MKR semi-final recap: Squab heads and bad desserts

THIS is the face of a woman who has just eaten something horrible in a dessert. What were Amy and Tyson thinking?

WOAH.

We’re in the semi-finals of MKR, and it’s an epic battle. We know it’s an epic battle, partly because the perpetually-clenched voice-over guy tells us so, and partly because there’s superimposed phrases floating across the screen.

There’s basically three main players in tonight’s episode.

The first:

‘Siblings’ just isn’t a menacing word, is it?

The second:

Presumably the phrase ‘friend-zoned cucks’ was unavailable.

And of course, the team that really holds this whole episode together:

It’s like a delicious horror movie.

We’re really at the point now where losing any team will feel like losing a limb, and the two teams making entree, main and dessert today are very, very important to the MKR story.

On the one hand, if we lose Amy and Tyson we lose some of the most innovative and technique-drenched cooking this competition has ever seen.

On the other hand, if we lose David and Betty we may never hear the word “hashtag” again.

Hashtag oh no.

Still, as constant footage of people looking diagonally upwards at a clock tells us, there’s no time. We need to get cooking.

ENTREE

There are two important cooking techniques to be learned when watching the teams making their delicious entrees.

The first is the introduction of “bounciness” into your sugarcane prawn mixture, achieved by pounding your dough repeatedly.

David knows not to ask if Betty needs help pounding her dough.

The other is the intensely gruesome technique of decapitating squabs, or young pigeons, a practice that MKR’s editors take considerable glee in turning into a violent montage.

No squabs were harmed during filming, except these four.

But look, it’s fine. Amy’s just going to pop the squab heads in the oven so the flavour of their innermost thoughts can really infiltrate her sauce. It’s pretty generous of her to save us the hassle of thinking up our own nightmares tonight.

Betty and David’s secret entree ingredient is mentioning their mothers a lot.

Amy and Tyson’s secret entree ingredient is pretending once again that the appearance of “Angry Angry Man” is imminent, despite zero confirmed sightings of him over the last three months.

Either way, the techniques work a treat, with judges unable to separate the two delicious dishes.

Mmmm, you can really taste the beak.

As Manu shouts “DON’T LET YOUR DREAM DIE TODAY” in that upbeat, casual way that Frenchmen are known for, the teams rush to start:

MAIN COURSE

Like a starlet’s Spanx at the Logies, both teams try to cram as much into their main course dishes as possible.

Betty and David make twice-cooked pork belly with pumpkin puree and nashi pear, while Amy and Tyson cook duck two ways and turnip three ways with two different sauces.

Despite all that, David still finds time to chip away at Betty’s friendzone resolve, using the most romantic of all vegetables: the onion.

“I’m like an onion Betty, I have many layers” he says, starting well.

“I’m sweet, I’ll make you cry” he continues, losing his momentum.

“I’ll make you laugh” he adds, over-estimating the comedic value of onions.

And finally, once he’s beyond rescue, David finishes with “I’m tasty when I’m charred?”.

By this point Betty is clearly aflame with desire.

She’ll have none of your bulbs, mate.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the fridges, Tyson and Amy are writing a poem called “Stop Fiddling With The Duck While I’m Plating Up”, which goes:

I’m searing duck skin in a pan.

(Let’s go Ty. Let’s go Ty)

Plate turnips quickly as you can.

(Let’s go Ty. Let’s go Ty)

I’ll do this one thing, you do nine

(Let’s go let’s go let’s go Ty)

OH HOLY CRAP, IS THAT THE TIME?

(UM YES IT IS MATE, LET’S GO TY).

The judges are less impressed with the main than the entrees due to undercooked pork and overcooked duck, and maybe because they miss the subtle flavouring of decapitated heads. The result will all come down to:

DESSERT

With dessert not their strong point, David and Betty keep their flavours relatively direct and pure with a sweet mango sorbet offset by a salty coconut sauce artistically splattered onto the plate.

“I’m definitely getting my Jackson Pollock on with this plating, it reminds me of Year Nine art class” says Betty.

Betty sat next to a guy called Miggs in art class.

By contrast, Amy and Tyson make a Pimm’s and ginger jelly with cucumber sorbet and pickled cucumber, a complex and time-consuming dish garnished with fruit, panic, and swearing.

“We’ve only got half an hour, we don’t have enough time for Tyson to be swearing at oranges” exclaims Amy.

He’s saying “Oranges are great! They should definitely not go to hell”.

Desserts are served to the judges, who are impressed by Betty and David’s mango sorbet but left a little cold by the chewy, dry sticky rice. Ha! By this point surely Amy and Tyson will bring it home easily with their fancy cocktail dessert.

Unless ...

That’s not good.

Unless they put great chunks of vinegary cucumber in the middle of their dessert I guess.

There was a dish served on MKR tonight that elicited this face. Not good.

We don’t get to hear the full critique before we’re suddenly there, on the stage bit, abruptly ready to find out if it will be chewy rice or vinegary cucumber that will kill dreams today.

Scores are revealed agonisingly slowly — a drowsy cavalcade of all eights and nines, until by an absolute hair of a two-point difference, Amy and Tyson emerge victorious. There’s barely a dry squab eyeball in the house.

Beheading skills always come through in the end.

David and Betty sadly gather their thoughts for their final to-camera interview, taking the opportunity for a final inspiring philosophical dictum.

“Hashtag disappointed” says David.

That’s beautiful, man.

Jo Thornely is a writer who loves it when you explain her jokes back to her on Twitter. Follow her @JoThornely