The contestants are on an excursion, which they’re pretty excited about, and they end up in the Victorian state library. They walk into the Latrobe reading room.
I feel like the last time I saw this room on TV was the Biggest Loser around ten years ago, and they had to walk around and not eat any of the food.
Instead or not eating any of the food, the judges tell them they have to take inspiration from food served here, which they have to read about in menus. These dinners were used in state dinners for Prince Charles and the Queen.
The judges, and Nigella, are dressed in black. George is wearing a white shirt. Matt is wearing white and black plaid pants. It’s more flannel check than chef pants checked. I love them.
The teams are split into two teams and have to cook three courses – entrée, main and dessert.
Leading the purple team is Kyle. Leading the burgundy team is Steph, who Abbey describes as, “the house mum.”
Anushka is wearing really cute cream frmaes that are a bit of a square cat eye. I also love it.
So, the teams start to brainstorm their ideas for their menus. There’s a lot of discussion, and I don’t really care about any of it.
Kyle’s team is cooking whiting for entrée, lamb backstrap for main, and parfait for dessert, all with a 1920’s twist.
Steph’s team is also cooking whiting for entrée, but their main is chicken Maryland, and mini bombe Alaska with coffee sponge, almond, coffee and cherry, and Italian meringue.
Time starts, and everyone begins.
Blah blah blah, Mandy wants to keep trying different ways to cook the fish, and it’s really stressing Steph out.
The judges taste the burgundy team’s entrée and they overall they really like it. It’s a whiting with grapefruit butter sauce, and mint.
Purple team starts serving. They have whiting rolled into roses with wilted spinach, dill beurre blanc and caviar. I don’t know what any of that means.
Matt, George, Gaz and Nigella are horrified to find the fish isn’t cooked through.
Time for the mains, and the burgundy have chicken Maryland, pea puree and chicken jus.
As the judges start eating, Nigella says, “The chicken’s a bit too pink for me…”
Horrified, the trio realise their chicken is also undercooked.
George gets up to send it back, and grabs a couple of plates that had already been served on the way. He turns wait staff around, and everyone heads to the kitchen.
If Steph wasn’t stressed before, she is now, and has to arrange a way to cook the chicken properly. It’s discovered they don’t have any spare chicken and have to cook the breast for a few people.
At this stage, Kyle’s team has to really majorly ruin their dessert for the burgundy team to win.
Purple serves their dessert, venetian parfait, chocolate parfait, muscat sauce, grapes, coffee granita, and toffee twirl.
The judges love the flavours. They have nothing negative to say.
Steph’s team serve their mini bombe Alaska with coffee sponge, almond, coffee, cherry and Italian meringue. The judges felt they did a fabulous job.
Once everything was done and dusted, it was time for results.
They said that Kyle’s team had perfect lamb and the chocolate dessert was a crowd pleaser. Their whiting was inconsistently cooked, and much of it was undercooked.
Steph’s team was told their whiting was perfectly cooked.
“Even if the dessert was the best in the world, it wouldn’t compensate for the undercooked chicken,” Gaz said.
The burgundy team – all 10 people – are up for elimination tomorrow night.
Nigella gives them a pep talk to try and cheer them up.
“Be excited that you get to cook again tomorrow,” she tells them.
Felicity Feiner 
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