CliqueClackMasterChef – A bold (or foolish) plan for saving your ass as a contestant
Last night, another ‘MasterChef’ season four hopeful went down, and I have a plan that could have saved them: serve nothing. Spoilers follow!
I’ll say again: spoilers for last night’s MasterChef follow. …
A few weeks ago, as I was watching an episode of MasterChef with Deb, a contestant — I can’t remember who it was — presented a dish to the judges that was crap. It wasn’t just presented poorly or simply underdone; it was raw. And by raw I mean it was inedible. If someone ate it, they’d likely become ill. As this contestant was being berated by the judges for having served them that trash, I paused the episode and said, “I have a ballsy move someone on the show should try sometime to save themselves. It would be a huge risk and would be a one-off trick, but it might just save their ass in a situation like this.”
“Drop the plate on the way up?” Deb asked.
“No! That would never win the judges’ sympathy, and they’d see right through that bullshit. I’m saying they walk right up there either empty handed or — in an even more ballsy move — take their dish up there and do the honors of dumping it right in the trash.”
Deb, of course, thinks I’m insane. But hear me out!
My thinking is this: if you’re trying to be a “master chef,” then act like it. Someone who’s competing to make a name for themselves either with incredible dishes in their own restaurant or with a cookbook would never — NEVER — knowingly serve inedible, disgusting or possibly dangerously undercooked food. It just wouldn’t happen. So why serve it to the judges? Hoping they won’t notice or not throw up on the spot?
For my plan to work, it would have to be executed flawlessly, at the perfect moment and could only work ONE time. And by “one time” I mean it would only work once in the season and for no one else afterwards — possibly for the extent of the series.
Let me play out the perfect scenario. You’re a contestant on MasterChef, and as you’re busting your ass trying to cook, say, chicken, you realize this dish just isn’t going to be edible; it’s going to be raw or just gross, and the judges probably won’t even take a bite. You’re fucked. As you’re stressing this over before being called up to the judges’ table, you notice that another contestant has a pretty awful dish as well; maybe not worse than yours, but definitely second-worse. Ideally, that person is called up first, and the judges tear them apart. Now’s your chance. Your name is called to the table. You walk right up there, and instead of putting the plate on the table, you dump it right in the trash.
“What the bloody hell did you do that for?!” would be Gordon’s likely response.
Your response back: “What I cooked there was something I would never, ever put in front of someone I was serving food to. I’m not going to dishonor myself or you guys by trying to even pass it off as something you should or could eat. So I’m presenting you with the best I have right now, which is nothing. Serving nothing is better than serving that.”
Deb’s (and likely your) first reaction to this is: bullshit; it’d never work. They’d be first to get kicked out, right? I’m saying I think it could not only work in the contestant’s favor, but it’d cause a wave of shock throughout the MasterChef-verse at what a ballsy (and, I might add, professional) move it was to pull, but that the judges let him stay.
Why would this work? Because the judges could say his conduct was most becoming of what it means to be a true “master chef” in the business. That a chef not only needs to be able to cook and cook well, but that they are able to discern what is suitable for someone to eat before serving it. Sometimes a chef makes mistakes, and they need to recognize that. Because this contestant chose to hold their head high and not present something knowingly bad to the judges and (and this is the most important part) because another contestant chose instead to give them slop, the one throwing their dish in the trash is safe.
Yes, this is a huge gamble. I’m definitely not saying this would surely work. I do think it’s a worthwhile consideration, though, if what you’re presenting to the judges is clearly going to get your ass thrown out. I’m also not entirely sure this would have worked with Eddie’s issue last night, since he would have been speaking for both himself and Jessie — I’m not sure she’d have gone for that move, unless at the last second he pulled the uni off the plate and threw it away without consulting her.
So, am I as delusional as Deb continues to say I am? Think this could be a “get out of jail free card” for someone some day? Or what if MasterChef allowed each contestant one time to pull this off, at the risk of that meaning their dish will be considered as “the worst” if nobody else puts something up that’s awful?
One Comment on “MasterChef – A bold (or foolish) plan for saving your ass as a contestant”
Someone did this on Masterchef Australia. Can’t remember all the details, but it was early in a season. The Judges respected the decision but he still found himself in an elimination challenge.