Unwavering focus and absolute professionalism. Well, if they were in the GBM kitchen this week, they were probably playing hide and seek in a store cupboard. ‘You’re like a naughty little school class, you four,’ observed Andi Oliver, as the fresh-faced chefs taunted and teased each other, claiming it was ‘all part of the craic.’ Veteran chef Richard Corrigan seemed amused at first, then exasperated as cries of ‘coming now!’ invariably meant a wait of several minutes before any food reached the pass.
Niall Sarhan, head chef at The Rabbit Hotel, in Templepatrick, was the first to leave, before Richard too unexpectedly called it a day, perhaps a little relieved to pass on his duties to Spencer Metzger. No nonsense Spencer urged the chefs to be more organised, with some success, but sadly not enough to achieve high scores and avoid time penalties. Colin McSherry, a pop-up chef working in and around Newcastle, County Down, went next, leaving Lottie Noren, chef patron at Edo, Belfast, and Melissa McCabe, owner of the Feast food truck, to face judges, Ed, Nisha and Tom, and guest, Dr Michael McKillon MBE.
There’s less food truck, more ice cream van about the delivery of the canapés. Melissa’s is a Magnum-style lollipop of monkfish, black pudding and Marie Rose sauce, whilst Lottie’s is a Cornetto of duck liver parfait with bergamot gel and pain d’épices crumb. ‘Lovely and really hearty,’ says Nisha of the first. ‘Perfectly pleasant', is her assessment of the second. Tom disagrees, saying Lottie’s is ‘not very good’ and it’s a clean sweep for Melissa.
‘Goodwill’ is Melissa’s celebration of the opening celeriac… oh, sorry, opening ceremony. But there is a lot of celeriac. It appears whole and hay-baked, as a compote, a jus and even the accompanying pickled apple, hazelnut and truffle salad gets a garnish of crispy celeriac. Michael likes the crunch of the hazelnuts, Ed enjoys the salad, but all agree with Nisha when she says, ‘that main bit of celeriac is just celeriac, at the end of the day'.