Masterchef Canada Recap, episode 6: “This hot mess is serving good food”

Finally, some honest-to-goodness cookery! For the first time all season, the contestants’ dishes looked more like haute cuisine than entrées from Applebee’s two-for-$20 menu. The judges must have felt sort of like Dr. Grant in Jurassic Park when he realized the raptors could open doors.

Here, three takeaways from episode six.

Lesson #1: You can take the lady plumber out of Rocky Mountain House, Alberta
Is it just us, or did Dora suddenly become 100 times more down-homey this episode? Somehow, the prospect of serving canapés to an uppity crowd of art appreciators morphed her into a rockabilly fishwife with Aileen Wuarnos–style hair. As team captain, Dora got to pick her own hog-racin’ herd kitchen crew. Shrewdly, she planned on singling out contestants who had experience catering swanky affairs (“I really want Dale because he is one fancy bitch”), yet her totally incompatible strategy of just picking her friends meant the group’s fine-dining experts—Dale and Josh—were snapped up before she got the chance to call their names.

Lesson #2: It all comes down to the plate
Meanwhile, mousy Danielle morphed into a cold-blooded, kitchen-team-leading automaton. While Dora’s crew ran around over-spicing samosas and making unconventional plating decisions, Danielle was Sully Sullenberger-style calm under pressure. Ultimately, though, the other team’s food just tasted better. Dora summed it up well: “We’re a hot mess, but guess what: this hot mess is serving good food.” All the canapés looked surprisingly appetizing. Our favourite: Kaila’s clever purple potato chip dressed up like a miniature artist’s palette with tiny scallops and edible flowers. Yum.

Lesson #3: Bad things happen to people who cross Kaila
Speaking of Kaila, it seems entirely possible that she may have telekinetic powers. Last week, her most outspoken detractor almost sliced his hand off. This week, Josh deviously took credit for Kaila’s prosciutto-potato switcheroo and was swiftly punished with a woefully slumpy cheesecake. The latter not only prompted the night’s best/worst Alvin Leung zinger (“The only thing tropical about this is a typhoon hit it”), it also got him eliminated. It may have just been a coincidence, but Dale should probably watch his back.

Images courtesy of Bell Media