Oh Masterchef, how you have changed Reality TV for the better. Great work by Channel Ten in dumping Big Brother and replacing it with something I actually like to watch during dinner-time. Brilliant decisions by the producers in selecting the final contestants - wonders will never cease - I was pleasantly shocked by them all.

Now the advantage of having intelligent, articulate reality TV contestants is that you get interesting and honest interviews from them. Recently eliminated contestant Tom gave some pure gold in TV Week.

Some of the best quotes:

On how he felt about being eliminated:

On one side, I was quite happy to be eliminated on the basis of the judges’ decision as opposed to a team elimination. But having said that, I’m disappointed that I was eliminated only because I feel that there are people still in the house that aren’t as good a cook as I am. And I think there’s a general feeling in the house that there are people there that don’t deserve to be there.

On whether he thinks there is someone who should not be there
Somebody like Sam. I think a lot of people in the house are surprised that he’s actually come so far. He’s only got one style of cooking, which is a very sort of café, bistro style of cooking. I think he hasn’t been eliminated because when he’s given a recipe he can actually produce something good. So it’s a combination of that skill and also just luck.

On the croquembouche challenge:

Even though I had the best custard and I had the best toffee, I was eliminated. But then Poh actually completely stuffed up her pastry and had to redo it and then at the very end ran out of time to construct the base that it had to sit on. It was a funny elimination and I don’t want to actually think that it’s because of favouritism, but there were flaws in all of our dishes. I’ve accepted it and I’ve moved on, but I’m still disappointed in terms of my elimination because, although my pastry was burnt, other people like Poh didn’t actually complete the entire dish.

On 'beefgate' and the sushi train challenge:
I think it’s been badly edited. What had actually happened on the day was that we were told by the chef that when we went down into the actual restaurant, all of our ingredients would be down there, including the beef. Trevor was the one that was delegated to sear our beef. And he’s yelling out from the kitchen, “Where’s the beef?” I walked past a station and saw a beef which I picked up and gave to him. Off camera, I had actually said to both the red and blue teams that I’d taken the beef, so both teams knew. But it still hasn’t been resolved as to whether or not it was the blue team’s beef that I picked up. And about an hour into service, both teams ran out of food, so the restaurant supplied us with all this extra beef and fish. So even though it’s shown on television that the blue team didn’t have any beef, they did. People seem to think the blue team would have won if they had beef. But they actually did have beef and they still didn’t win!

Interesting that he confirmed things that have been discussed over watercoolers for awhile….

Stay tuned - I am considering making my very first croquembouche in the very near future. Yikes! All resulting photos of profiteroles and kitchen disasters will be posted here, for your viewing pleasure!

Tom is currently doing work experience at top Brisbane restaurant E’cco, which is just a hop, step and jump from my day-job. Anyone want to join me soon to try his wares out at E'cco?