MasterChef Australia Season 14 Episode 49 is an immunity challenge. The episode is called ‘Prickly Ingredients Immunity Challenge’ and has a runtime of about 1 hour and 28 minutes. The synopsis for the episode reads, “Today’s challenge is to tame one of these very prickly ingredients: chestnuts, stinging nettle, prickly pear and sea urchin. The best chef will win immunity.”
The person who will win the immunity will be saved from the next eliminations and will automatically become one of the members of the top 7 for MasterChef Australia Season 14. In this challenge, the contestants have to make a dish using the prickly ingredients that include, sea urchins, prickly pear, stinging nettles and chestnuts, within 75 minutes. They can make any dish, sweet or savoury but the main focus should be the ingredients they have picked.
MasterChef Australia Season 14 Episode 49 Recap Contains Spoilers
The contestants competing in this challenge of MasterChef Australia Season 14 Episode 49 are Alvin, Julie, Sarah and Kyema. She is the first one to choose the ingredient and she picks prickly pear, followed by Sarah who went for chestnuts and Alvin chose sea urchins. At last, they are left with stinging nettles and thus the last member Julie, has to work with them.
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Billie and the other contestants in the stands call it the hardest challenge ever on the show because most of them are not familiar with the ingredients they are assigned. The pantry and the garden are fully open for them to take any ingredients they want. Sarah seems like she already has a plan and straight away goes for the chicken in the pantry.
She decides to make poached chicken breast with chestnut cream and mushrooms. She quickly starts roasting the chestnuts on the hibachi so she could have plenty of time to create a smooth puree, which is the most important part of the dish. Meanwhile, Julie picks up the biggest salmon which could feed the entire crew of the show.
She wants to make the whole salmon with sauce and salad of stinging nettle. To get the stinging taste out she blanched the stinging nettles but after a boil, they became very mild, almost tasteless with the texture of a grass stalk. Even the judge, Andy Allen said that he would never pick the nettles as they are very difficult to work with.
On the other hand, Keyma, who was the first one to pick, decides to make a dessert with the prickly pears. She plans to make a French doughnut and serve it with prickly pear sorbet and gel. And Alvin decides on a simpler dish with flat egg noodles, sea urchin butter and some more urchin on top of it.
Although all the contestants look like they have a rough plan about what they are going to present that would help them win the immunity, it is not without its troubles. Roasting and peeling chestnuts take up most of Sarah’s time that she should be using on getting other things ready, Keyma’s dish is questioned by the judges and that makes her change up the menu at the last minute.
Julie’s salmon is too big, even for the oven and is unlikely to cook on time, on the brighter side, Alvin was right on track with the ingredients and speed but his ambitions to get immunity make him do a mistake that even judges face palm their heads to make him stop.
MasterChef Australia Season 14 Episode 49: Who Wins the Immunity Challenge?
Within 75 minutes of MasterChef Australia Season 14 Episode 49, the four contestants go through a range of emotions to get their dish on the plate. Alvin is called on first to present his dish to the judges who complement his dish but tell him he was very close to making it, if only he hadn’t cooked the sea urchins with the noodles. Cooking it makes it lose its umami flavour and texture.
Next up is Sarah, who was able to make the perfect chestnut puree on time to present but could check up on the chicken. When the judges cut up the chicken breast, it is mostly undercooked and thus can’t be eaten. However, they taste the cooked parts with the puree and love the taste of it.
Followed by Julie, who was able to bring out the taste of the stinging nettles but the fish lacked salt and her puree was very gritty. At last, Keyma presents her incomplete dish as she dropped her cake on the floor. Thus, she only had the prickly pear sorbet, cream and gel on the plate. But little did she know that even though, her plan didn’t work, what she made was complete in itself and even won her immunity.
MasterChef Australia Season 14 Episode 49: Final Thoughts
MasterChef Australia Season 14 immunity challenge was one of the hardest ones to compete in. Even though Sarah and Alvin had worked before with the ingredients, they were not able to use their prior experience to their advantage. Whereas Julie and Keyma were dealing with something completely new, they were able to bring the best flavours out of them.
Also, it was nice to see the master class by the judges’ Jock and Andy who made dishes using crabs and guest chef Natalie Paull, who made a Carrot cake with a twist. As well as Daniel and Aldo, showed what their go-to midnight snack is, as everyone munched on them in the end.
You can watch MasterChef Australia Season 14 Episode 49 now on Disney+ Hotstar.
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