Image: Charlie Sperring

by Jan-Hendrik Botha

While some viewers showed off their homemade creations online, the pressure was about to build up again in the MasterChef SA kitchen.

First, he challenged our nine remaining contestants to a sensory test, during which each of them had to taste twelve brioches, or in South African terms, mosbolletjies, all having different and very unique South African flavours. 



Tarryn, Andriette, Charmaine, and Tembisa were the four contestants who identified the most flavours correctly and received immunity, allowing them to spend the rest of the challenge on the gantry. 


Next up was a two-hour pressure test during which Dr Harri, Luyanda S'li, Sims, and Shawn had to cook two of Jan Hendrik’s signature dishes – and the nerves were running very high. Even Twitterati felt it online. On the menu were two all-time South African favourites, reimagined: the ordinary braaibroodjie recreated into a braaibroodjie macaron...

...and what can only be described as a gastronomical mieliepaptert tower.

Straight off the bat, Sims started dissecting his recipe and was quite proactive in his approach, starting with his catalan.


But right from the start, there was amusingly nervous energy surrounding his station, especially when the judges, without saying too much, pointed out that something was wrong with his catalan. 


While Jan Hendrik wanted paptert towers, Sims’ started tumbling and he decided to lay it down instead. After plating, he was worried about his presentation, but Jan Hendrik loved it saying sometimes a serious flop can turn into serious inspiration. “This is how I’m going to do it from now on… It just makes sense.”


Back at Dr Harri’s station, 


...everything was spilling over, but he remained very calm and seemed very confident about what he was doing.


Jan Hendrik, however, was worried that Dr Harri didn't know what a braaibroodjie was. 


After presenting and dubbing his paptert tower Lady Rusticana, “a lady of leisure”, unfortunately, Jan Hendrik wasn’t too impressed with the taste of Dr Harri's braaibroodjie macaron. 


But though braaibroodjies aren't his forte, his paptert tower definitely did the trick to impress our guest chef.


S’li, on the other hand, was very familiar with all of his ingredients. However, he was quite confused about what he had to do with them. We felt the pressure at his station when he realised, after hitting the halfway mark, that he had no tomato gravy for his paptert. Luckily, he started improvising. 


After plating, he seemed unimpressed with his presentation, but Jan Hendrik loved the taste. “He wanted to create something delicious and I can taste it,” said Jan Hendrik. 

Shawn also impressed Jan Hendrik with his presentation and was the only contestant who decided to put his tomato relish inside the paptert tower instead of on top – and Jan Hendrik was inspired. 

Luyanda was probably the most excited to cook for Jan Hendrik, but when she read through his recipe, she quickly reached the limit of her “bundle of English”. 

After plating her paptert and garnishing it with corn leaves, Luyanda decided to light up her corn hair, giving us a good laugh. 


Back on the gantry, Andriette, Tarryn, and Tembisa collectively decided to keep quiet as the atmosphere seemed quite tense downstairs. But the silence was quickly broken when Tembisa stepped in and guided Luyanda on assembling her mieliepap tower.


Unfortunately, Luyanda ran out of time and left some of the acetate she used to build her tower on her plate. 

According to Jan Hendrik, this left a chemical taste in his mouth. 


And though the flavour and texture of her mieliepap impressed our judges, they felt leaving the acetate on her plate was a cardinal error and therefore was asked to leave the MasterChef SA kitchen.


See what she had to say after leaving below:

Let us know on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by using #MasterChefSA. Remember to watch MasterChef SA every Monday to Thursday at 18:00 on M-Net channel 101. In case you missed the latest episode, catch up with DStv using your connected device.