared of the invention test,

because there's no preparation time at all for it, so...

Would do this at home,

but usually I'm confident as to what I've got in the cupboard.

What's the dish, please, Dan, that's going to get you an apron?

A roasted poussin with

a mushroom risotto and a side of asparagus with capers.

What have you learned from the last round?

Don't serve dry chicken!

What we want is that chicken breast to be nice and moist.

Oh, man!

Mushroom risotto, we want rice which is cooked all the way through.

I think we're doing well, yeah.

And then it gets a little odd.

We have a side of asparagus with capers.

However, I will be impressed if, on the second attempt,

he does give us a beautifully moistly cooked chicken.

You are halfway.

I'm cutting this up just

to get more flavour inside the chicken. Straight from my head.

Are you a fan of inventing dishes, Michael?

Is this is the way you cook at home?

I try to sometimes. Sometimes, I do like experimenting,

but it goes wayward sometimes.

But, then, one thing I like about myself,

I learn from my mistakes,

and I go back and do it again to make it a bit better.

In this, you can't go back and make it OK on this one. Yeah.

You got to make it right to get one of those aprons.

Yeah, yeah. Tell me

the ingredients you decided to use from your Mystery Box.

Bell peppers and the chicken. And the small chicken.

Yeah. But on there, you've got blackberries,

eggs and cream. Yes. Why is that?

I'm going to make a cake. But you've only got to do one dish.

I thought it was two portions of two each of whatever.

One dish, two portions. OK.

So maybe you just want to concentrate on one of them.

I think I'll do the chicken.

Michael was planning two dishes. He was going to do a cake as well.

And now he seems to be just doing the chicken.

He's using peppers, garlic,

Scotch bonnet to marinate the chicken in.

They want it spicy, so must be sweet and spicy.

But what's the dish? He doesn't know yet.

The time's pressing.

He needs to know what he's going to put together.

OK. What am I doing? OK, OK, OK.

Guys, you've got just four minutes.

That means food should be going on the plates!

I'm not sure if I'm going to serve that because that's burnt.

SHE SIGHS

I wish I had asbestos hands. I think I might pull it off.

HE LAUGHS

60 seconds. On a plate, on a plate, on a plate.

Guys, that's it. Time's up. Stop, please.

Gabi, are you ready?

Gabi's dish is pan-fried poussin breast served with mustard

mashed potato, honey-roasted carrots and a creamy white wine sauce.

Where's the skin? Unfortunately, it burned.

Very nicely cooked chicken. Carrots,

I like the sweetness on them.

Wonderful, smooth mashed potato. Mustard through there,

really quite tangy. Very, very good indeed.

I would like to have seen that crispy skin across the top,

it would have given you texture.

White wine sauce, great flavour, but very, very thin.

Gabi, it's good, but it's not perfect.

SIGHS: Oh, a bit deflated.

WHISPERS: Oh... I'm gutted.

That was tough.

HE EXHALES

Michael's cooked poussin breast

and thigh marinated in bell pepper, Scotch bonnet,

honey and chilli, served with mashed potato.

Ooh, we've got a bit of a problem here, Michael.

Yeah. Chicken thigh,

it's not quite cooked all the way through. Breast looks OK.

The breast is nicely cooked,

and I love the coating on the outside.

There's almost a sweetness to it, there's a nuttiness to it.

And then, this time, of course, you have used that Scotch bonnet.

Yeah. I think that's great.

Your mashed potato, it's smooth, it's creamy, it's rich.

Sadly, the poussin thigh's not cooked all the way through,

and the whole thing needs a sauce.

I think the judges' comments were fair.

Initially, I wanted to do a dessert and a main,

for some reason, it was just in my mind.

But very happy that they enjoyed the flavours.

It was all right.

Last up is Dan. His dish is roasted poussin served

with mushroom risotto, asparagus and capers.

You'll be pleased to know this time your chicken's cooked

really, really well. You kept it on the crown, you kept the skin on.

Your risotto, creamy rice,

lovely rich mushroom flavour going through there.

I actually love the capers with the risotto.

I think they're really delicious. They're sharp,

and what they're doing is giving you a bit of contrast

to the creaminess of those mushrooms. Great!

I'm feeling really good after that.

HE EXHALES

To take away some really good positive feedback

from John and Gregg is something I'll treasure forever.

Absolutely fabulous day of cooking.

The odd mistake, as you would imagine.

Somebody who came in here who had a point to prove was Dan.

Dan overcooked his chicken in the first round,

and he used chicken again in this round.

And he did it absolutely perfectly.

With a really well-flavoured mushroom risotto,

I think Dan deserves himself an apron.

Dan's going through. Gabi, chicken, great. Mashed potato,

wonderful, flavoured with mustard.

But she burnt the chicken skin. She didn't serve it,

but, obviously, then we didn't get that crispy saltiness.

The sauce, well-flavoured but needed thickening up.

Michael, I love the flavourings that he got around that chicken.

The mashed potato was glorious. But that thigh

and leg were undercooked, and the dish needed a sauce.

I want the apron so bad.

I definitely feel like I've got more to show.

I'm not sure if I've done enough.

But wait and see what will happen. I'm hopeful.

We thank you very much for all your hard work.

As you know, we only have two MasterChef aprons left.

Our first contestant getting

an apron, joining Anjeza and Henry...is

Dan.

Good cookery.

Chicken redemption, we're calling it.

HE CHUCKLES

The second contestant getting an apron is...

..Gabi.

Very, very well done.

Michael, sorry you're leaving us. Thank you so much.

It's disappointing that it's coming to an end, but I'm very grateful.

I'm going to carry on cooking. I'm going to work on my blog

and some social media stuff, so watch out.

SHE LAUGHS

DAN: Well done.

Dan, Gabi, come and get your aprons.

Well deserved.

Well done.

I feel fantastic! I feel so good!

SHE LAUGHS

I've got an apron.

Mission accomplished.

But I want more of it. There's a hunger there, definitely.

This is a big challenge for you right now.

You are cooking for a place in a quarterfinal.

And we have invited three guests

to taste your food and help us make a decision.

Runner-up on MasterChef, Tony Rodd,

and two previous champions,

Simon Wood,

and Dr Saliha Mahmood Ahmed.

Two courses, 1 hour and 15 minutes.

There are only three quarterfinal places to give.

That does mean at the end of this, one of you will be going home.

Let's cook!

Right. In this round, I'm taking a risk,

going for a completely different cuisine,

just because I'm quite impatient and bored,

I can barely eat, like, seconds of a meal the next day.

But I'm confident I can do them, so it's a semi risk.

Henry. Yes. You've got a smile on your face.

Yes, I have, yeah. Are you happy to be here?

I'm really happy to be here, yeah,

it's been really fun so far. And, yeah,

it's fun to be in the kitchen cooking, yeah.

Very few people I have ever met on MasterChef say it's fun.

HENRY LAUGHS

Well, here's the thing. I found the cooking fun,

but then, the judgment,

I did not find fun at all, and I found that really stressful.

What's your dishes, Henry?

For the main, I'm making a prawn curry.

And then I'm going to do a sambal with that,

which is going to be with samphire, mango and coconut.

We've got nectarines. Does that mean we're getting a dessert?

Yes, I'm doing roasted nectarines

with cardamom mascarpone, and then crumble biscuit on top.

Why these two dishes? I really like eating curries,

and the dessert is something I'd cook for a dessert.

So I want to stay true to the food I actually eat and like.

Henry got through to this round cooking Italian food.

We are going somewhere completely different in this round.

OK.

He's doing a prawn curry with lots of spices.

He's also going to make a bisque from

the prawn shells to make sure he highlights

the flavour of prawn going through that curry, that's clever.

This so-called sambal intrigues me.

Mango and coconut and samphire?

It's a green chilli roux. And it's salt, so that's it.

So how that interacts with mango and coconut, I'm not sure.

HE EXHALES

Right.

Dessert, baked nectarines.

How long are your nectarines going to take to cook?

15 minutes. So I need to put them in before I serve the main.

With that cardamom flavouring going through his mascarpone,

pistachio crumb topping across the top, fantastic.

It's not necessarily a dessert you'd see very often,

but I think all those things together are just really delicious.

ANJEZA: I'm going into this round with a lot more

kind of, like, fire. Ah, OK! Because I feel like I know

what I'm doing a bit more now,

so, hopefully, that pushes me through.

Anjeza, are you doing Albanian food today?

Yes, I am. Yay! Hooray!

I am making you a traditional Albanian dish called tave kosi.

It's, like, a yoghurt traybake, traditionally served with lamb,

but I'm doing lamb and beef meatballs.

This is a dish that my mum would always make

if we're having a large amount of people.

We've got a lot of family in the UK,

so to make, like, 12 plates of, like, steak, chips, it's impossible.

So this would be the dish that she would always make

when we'd have, like, guests come to the house.

Everyone loves it, everyone in my family loves it.

Not to jinx it...

SHE LAUGHS

..but everyone loves it.

We've got lamb and beef meatballs. I think that's enough browning.

They get baked in the oven, and then a load of yoghurt gets added.

That's a seriously rich, creamy dish.

The texture's going to come from a piece of toast on the side.

What's troubling me, is there enough cookery skill on show?

The main course is, like, my family roots.

The dessert is more kind of, like,

what I like to eat in nice restaurants.

I'm doing a creme brulee, coffee flavoured,

there's espresso in there, with a black sesame crumb.

That's a bit of me. Like, I love sesame anything,

so the sesame needed to be in the creme brulee.

Coffee-flavoured creme brulee,

what a lovely idea.

I have to make sure the creme brulee's set.

I've done it once at home properly, but only once...

SHE LAUGHS

..so I'm a bit apprehensive. I probably should have

done this part when my hands stop shaking.

But she's putting sesame seeds across the top.

I like the idea of that. Sesame seeds,

fragrant, slightly nutty.

Oh, my God! So get your creme brulees in.

Yeah.

DAN: I'm feeling really competitive today.

Now I've got that apron,

it makes me even more determined to do my absolute best.

What are you going to cook for us, Dan?

I want to pay homage to the north coast of Cornwall.

The sea bass and the samphire grows locally to me.

So I'm cooking fillet

of sea bass with a fondant potato,

courgettes, samphire, pea puree and a beurre blanc sauce.

Oh, my word. Whoa. So you got

about six processes on one dish...

Yeah. ..without the dessert. Without a dessert.

For crying out loud, Dan. Well, I think we've reached the stage

in the competition where I've got my apron,

and, actually, it's given me a hunger for more.

I want to go further, and that's why I'm here,

and, you know, I want to do as much as possible.

What's the dessert?

The dessert is a chocolate fondant.

I've watched MasterChef many times,

and I've seen many a chocolate fondant fail

because it hasn't had a runny middle.

I want to serve it perfectly today with that runny middle,

and, you know, show a bit of skill. Anything with the chocolate fondant?

Yeah, I'm going to serve it a Chantilly cream.

OK. All my family love chocolate fondant,

and since I've been away, the first

thing my boy said to me was, "Daddy, I miss your chocolate fondant."

OK. Dan, he's being really ambitious.

He's doing sea bass, crispy skin on the outside,

flesh cooked all the way through.

We've got a potato fondant, a butter sauce,

a beurre blanc, and then a pea puree as well.

There are a lot of elements to my dish.

HE EXHALES

It's going to be tight.

Chocolate fondant, I think, is a scary, highly risky thing to do.

I want to serve it perfectly today with

that runny middle and show a bit of skill.

I think he's pushing himself a little too hard.

I hope I'm wrong.

You got this, you got this, you got this.

I feel absolutely terrified doing eight plates

of food in an hour and 15 minutes.

I really wish I had an extra half an hour.

SHE LAUGHS

Ooh!

Gabi, are you aiming for fine dining again in this round?

I am, yes, but maybe not so much fine dining,

more classic.

For starters,

I'm doing a Coquilles Saint-Jacques. What's a Coquilles Saint-Jacques?

So a Coquilles Saint-Jacques is essentially

scallops with creamy, cheesy filling with mashed potato.

For my main, I'm going to do a herb-crusted rack

of lamb with red wine jus and potato fondant.

This is the dishes I would cook for my friends.

It's good classic food, but, hopefully, done really well.

When you've made this for your boyfriend...

Yes. ..did you do it in the time?

I did, but I did make a few mistakes. Right,

and how did he take that? Oh, he loved it.

But he loves everything, so I want to hear what you guys think.

SHE LAUGHS

Gabi's first dish is a Coquilles Saint-Jacques,

scallop cooked in, like, a thick bechamel cheese.

SHE SIGHS

But cooked too much,

they can go very, very tough, like bullets.

Perfect.

The main course she's doing is a herb-crusted rack of lamb.

She's serving that with asparagus and pea puree.

Asparagus isn't really necessary. Potato fondants, we know take

a long time, so you've got to get that on quick.

No! No! Oh!

She's already burnt some potatoes.

She has to just calm it down a little bit.

This one's real tough. You're fine. You'll get there,

you'll get there, go on. Hold on to your nerve.

Oh, a disaster!

For me, this is the most difficult round that they're going to have.

If they get through today, it should give them huge confidence

to really press on and do well in this competition.

Ambition is always a good thing in this round,

but realism is also really important.

So really careful selection. You really want bang for your buck

in the cooking that you're doing today.

For me, the expectations are quite simple.

What's on the menu?

SHE LAUGHS

I want tasty food that shows off their personality.

Cheers, everyone. Cheers. Cheers.

Here's to some good food, eh? Mm!

You got 15 minutes, Henry. Yes. Rice on? Rice on.

Prawns are going on in a second. They only need

about five or six minutes. I think I'm almost there, yeah.

Henry's making us prawn, coconut and tamarind curry.

I love tender, juicy prawns. Tamarind,

I love the sourness it brings. Happy with the curry? Yeah,

pretty happy with the curry.

That sambal with the salty samphire, sweet mango,

if that combination's right,

it's going to be absolutely sensational.

You got two minutes, Chef. Yes, Chef.

Good to go. Good to go. Let's go!

Breathe, Henry, breathe and smile.

Hello, Chefs. Hello. Hello. Thank you.

I have made you a prawn, coconut and tamarind curry,

spiced basmati rice.

And then a samphire, mango and coconut sambal.

Hope you enjoy. Thank you. Thanks, Henry.

Thanks very much. Thank you.

My prawns are fantastic. Perfectly cooked.

The curry is well-balanced, the rice is cooked to perfection.

It's so yummy.

The samphire is amazing in the sambal

because it's that sea salty kind of element that's matching

really nicely with the mango and the coconut.

Very tasty plate of food.

It's got a little bit of him with that sambal with the samphire.

It all balances well, it eats really well,

it's cooked very, very well.

I think Henry's nailed this.

The prawn's cooked really, really well.

Rice is cooked perfectly.

That sweet mango, nuttiness of the

coconut, salty samphire actually works.

I think that's really, really clever.

Henry, six minutes.

HE EXHALES

Dessert, we've got a roast nectarine,

which is going to reduce those sugars,

caramelisation, sweetness is going to come out.

And then you've got mascarpone, and cardamom will give

you some fragrant umami notes to the dish.

With the pistachio biscuit, it almost sounds to me like a lovely

cheesecake-y kind of dessert.

Come on, Henry, keep your nerve, don't crumble now.

With the extra roasted fruit on the side,

I think it'll be lovely.

Nice! Look at that!

Yay! Well done, H. OK, let's go.

Amazing, thank you.

I've made you a roasted

nectarine with cardamom mascarpone and a crumble with pistachio.

I hope you enjoy. Thank you, cheers.

It does look just so pretty, doesn't it?

Yeah, I feel OK, actually.

The food I've put up, I'm reasonably happy with.

I don't feel like I've ashamed myself,

but feel relieved for it to be done, yeah, for sure.

The nectarine itself is roasted and cooked beautifully.

I think the texture on that is gorgeous.

The mascarpone is nice and smooth.

Could do with a little bit more cardamom,

but I think it was a very delicious dessert.

I really do enjoy the crumble, it's really good.

I finished the entire thing, and that says something

for me, cos I'm not a sweet person.

The nectarine's cooked beautifully. It's soft enough

that it actually just melts in your mouth.

I'm loving the whisked mascarpone, and it's got cardamom.

I think that's really, really clever.

Just 15 minutes, please. Are we OK?

Yeah, we're fine, we're fine.

Anjeza is making us tave kosi with kofta.

Tave kosi's traditionally, like, a traybake

which has rice and yoghurt and lamb inside it.

I haven't seen it with sourdough

and brown butter, but I think that'll be lovely.

I never said it was healthy. GREGG: Oh, my word.

Hello! Hello. Hello.

Oh, wow! So I have made for you guys tave kosi.

It's lamb and beef meatballs served in, like,

a set yoghurt drizzled with butter and served with some sourdough.

Hope you enjoy! Thank you. Thank you.

The meatballs are very juicy, the yoghurt-y sauce is very,

very salty and savoury, but I love that,

particularly with the sourdough bread.

I wasn't sure about the brown butter

when I read the menu, but, actually, in this it adds

that extra depth and nuttiness that I think lifts it slightly.

I think it's a very rich dish. There's too much yoghurt.

I don't think the butter brings anything.

We've got meatballs in a yoghurt sauce,

but they're very, very good meatballs.

I'm not sure I could finish it all, it's very, very rich,

and there isn't a great deal of cookery skill on show.

Anjeza. Yes. 15 minutes on brulee, please.

Anjeza's dessert is

an espresso creme brulee with black sesame crumb.

We can make crumbs out of that. I love a creme brulee.

I hope she can get that lovely texture that we expect.

I like its wibbly-wobbliness.

I just hope that custard's OK underneath.

Thank you.

So, for dessert, I made you

an espresso-flavoured creme brulee

with a toasted black sesame crumb,

and an edible flower for decoration.

Hope you enjoy, guys, thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

I feel really tired.

I think it came together.

I wish I'd tested and tried more throughout the cooking,

but I didn't have time, so we'll see.

The Creme brulee was a little under-set, but I still enjoyed it.

I like coffee, I like sesame. I really liked the lovely set,

crispy sugar on the top,

and I really think the sesame is inspired.

That was obviously delicious,

but under-set. Has that detracted?

Yes, obviously, but I think we all really enjoyed it.

Oh, no, that's not worked, has it?

That's a lovely flavour. Deep, rich coffee, and the sesame

seeds on top do give it a nuttiness. But it's not set in any way.

I mean, that's a real shame.

Dan, is this the most stressful thing you've ever done in your life?

Yeah, pretty much the most stressful thing.

Come on. Come on. Yeah.

Dan's giving us pan-seared fillet of sea bass.

Oh, look at that! Nice, Dan, nice!

We've got buttered samphire,

courgettes, fondant potato, pea puree...

GREGG: Good, vivid colour. ..and a beurre blanc sauce.

That took a while to say

cos there's a lot of things on there.

That's my beurre blanc. Has it worked? Yeah.

He's backing himself, that's for sure.

There's a lot of technical cookery ability.

I can't believe you've got this done, I'm really impressed.

SALIHA: Oh, thank you. Today, I'm serving you pan-seared

sea bass on samphire with a fondant potato,

sauteed courgettes, a pea puree. And to marry it all together,

I've served you a beurre blanc sauce as well.

Thank you.

My fish was actually cooked quite nicely.

My skin was fairly crispy as well.

The fondants are cooked nicely, and I like the flavour in the puree.

But the beurre blanc, we've got a watery, slightly over-acidic sauce,

so that's a shame.

Dan's beurre blanc is a little bit thin,

it's a bit too sharp with vinegar,

but everything else is absolutely great.

That fish is beautiful.

He's got the skin crispy, the flesh is soft.

That fondant is great. That's good cookery.

15 minutes. If you can get

a perfect fondant out, we might be at the races.

WHISPERS: Come on, baby!

A chocolate fondant is a thing

of unparalleled beauty... Oh, they've risen, Dan!

..so I really, really hope he does a good one.

Are you happy with those? Yeah,

I'd like some to be a bit neater around the edge.

There's no hiding place. It's right or it's wrong.

ALL: Oh! Hey!

Yeehaw!

I'm so impressed with this.

Have you split that cream a bit? It's slightly split, innit?

I think it has, yeah.

Are we going to serve it or not? Put some pouring cream on.

A bit of Cornish cream. Go. Go, Dan.

SALIHA: Thank you.

I'm serving you today a dark chocolate fondant.

It was going to be served with Chantilly cream,

but, unfortunately, the cream's split,

so I've just served it with some pouring cream.

Aw, thank you. Thank you.

Oh, well done. Mm!

I'm feeling really good.

I had so many elements to get on the plates.

I'm ready for a nap now, yeah, definitely, yeah.

Technically,

I'm very impressed at this stage of the competition with his fondant.

It's soft in the middle,

it's got a little crunch around the outside.

It's super-rich. I feel like, is it

Bruce Bogtrotter from Matilda, right now?!

Like, it's so chocolaty.

I think Dan has done

a really good job of giving us a fondant.

However, this is so rich

and bitter, without the sweetness from a Chantilly

that's been whipped nicely, there's nothing to offset that.

ALL: Oh!

Looks like we've got a fondant. Lovely crust on the outside.

Soft sponge, oozy middle.

Shame we haven't got the Chantilly, but it's a good fondant.

Gabi, 14 minutes.

Gabi's giving us

Coquilles Saint-Jacques, a very classic recipe.

I don't want the scallop overcooked.

Well, chicken cooks at 65, so scallops

are definitely going to be cooked at 65.

I don't want any lumps and bumps in my mash.

It's tricky, so let's hope that they get it right.

GREGG: Go, go, go! JOHN: Go, go, go.

Today, I've cooked for you a Coquilles Saint-Jacques with

a little bit of a sourdough crisp.

It is on a bed of salt. Please don't eat it, OK?

THEY LAUGH

My scallop was cooked really, really well.

I think there's a couple of technical errors.

Thicker mash, a little bit less cheese,

but it's really tasty.

The crisp was a nice touch on the side, I enjoyed that.

The roux needed to be a bit thicker, the mash a little bit thicker.

But flavour-wise, I'm very happy.

The scallop's cooked, it is right

amount of cheese for me. It's rich, it's tangy.

Smooth, buttery mashed potato round the outside, I'm happy.

The actual sauce is a little bit runny,

but you can see how rushed she is.

I think she's done a pretty good job.

Herb-crusted lamb, we want the fat rendered,

which is tricky to do with a crust,

and we want the meat nice and pink.

Beautiful! Perfect lamb, look at that!

Oh, God, my crust's fallen off!

Forget about the crust, you can always put it on the side.

Fondant potatoes, making sure they're soft and not burned.

Mm. That's good. And then, finally, a red wine jus, which could

be either be watery and have no flavour at all,

or be over-reduced and just be a little bit too much.

I've added more stock. I think it's too thin now.

This is a tough, tough menu.

Ready to go? Yes.

Hiya. TONY: Thank you very much.

I've cooked for you a herb-crusted rack of lamb on

a pea and asparagus puree with

a fondant potato and a red wine sauce.

I really hope you enjoy. Thank you. Thank you.

Ooh!

It's really, really, really tough. There's just so many elements,

and making everything work at the same time.

I hope they love it.

I think the lamb cookery was fantastic. Ten out of ten.

The fondant was nice and soft

and seasoned and quite nice and salty.

I enjoyed that. The sauce, it's got a nice sweetness to it.

You know, the flavour's not bad, but because it's so thin,

it's not coating anything

and it hasn't got that richness of flavour.

The lamb's cooked very well, nice and pink, wonderful and soft.

The crust is great with herbs.

The fondant, absolutely perfect. That sauce is nice,

it's just too runny. And there's a lot of pea puree,

it's making it almost into a pea stew.

That aside, she's pulled it off.

Good standard in here today. A little chaotic at times,

but, John, there were some great cookery.

Three quarterfinal places, you and I need to make a decision.

The dining room have named Henry their cook of the day,

and I think I've got to agree with him, really.

The curry with a bisque-type sauce

that he'd made out of the shells of the prawns,

I thought that was great. Dessert - the nectarine, cooked beautifully.

Mascarpone, rich as you like.

Henry has got himself a quarterfinal place.

I like Dan. He worked his socks off, that fellow, today.

Really good sea bass. The chocolate fondant worked.

Let's give Dan a quarterfinal place.

That now leaves us a conversation about Gabi and Anjeza.

Anjeza's meatballs I thought tasted great.

But, Gregg, it's a meatball with some yoghurt across the top.

It's not the most complex of dishes. It was very rich.

Creme brulee, beautiful flavour. but the creme brulee didn't set.

Can we forgive that mistake? That's the question.

Gabi, those scallops, poached beautifully in the sauce.

Maybe the sauce could have been a little bit thicker,

but she's trying really hard.

The lamb rack was cooked well.

The fondant potato she got absolutely right.

But the sauce wasn't thickened. Puree, too much of it.

We can see fault with it. We can also see the ambition.

I would love a place in this quarterfinal.

I know I've given it my all and I've burnt my eyelashes off

as well, so it's got to be worth something.

SHE LAUGHS

ANJEZA: It would mean everything to get a place in the quarterfinal.

Hopefully, I get a chance to cook again.

It'd be so good. But, toss of the coin, I don't know.

Thank you, all four of you.

Some fantastic food, but, sadly, one of you is going home.

The contestant leaving us is...

..Anjeza.

It was a very close-run thing. Thank you, guys.

Thanks, Anjeza. Thanks so much indeed.

I can't hide that I feel really sad.

But it's been fun, it's been wild, it's been a ride, so no regrets.

Yes! Well done, guys.

Well done, guys, really great.

This means so much to me.

I think my family are going to be absolutely over-the-moon.

Ecstatic.

Hey!

I'm speechless, I really am. Look, my cheeks are hurting,

I can't stop smiling.

Quarterfinalist sounds pretty cool,

but now you've got to try and, like, set your sights higher.

There's still a couple of other things up my sleeve,

I hope, but, yeah, we'll just see how the next round goes.

Next time, it's the quarterfinal,

and Gabi, Dan and Henry... You're scaring me.

..will be joining Munopa,

Darren and Harry, cooking for one of the UK's top restaurant critics.

I'm really on a crunch for time.

I think it's delicious.

It needs more "urgh!"