MasterChef Australia: All Stars – Four Cuisine Challenge

Previous Episode: MasterChef Australia: All Stars – Launch

Contestants will tonight cook in four heats with their team. Who will win MORE money for their charity?

The contestants are still shocked to be on MasterChef. They head to the kitchen for their next challenge.

Challenge Brief: Today, they have to cook head to head in four thirty minute showdown rounds. In each round, they have to nominate a cook to compete. For each head, $5,000 will be up for grabs. As the captain of the winning team in Thursday’s challenge, Kate will get to pick which cuisine everyone has to cook. Ok, to round one.

Round 1 Players

2009: Julie

2010: Jonathan

2011: Kate

Cuisine: Lebanese

Progress: So a left-of-field choice there by Kate who has a Lebanese husband (hence, the inspiration for the theme). Jonathan has cooked Moroccan leaving Julie with a bit of a disadvantage here. Kate will do a spice rub lamb while Jonathan will go for kibbeh, but is not confident! He’s going to make it up as he goes. Julie will go for a Kofta and tabouli filled dish.

They have to be quick with only 15 minutes left on the clock. Jonathan begins to regret his choice of dish as he begins to make mistakes. Oh dear. One minute left. When time is up, it’s time for the first tasting of the night. Jonathan is nervous as he wouldn’t serve his dish to anyone.

Tasting & Results

Kate

Cooking: Spice Rubbed Lamb

Comments: Gary loves the combination of flavours and also loves the presentation. He would have liked more spices but thinks she’s played to her strategy perfectly.

Jonathan

Cooking: Kibbeh

Comments: The judges don’t seem impressed with the presentation. George loves the texture however compares the dish to fried rissoles.

Julie

Cooking: Beef Kofta

Comments: Matt loves how the elements came together on the plate. He says it looks wonderful. They love the tastes so much. It sounds like Julie is on a winner. They do criticise some of her bread.

Result: The winner of round one, and therefore the first $5,000, is…Julie!

So the season one winner triumphs over the season three winner…and Jonathan. And remember, the charities for each contestant is listed on the blog for the launch episode.

Round 2 Players

2009: Poh

2010: Marion

2011: Dani

Cuisine: Chinese

Progress: So they are the queens of Asian cuisine, however only Poh professes in Chinese cuisine. Marion and Dani skew more southeast. Dani is worried she isn’t as good as the other two. I must say, she’s going up against MasterChef heavyweights. Poh on the other hand is nervous about having to uphold her heritage. She will be doing some dumplings.

Marion on the other hand will be making some salt and pepper prawns. Dani looks to be doing something similar with her lychee dish. It’s a dessert dish.

Poh finishes wrapping her dumplings but hopes they will cook through. Meanwhile, Dani calls her dish a gamble. Soon, round two is up and the tasting begins.

Tasting & Results

Poh

Cooking: Pork & Beef Dumplings

Comments: George tells her that this dish is the reason she is an all-star.

Marion

Cooking: Salt & Pepper Scampi.

Comments: Matt is wowed by the dish and tells her that he stared into the distance, not because he was trying to identify flavours, but because he was savouring the moment.

Dani

Cooking: Lychee Toffee Pops.

Comments: She gives one of the toffee pops to her heroes behind her. Despite Poh joking that they are crap, they’re actually really good and get raving reviews.

Result: The winner of round two, and the second $5,000 giveaway, is…Dani!

Well-deserved there. So who will compete next?

Round 3 Players

2009: Chris

2010: Aaron

2011: Kumar

Cuisine: Indian

Progress: Kumar puts on the most hilarious fake-concerned face. George already thinks Kumar has this in the bag. Chris is going to invent an Indian spice rubbed piece of salmon as he is out of his depth. Kumar is going to make a coconut, South Indian curry. Aaron is doing a prawn curry. Sounds good all round. Hopefully they can all pull this off.

Aaron is actually quite nervous and is also making the dish up on the spot. Kumar is, naturally, not worried at all. Chris is just totally uncomfortable after screwing up salmon before on MasterChef. Soon, round three is all up and over.

Tasting & Results

Kumar

Cooking: Mussels in Coconut Sauce

Comments: Gary likes how they’ve been cooked well but spots a few beards. He does think they are delicious though. He also likes the combinations of the other flavours.

Aaron

Cooking: Prawns in Curry Sauce

Comments: Matt loves the use of the bread on the dish.

Chris

Cooking: Indian Spice Rubbed Salmon with Raita

Comments: This time around, he has cooked his salmon beautifully. In fact, it is the best salmon George has seen in years.

Result: The winner of the third round and the attached $5,000 for charity is…Chris!

The 2010 team just can’t seem to win some money! Maybe they will do better in round four.

Round 4 Players

2009: Justine

2010: Callum

2011: Hayden

Cuisine: French

Progress: So Justine will cook a zucchini and prawn sauce with some snapper. Callum is doing a quail. He will make a butter sauce with it. Hayden is doing some pan fried snapper. We have a battle between Hayden and Justine here. Justine is just nervous about cooking her fish to perfection.

Nothing too stressful here, pretty straight forward.

Tasting & Results

Justine

Cooking: Pan Fried Snapper

Comments: George thinks the sauce makes the snapper soggy, but loves the dish nonetheless.

Callum

Cooking: Quail with Mushrooms

Comments: He’s cooked the quail perfectly and Gary loves the seasoning and the textures. He also loves the sauce.

Hayden

Cooking: Pan Fried Snapper

Comments: Hayden used the wrong vinegar in this dish, hope it goes OK. Matt likes it, but agrees it is a bit too sweet.

Result: The winner of the final round and final $5,000 giveaway is…Callum.

Finally a winner for team 2010- and an SA winner as well!

MasterChef: All Stars next airs Jul 30 at 7PM on TEN. 

About the author

ENQUIRIES INCLUDING CORRECTIONS, GENERAL COMMENTS OR CONTACT INFORMATION (professional purposes only) MAY BE DIRECTED PRIVATELY TO MY EMAIL ADDRESS: lewdon13@gmail.com

Hey guy's,
If you've stumbled across here, I'm assuming you are as big a fan of reality television as I am! I reported for Throng Australia as their resident Reality Television Commentator from May 2011 to January 2013. I will continue to provide Top 20 Reality Television Star lists for 2013. I'm currently covering the upcoming season of Big Brother on Big Brother 24/7!
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Courtney xx
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  • http://twitter.com/johnsonleung Johnson Leung

    Three things I notice in tonight’s episode:
    1. the 12 contestants lived in the MC house, just like what they did when they were competing to win the title. Filming on All-Stars began in mid-June, which meant the All-Stars moved in to the house days after the final 3 of season 4 (Audra, Andy and Julia) left for the filming of the finale. Julie told today’s The Sun-Herald in Sydney that for this series, she and her fellow contestants had few more privileges: they could use their mobile phones and call whenever they wanted to, they had access to computers and they could go home on weekends.
    2. I counted there were five prompts for Twitter conversation on the bottom left of the screen. During season 4 there was only one prompt, as the contestants walked in to the kitchen.
    3. In the final round, Kate asked Kumar during cooking at least twice if he had pulled the beards out of mussels and both times Kumar said yes. But during tasting Gary still managed to find beards in a mussel. Was Kumar a bit careless?
    Some more MC-related news. The Sunday Telegraph says today season 4 could be the last to be filmed in Sydney with the series moving to Melbourne in 2013. Earlier this year its sister paper The Daily Telegraph reported that the building in Alexandria which housed the kitchen had been put up for sale. Maybe the production company wants to leave before it can be evicted by the new owner? The Sunday Telegraph also says Justin North, who was a regular on MasterChef since it began in 2009, has his group of restaurants placed into liquidation this month. His employees have been owed $990,000 in unpaid superannuation and himself is bankrupt. So it looks like we won’t see him again in the show.

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100003368455102 Courtney Lewdon

    It looks likely MasterChef will be moving- which could mean a brand new look MasterChef for season five. Shame about Justin though.

    I will not hear a bad word about Kumar. :P It is clear the mussels somehow grew their beards back after he removed them! :)

  • AliciaB

    FYI – For the 1st time ever this year, the MasterChef launch party was actually held in Melb not Sydney – George and Gary’s restaurants are there and so this makes great sense.