Last night’s episode was quite interesting. None of contestants were that great and three of them were really annoying, including a wannabe rapper and an arrogant, Toronto chef who actually worked for one of the judges (is this even fair?). A third kept on referring to his East Asian heritage, as if he had no confidence (dude: you really shouldn’t be doing this when Susur Lee is on the panel). The fourth contestant was a pastry chef from a Toronto dessert shop that I’ve been to several times.
Slices of dragon fruit
For the first round, the contestants were to prepare an appetizer using dragon fruit, donair (more or less gyros with an Eastern Canadian twist), amaretti and garlic powder. One contestant, the pastry chef from Toronto, made a pan-fried donair and corn fritters (the chef thought it would be a little bit different, since fritters are usually deep fried) with a dragon fruit and green salad. However, the results weren’t that great. Though one judge loved that she used the entire dragon fruit for the salad, another thought it was a bit on the heavy side. The third judge was not pleased that the contestant tossed the salad with her hands without washing after working with raw eggs. Another contestant made a dragon fruit soup with donair – it was rather ugly looking, but tasty, according to the judges. Other dishes included a dragon fruit and donair Napoleon (beautiful work of art, but it wasn’t exactly a Napoleon, since it was on its side) and an East Coast donair with a dragon fruit relish, made by the faux rapper (a judge applauded him for emphasizing his regional roots). Likely due to the heaviness of the dish and the fact that she did not wash her hands before tossing the salad, the pastry chef was chopped.
The mandatory ingredients for the main course were: mullet fish, dulce de leche, fennel and cheese curds (but no, no one made poutine). One chef made pan-fried mullets and cheese curd fritters (one of the judges thought that the fish wasn’t properly de-boned and that the contestant should have made better use of the fennel), while another pan-seared the mullet and accompanied it with a dulce de leche and orange fumé (it sounded fancy, but the judges did not like it one bit. Comments included its blandness, portion size (thanks to dropping one of the fishes) and the fact that the oranges were too “fishy” tasting). I think this cost him the round. A third, the contestant from Newfoundland, did not fillet the fish, but instead, grilled them whole with the dulce de leche and spices. The result? Curried dulce de leche mullet, served with cheese curd potatoes and leeks. One of the judges was impressed by the rustic presentation and another, by the leek and potatoes. The judges also liked the presentation. However, it wasn’t perfect as the dish was criticized for being too “lemony” and the fact that the dulce de leche was barely there.
As soon as I heard that pretzel buns was on the ingredients list for the dessert round, I KNEW that at least one of the remaining chefs was going to make bread pudding. How creative. The other items were beer, frozen mixed berries and lime jelly powder (what can you do with jelly powder in under an hour, anyway?). The bread pudding, or rather, pretzel pudding in berry ale ice was barely done – the chef waited until almost the last second to plate, just so the berry ice would be more “frozen.” He had a lot of attitude about the dish (as he did in the two earlier rounds), too. He was not a pleasant contestant to watch. He received negative feedback on the presentation and taste. The other remaining contestant made pretzel ice cream with beer infused jelly and berry compote. The judges were not too pleased with his dish either. The ice cream wasn’t sweet enough and one judge thought that there wasn’t enough berry. This chef was chopped, making the more “arrogant” contestant the winner.
To be quite honest, I’m not sure the winner deserved the $10,000. He had previously worked for one of the judges – Chef Michael Smith – so there was definitely some sort of bias. Personally, I don’t think Chef Michael should have been on the panel. But whatever. What’s done is done.
Image credit: By PookieFugglestein (Own work) [CC0], via Wikimedia Commons
