It is week two for season five of MasterChef and with that enters the top 22 contestants from around the country, competing with their sharpest knife to be named the best home cook in America. The episode begins with chefs telling their own personal stories on what they plan to do once they win, hopeful thinkers some may call them as they need to beat out the other 21 people before they can do so.
The judges offer the remaining 22 some advice including, “Make sure you’re the last person in this kitchen” and “Always bring your A-game” which that definitely sends across the message of no pressure but pressure.
Following the opening remarks, the show returns to its usual format, which begins with the mystery box challenge. The chefs are sent to their stations as the challenge is explained. In front of each chef is a box, which underneath contains the ingredients that the chefs must use in their dish in 90 minutes. In this box there were chocolate, bananas, strawberries, blueberries, brandy, ladyfingers, an assortment of extracts, honey and ground coffee. Most of the chefs were thrilled to be working on a dessert while some bit their lip and worked with what they had. It is right before the chefs begin to cook that the judges make one final announcement, that someone will be eliminated following this challenge. Again, no pressure.
One may think that a dessert is not something to truly sweat over but desserts are actually one of the most complicated things to create. As Judge and Chef Graham Elliot said it, “helps us weed out those who do not belong here.” From there the judges survey the stations and observe the different type of desserts being made for later consumption. For Courtney her dessert of choice is a honeybee cake with a honey caramel glaze while for Willie it is a spicy ginger bake cake. Cutter chooses to make a cappuccino pudding with a vanilla whipped cream with a biscotti dipped in chocolate on the side, Jaimee, the baking assistant from Queens NY, makes a chocolate pecan brownie, and for Elizabeth, strawberry balsamic cake with a honey icing which turns into her own take on a strawberry tall cake.
The mystery box challenges also gives the viewers an opportunity to learn a little more about the contestants. Willie turns out to be the only chef in his huge family as the main woman in his lie, mom, grandma and aunt, cannot cook. The closest thing to a sous chef he has is his aunt because of her ability to boil water and that is where it ends. Cutter spent most of his time in the military where he jumped out of airplanes and hopes this can be a chance for him to do something else with his life and then Jaimee wants to make something of herself.
Gordon Ramsey at one point asks Elizabeth who she believes is going to be going home from this challenge and she sys Leslie, claiming he “flabs his jaw” too often. And of course Leslie, who is perfectly positioned at the station right in front of her, does not like to hear that and states, If you want drama, I’ll give it to you”. It is almost embarrassing that Ramsey has to go over to the man to remind him that hey, as one of the eldest chefs in the competition, perhaps he should act that way with true maturity.
The 90 minutes finish up and the judges do one final look around before making any decisions. It is then that they call up Cutter and Astrid, who earlier said, “I never bake” as she worked on her lemon bars. But that is not all as right after they ask for Courtney and Willie to come forward with their dishes as well. Ramsey then lets everyone else in on what the judges have decides. Two of those dishes are the worst and two are the best. It does not take long for Cutter to put two and two together to realize that him and Astrid should not be thrilled to be standing up there. As the judges reviewed their dishes, Ramsey tore Cutter apart for putting a MasterChef logo on his pudding and insisting, “plates have standards.” It felt like it could not get any worse but then Astrid’s lemon bars were raw. It was with that disappointment that Astrid was sent home. Her exit interview featured her telling the viewers that she came here, “to learn and to grow” when unfortunately, this is not the game show to do that. When entering this competition everyone is assumed to have mastered enough of the techniques and plates that they can serve a dessert without it being undercooked.
On the winning side, it is stiff competition between the best and brightest. Courtney receives high praise for her dish, as it is visually appealing and equally appetizing. Willie gets close to the same as Chef Joe tells him it is, “a party in my mouth” after cracking a joke about how beautiful and dainty it is, and then there is Willie, who is, no secret about it, overweight. But the joke is received well as everyone chuckles before the judges make a decision. In the end it is Courtney who came out on top who is then whisked away to the pantry to begin reaping her rewards.
First she is informed that she is spared from cooking in the elimination challenge, which is a given. Second she gets to choose the meal that everyone else has to cook. The theme of the meal is ground beef and her options are meatloaf, meatballs and hamburger. Her eyes are filed with a glint of mischief as the girl recognizes how much power she truly has and then makes her decision.
The chefs and Courtney walk back into the major arena where Gordon Ramsey informs everyone of Courtney’s power. It is easy to see some peoples face drop, especially when Ramsey tells everyone that Courtney now has the ability to save ten people from elimination and the cooking challenge. Now is when everyone sees her true competitive side shine through as she picks out the people who she believes are not a threat to her in the competition: Leslie, Jaimee, Gordon, Elise, Cutter, Francis, Kira, Aran, Elizabeth and Christian.
“I feel like a puppet master… check mate,” the girl tells the cameras with a smirk on her face that could make any of her competitors wince.
It turns out that she chose meatloaf for one persons last chance in the kitchen which leads to an array of different meatloaves some may have never imagined possible which are concocted within a one hour span.
At the end of the hour the judges chose Francis, not to be confused with the saved Francis, and the worst went to Stephani, Dan and Whitney. All atrocious dishes and just when everyone believes Dan, the arrogant Asian man, is about to be kicked off he is saved because the other two were just worse.
In the finale of the episode Ramsey asks Courtney who she believes will be sent home out of the two and when she guesses correctly, it is not a surprise. It is Whitney the cook who hopes to return to culinary school who returns home empty handed. One can only hope that her future classmates do not see the episode so she cannot be judged for her inability to cook a meatloaf.
Next episode the first team challenge occurs for our soldiers, which will no doubt go up in flames.