MKR – Wed, Mar 23 – Miners V Lovebirds

Go now, boys. Run - be free of your constraining shirts.
Go now, boys. Run – be free of your constraining shirts.

At this point does it matter who goes home? We know neither of these teams is going to be in the grand final. I guess I want the Miners to win because they are affable chaps who don’t do ridiculous PDA, but is that just prolonging their suffering?
Boys, use your mining cash to start a food truck selling Mexican food and juices. Put Gareth on customer service and you’d make a motza.


Hmmm, nice raw meat touching cabbage there, MKR fridge stockers.

And so the race to see who the not-quite-so-sucky of two sucky teams begins … But first, we check in with Paige, who recounts her fishy story and says she’s on the mend (but surely she can’t continue in the competition while recovering from hand surgery?).

Gareth and Alex’s menu:

Entree: Salmon sashimi with avocado puree and rice crackers (Sounds way basic so they’d better have awesome sushi knife skills. Seems unlikely.)

Main: Eye fillet with butter bean mash and red wine jus (Sounds like a Nev dish – should that be juss?)

Dessert: Chocolate mousse dome with cherry sorbet (Yum – hope they have been practising their tempering. Any dessert based on the flavours of a Cherry Ripe is a winner with me.)

JP and Nelly:

Entree: Polish borscht with caraway flatbread and dill yoghurt (What’s with all the soup’s this year on MKR? From the Cops’ gluggy pea and ham to Dee’s whatever that mess was with unfried chorizo, they’ll all been flops, despite not being technically challenging.)

Main: Roast duck maryland with potato and leek mash and red wine jus (Meh. Could be delicious but it’s not exactly inspirational)

Dessert: White chocolate mascarpone tart with caramelised figs and hints of earl grey (I believe I’ve made my view on the nothingness that is white chocolate clear.)

And they’re cooking … Alex confesses he’s only tempered chocolate once before but it looks like he’s been shotgunning YouTube videos. It’s going to be hard controlling the temperature under the studio lights.

Nelly is working on her tart pastry but there’s still time for nauseating pecks with JP. But what does official commentator Lauren think? She mutters (correctly) from the sidelines: “There’s too much love between them and not enough in the food.”

Gareth (aka Man Bun) says the dressing is “ponzu-inspired” and “We’re showing a bit of creative flair.” This does not bode well. If combining the sauce and avocado was a good idea, the Japanese would have started doing it centuries ago.

Both teams seem behind with their entrees, but who can tell, really, with the editing. Supposedly with 20 minutes to go Nelly yells “shish-kebab!” and remembers she has to make flatbread for the entree. And with 15 minutes to go their rice crackers aren’t in the oven and the fish hasn’t been touched.

Back from the ad break, Manu pretends he’s excited and tells Pete “We’ve got salmon versus soup; the ‘fat’ is on.”

Urgh – more kissy kissy. Nelly’s flatbread doesn’t seem to be baking in the oven so they pop it in a frypan. Allegedly with 60 seconds to go Gareth is cutting up his hot rice crackers with a pizza wheel.

Time for judging …


Guy says the soup has a grainy texture. It’s all a bit blah.


“It’s a good bit of fish, but a few microherbs thrown on top, it just doesn’t cut the mustard for me.” Karen says the rice cracker wasn’t cooked enough. Colin is scathing: “What are you doing with all that time? … When we’ve seem some of the other dishes the other teams have put up …”

Time for mains … the boys get their sorbet in the freezer and start to unmould their chocolate. Their domes are breaking. But then Alex gets the hang of it and the crowd goes wild. The Lovebirds are also focusing on dessert – can someone please start their main!
Alex does a paprika and onion powder rub for his beef fillet and browns it in a pan that’s far too hot. Man Bun is entrusted with mixing lemon into butter.
Nelly is making potato and leek mash and is trying to get it smooth with a stick blender. But what does official commentator, Lauren, think: “They’re going to turn into glue.”
That’s twice I’ve agreed with Lauren tonight. Can someone check my temperature? Does Nelly not watch the show? It’s called a drum sieve, girl. And why is she cooking broccolini with oodles of time left on the clock?
Meanwhile, everything’s going wrong on the other side. Pete and Manu are exchanging alarmed looks at the thought of eating the Miners’ gloppy bean puree (Fass is going to lose it); the boys have forgotten to put the wine in their jus; and Alex has burnt some of the beef because he burnt the spices when he fried it earlier. Oh no, it’s actually because he had one of the ovens on grill. He’s understandably freaking out.
It’s the battle of the sozes, and the onlookers think both jus will be rubbish. The Mners’ meat is resting without a thermometer in sight, but luckily for them it looks nice and pink inside. Well, one fillet, at least. The other is almost raw. The Lovebirds are plopping their Clag mash and overcooked broccoli on the plate. We haven’t heard much about the duck, so it’s probably fine.

The judges dig in …


Fass: “It was dry. The broccoli .. it was three times cooked .. I’m a bit disheartened today actually.” The sauce is yucky, as is the Clag.


Some beef is blue, some is overcooked, the beans are stodgy. Manu: “The jus is just red wine. I prefer to have no soz at all.”
Fass: “I might not even come back – I’m that angry”
Jordan sums it up: “The butter has [pause while he tries to think of something nice to say] flavour in it and the leek was actually all right. Normally I have my red wine in a glass.”

As predicted, it’s a huge letdown after the highs of the Italians V Zana showdown where people made their own pasta and filo, stuffed squid, made risotto, etc.

It’s dessert time and the boys are quenelling sorbet like champions. Gareth starts making praline. At least the dessert will have a number of elements showcasing technique.
The Lovebirds take their tea-flavoured pastry out and it looks a bit blond but they seem happy. It’s certainly thin.
But then Nelly is having fig trouble and yet again has to be bleeped for swearing. I remember this from her instant restaurant – she was depicted as Snow White but there was a lot of bleeping.
Why didn’t she just torch them to start with? Perhaps because she was terrible memories of blow torch dramas from their restaurant – remember JP driving from servo to servo?
The Miners are plating up and it looks so much better than their last sweet effort:

Not plated up by four year olds.
Not plated up by four year olds.

Yep, they’ve got this.

Tasting time …
The judges are delighted to have two dishes that look edible.


Guy: “Wow – it’s like it’s a different team.” The choc is well tempered and the sorbet is refreshingly tart. Fass would like a thinner dome but he’s just happy to have decent food. Manu eats everything on his plate.


Guy likes the shortness of the pastry. Colin: “It’s elegant, it’s feminine.” They all like it.

The Miners are judged first and Colin does some truth telling to their sad little faces, but they “romped it home” for dessert.
Scores: Fass 4; Guy 5; Karen 5; Liz 5; Pete 5; Manu 5. Total 29/60
The boys think they’re going home and JP and Nelly are hopeful, until …
Fass schools them in how to make a vegie trivet to stop duck overcooking on the bottom and says their soz was a waste of red wine.
Scores: Fass 3; Guy 4; Karen 5; Liz 5; Pete 5; Manu 5. 27/60
The camera must have missed Zana’s reaction, so instead we get:

OMG
OMG

JP is so devo that Nelly has to do all the talking.
Go have a cup of tea, JP.
Go have a cup of tea, JP.

Yep, see ya – don’t mind me while I fast forward through your kissing montage.

A reminder there’s no MKR Sunday but it’s back Monday with a feed-the-public challenge at a movie night. It looks like everything goes wrong for Zana, probably because they made her wear pink lippie instead of her usual villain red. Lauren must have gotten that shade – for when she’s throwing shade.



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