HOW THEY APPROACH PUTTING A TWIST ON THINGS...
THE latest series of MasterChef has kicked off with Greg Wallace, Marcus Wareing and Monica Galetti putting professional chefs through their paces.
Home cooks can have a go, too, thanks to new cookbook, MasterChef: The Classics With A Twist. The 100-strong recipe collection is filled with nifty culinary ideas and traditional dishes from past winners of the amateur and celebrity MasterChef competitions.
For starters, there’s Natalie Coleman’s smoky aubergine parmigiana arancini and chilli con carne samosas. Or, try Tim Anderson’s xian-style roast leg of lamb and prawn cocktail tacos.
Then there’s 2017 celebrity champ 2017 Angellica Bell’s pear, and passion fruit and raspberry pavlova.
We caught up with 2014 champion Ping Coombes and 2012 winner Shelina Permalloo to find out more about embellishing classics and how the MasterChef experience can change your life... FOR Ping, adding Asian ingredients to dishes comes naturally. “I’m used to changing things to my liking because I’m married to an Englishman and I’m Malaysian, so I put a lot of Malaysian ingredients into my food.”
Take her lamb ragu with lemongrass and ginger (“It’s Italian fusion with Asian ingredients, and I serve it with linguine,”) while in the book, she shares an apple and blackberry pie flavoured with cardamom
has a flash of lemon on the nose and a playfulness of stone fruits such as apricot and peach. The palate is intense with citrus freshness and a tingle of spice. This wine could add zizzang to your prawn starter and then pour through the rest of your meal. We’ll stay in Europe (oooh, not in the Brexit sense) and wander lazily over to Italy with that uses activated charcoal: “The pastry turns jet black, it still tastes the same, but it looks completely different.”
It’s about being clever, not completely overhauling an entire iconic dish, she explains: “Don’t go overboard. Keep the core flavours, but then maybe add one or two ingredients that you love, or are a bit unusual, or make it look different.”
“The whole point is: How can we elevate a normal homecooked meal into something a bit more MasterCheffy?” adds Shelina. “Sometimes it doesn’t necessarily need to be about the technical skills involved, for me, it’s about a true balance of flavour that can take something from being ordinary, to being sublime.”
THEIR KEY INGREDIENTS FOR ADDING A FLOURISH TO A DISH...
MAURITIAN flavourings are crucial in Shelina’s cooking, and there’s one fruit she cannot do without. “I have a mango obsession,” she buzzes. “I think I used mango in every single recipe in the final of MasterChef,” – try her tart mango and lime coleslaw from the book.
Ping, meanwhile, is all about lemongrass (“I have a tonne of it in the freezer,”) as well as ginger, garlic and a range of chilli sauces, which she says are particularly versatile.
“Sweet chilli sauce can be more than just a dip, you can make a lovely dressing, it can be put in a dish to sweeten it up – it’s just about knowing how to use your ingredients to the best of your ability.”
It is dry and refreshing, with delightful, if not a little shy, aromas of white peach and lemon. There’s also a subtle peep of orange peel in the mouth. Mmmmm, salmon please and a squeeze of lemon.
We’re going to head to the southern hemisphere now.
is a vibrant New Zealand wine, very confident in itself and the stone fruit and herbal nuances it delivers. A dash across the Pacific takes us to Chile and another sauvignon blanc,
THIS IS WHAT IT TAKES TO WIN MASTERCHEF...
“A LOT of determination,” says Ping, “and a lot of blood, sweat and tears, but it’s a lot of fun as well.”
“I was at the deepest darkest hour of my life, I’d been made redundant,” she adds, on why she applied. “I wanted to do something which I love, which is to cook – but I didn’t do it to win.”
“A real love to want to change your life and cook,” is paramount, agrees Shelina. “That’s the most important thing.”
HOW MASTERCHEF CAN SWITCH UP YOUR WHOLE LIFE...
PING now runs restaurants in London and Birmingham. While MasterChef launched her food career, she says, “it’s definitely really hard
White peach, pear and lemons set the scene with this Australian wine, as a freshness and good acidity lift the palate and a subtlety of flint adds backbone.
Oh my, finally a pinot grigio (I know, I never mention pinot grigio!). Credit where it’s due and a nod to being a MasterChef champion, having been a home cook, and then suddenly people expecting you to be this professional cook within 24 hours of winning.”
“It’s the challenge to be taken seriously,” she explains. “You’re kind of in between a home cook and a professional cook, and you have to get through that.”
Since winning the show, Shelina has written two cookbooks and worked in Michelin star restaurants, and has opened her own joint, Lakaz Maman. “It’s a real whirlwind as soon as you leave the show and start experiencing what it’s like to work in a professional kitchen,” she recalls. “You sink or swim really, really quickly.”
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The grapes of northern Alpine Italy deliver a nose of pears and lychees and to taste, a freshness and purity.
■ gin. It seems we can’t get enough of gin. A festive lovely is ■ Jane is a member of the Circle of Wine Writers. Find her on social media and online as One Foot in the Grapes.
so I Googled and read that it’s won a gold gong at the Quality Food Awards. The grape is native to Rías Baixas in the Galicia region of Spain and this wine is quite lovely. It is zippy with notes of lime, pear and grapefruit and I’d be happy to share a glass on Christmas Day. Or maybe keep to myself.
a glass in hand to try