After last week's ding-dong over rendang curry it was back to less contentious culinary capers as bank manager Kenny Tutt was crowned winner of MasterChef 2018 (BBC One).
While there was no repeat of Thursday night's weep-a-thon in which John Torode was moved to tears by an especially stirring apple crumble, he and fellow judge Gregg Wallace were nonetheless floored by Tutt's three-course meal, which he was required to put together in just three hours.
He tingled their tastebuds with a starter of roast scallops, smoked cauliflower, shimeji mushroom and pancetta, then raised the ante with a main course of Squab pigeon breast and bon-bon, heritage beetroot, baby turnip, spiced cherries, bread sauce and game jus. Dessert was bitter chocolate, ale ice-cream, malt tuile and smoked caramel.
The chocolate may have been bitter but likeable Tutt (36), who had been encouraged to enter the competition by his wife, was clearly chuffed. “I'm tired beyond words but happy beyond words," commented the Worthing, West Sussex native "This has been a real roller-coaster."
He saw off the challenges of Nawamin Pinpathomrat, a 28 year-old medical student from Thailand, and David Crichton, a 41-year-old airline pilot from Cheshire. They had tumbled at the last hurdle after a gruelling week that had seen the contestants travel to Peru at cook at Virgilio Martínez's celebrated restaurant Central and prepare a meal for London chef Ashley Palmer-Watts.
The final was a typically tense affair ("If I win the trophy it will be the best moment of my life," said Pinpathomrat, whose trio of dishes utilised 50 ingredients and featured a coconut and dumpling dessert animal hatching an egg representing Pinpathomrat coming of age in the kitchen). But it is unlikely to spark an international incident on the scale of the blacklash against Torode and Wallace after they told Malaysian-born contestant Zaleha Kadir Olpin her take on the traditional South East Asian dish chicken rendang was insufficiently crispy.
The remarks caused a furore in Malaysia, where the British High Commissioner and the Prime Minister were among those to point out that crispy was the last thing a self-respecting chicken rendang should be. For MasterChef to find itself at the centre of a global outcry was simultaneously surreal and slightly disturbing – and fans will be relieved the show signed-off on an uncontroversial note, without a single foot planted in mouth.
