by Todd Betzold

 

It's another Mystery Box Challenge for the top 13 on MasterChef.

 

For this challenge, the mystery box contains only vegetables and the competitors have 60 minutes to create a vegetarian dish, which does not include a salad or side dish. The judges will taste only the top three dishes, so make them look good competitors.

 

Christian, even though he was very cocky and confident during the cooking process, was told he had the worst dish. He argues with the judges and tells them they are wrong. Chef Ramsay proceeds to tell him that his talent does not match his arrogance. Keep it together Christian, this may come back to hurt you.

 

The first dish they choose to taste is Jennifer's dish, Vegetable Terrine with Eggplant Wrap and Tomato Sauce. Graham says that he loved the spice that comes out in the dish and Joe says that it exemplifies what they are looking for.

 

Adrien's dish, Green Gazpacho with Spanish Rice and Fried Egg, is the second dish chosen. Graham said the flavors are great and it is the best dish he has had in a while. Joe proceeds to say that Adrien won the last Mystery Box Challenge and he is a strong contender in this one too.

 

The last dish chosen is Alejandra's dish, Vegetable Korma with Rice and Asian Pear. Even though Joe said the dish was quite delicious and was a triumphant dish, Chef Ramsay says that the eggplant was undercooked.

 

Some discussion by the judges and they announce that the winner of the Mystery Box Challenge is Jennifer, as she joins them in the MasterChef pantry to help choose the dish for the Elimination Test. For this test, they brought back MasterChef Season One winner, Whitney Miller, who just released her first cookbook. Jennifer has three different dishes from Whitney's cookbook to choose from and all the competitors must replicate that dish.

 

They come back from the pantry to announce that Jennifer chose the Crispy Catfish with Slaw and Sweet Potato Fries as the dish for them all to replicate, even in presentation of the plate. At this time, Jennifer is given another advantage for winning...she is given a basket with all 29 ingredients to this dish...now she just has to figure out what each item gets.

 

The competitors all get a chance to taste the dish and look at the dish before getting one trip to the pantry for 10 minutes to try and figure out all the ingredients needed. After seeing some of the competitors struggle, Jennie, and some of them very confident, Christian, while cooking, we are ready for the judges to taste.

 

Jennifer is first and with her advantage of having a basket with all the ingredients, she does not screw it up and impresses the judges enough for her to feel confident she is not going home. Christian redeems himself from the Mystery Box Challenge and makes a superb dish and Esther and Giuseppe follow with positive feedback.

 

Alejandra is next, and even though she only missed five of the ingredients from the original Whitney dish, she added a few of her own, including garlic to the slaw. Graham wanted something to drink after tasting it and Joe said it was a huge technical error adding the garlic.

 

Derrick has his chance and his coating on the fish is a disaster. Graham said it was a pretty bad dish, but was it enough to make it in the bottom three?

 

Adrien comes up and his plating of the dish is not anything like Whitney's plating, which sets Joe off on a tizzy. Joe states it doesn't taste great and then proceeds to plate it properly, to show how little amount of time it takes to do it the right way.

 

Jennie is next and this was her first time frying fish and it showed with the judges' reactions to it. Graham said it's too salty and the texture of the slaw looks like someone pre-chewed it. Chef Ramsay just says it's disgusting.

 

Ben is last up and we have not seen much of him during the previous shows. After Joe tasted it and gave him a weird look, he yells at him asking him why he doesn't cook like this all the time? It was delicious.

 

The judges announce the top two dishes for the test, which will be team captains for the next challenge. Those dishes belong to Christian and Ben.

 

The bottom three dishes are announced, with at least one of them going home. The three people are Adrien (didn't plate correctly), Jennie (seemed lost in test) and Alejandra (put garlic in slaw). So, Adrien and Alejandra both went from being top three in the Mystery Box Challenge to bottom three in the Elimination Test.

 

Chef Ramsay tells Jennie that she will be going home. He then tells Adrien and Alejandra to take their aprons back to their stations...they are still safe. 12 competitors remain!

 

 

MasterChef airs on Monday at 9/8c on Fox.

 

(Image courtesy of Fox)

 

 

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