Episode 14 of MasterChef South Africa aired last week and of course I have to share my views. Having been part of the fourth season of MasterChef, I can’t help but compare while watching the show. Read my episode summary below.

Fun fact - my lighting company LLSA supplied all the lights in the pantry and around the studio, and we are mentioned as a sponsor in the credits. 

Spoiler Alert

If you are behind, I recommend you stop reading now!
Click here read up more about the MasterChef season 5 contestants, or read the summaries from the previous MasterChef episodes if you’re trying to catch up.

Want to Watch MasterChef South Africa?

MasterChef South Africa Season premiered on Saturday July 13 at 7:30 pm on S3, and new episodes are aired every Saturday.
From November, episodes will air at 8:30 pm every Saturday, with the rebroadcasts on Sundays on S2 at 6:30 pm and on Wednesdays on S3 at 6:00 pm. The last episode (the finale!) airs on 23 November at 8:30 pm on S3, but each episode is available on catchup for about a week (select Saturday and S3 to find it).

Looking back - What happened on the previous MasterChef episodes?

Click here to jump straight to episode 14 and skip the summaries of the previous episodes.

In the first episode, contestants had to make a chicken dish with a sauce or a broth, but for it to be at MasterChef-worthy standard. They were given 90 minutes and their dish needed to include a mirepoix (a mixture of diced vegetables cooked on a low heat in oil or butter) and it needed to include a Bouquet Garni, which is a bundle of herbs. In traditional French cuisine this includes parsley, bay leaves and thyme but other herbs can be added too. 

What was most shocking about this first episode, is that the contestants went down from 20 to 15 in one go. The contestants who were eliminated in the first episode were Lucas, Lesego, Robyn, Andrew and Ella. 

In the second episode, contestants had to use the single humble ingredient of an apple, and think of the apple of their eye in their life when cooking. The contestants were allowed to make something sweet or savoury.  No contestants were eliminated and Naledi won the mystery box challenge.

In the third episode, Naledi was up in the gantry as a reward for winning the mystery box challenge in the previous episode. The remaining contestants were challenged by guest judge Chef Nokx Majozi in a pressure test to recreate her signature Pepper Steak Pie. Tina, Bridget and Amo had made the best pepper steak pies, and Tina won the elimination challenge. Nash, Lona and Melanie found themselves in the bottom three and Melanie was eliminated. 

In the fourth episode, the contestants were asked to pay tribute to and draw inspiration from the judges’ star signs when creating their dishes in this challenge. They couldn’t choose which judge’s star sign they were going to base their dish on, but it was an elimination based on chance as they had to choose a card in order to determine which protein they would be cooking. Chanel, Shreya and Zak found themselves in the bottom three. Zakariyya Ibrahim (Zak) went home as his curry failed to deliver. According to Judge Katlego, the lack of seasoning was his downfall and both the rice and carrots were overcooked, and the dish was not balanced.

In the fifth episode, guest judge Jackie Burger challenged the contestants to use fashion models and their incredible outfits to make their own creative interpretation of the outfits. Nabela, Ketsia and Tebogo were in the top 3 and Amogelang Maluleke (Amo), Tzu Ting Long (Tina) and Penny in the bottom, with Tina from Home Bao going home in the end.

In the sixth episode, MasterChef contestants competed in their first team challenge. The episode took place at Durbanville Hills wine estate. Contestants were welcomed to the award-winning Tangram restaurant by cellar master Pieter-Niel Rossouw and Head Chef Tamzyn Ehlers. Tebogo was Team Captain for the Blue Team (made up of Naledi, Chanel, Amo, Shreya and Nabila) and Nash headed up the Red Team which also included Penny, Ketsia, Nash, Bridget, Lona and Refe. Contestants needed to create a ‘Buffet of New Beginnings’ which was basically an interactive buffet table re-inventing old-style buffet combinations and pairing creations with wine from the Durbanville Hills Collectors Reserve range. Ultimately, the blue team took home the victory.

The seventh episode saw Penny, Ketsia, Nash, Bridget, Lona, Refe and Nash battling it out against each other in a elimination challenge. They were given an hour to showcase their creativity by whipping up a gourmet meal from the judges’ typical month-end leftovers and were only allowed to use 20 classic frugal South African staples. Ultimately Ketsia’s flatbread and tuna salad dish did not meet the mark and she was eliminated from the competition.

In the eight episode contestants were asked to embrace the air fryer revolution and use it as their main cooking method to reinvent a classic potato dish to a modern bistro-worthy delight. Nash, Chanel and Lona cooked the top 3 dishes and Bridget, Tebogo and Naledi found themselves in the bottom three. Chanel won the challenge with her potato dauphinoise with chorizo caramelised crisp and a little bit of lemon and she was given the opportunity to win an Immunity Pin. She did need to beat Herman Lensing at his game - Herman has published several cookbooks and three with air fryer recipes specifically so he is South Africa’s leading expert on cooking with air fryers. This is when mysterious guest rode in on a Pick ‘n Pay asap! scooter… me!

I took two paper bags out my Pick ‘n Pay asap! scooter, one with a “Land” and one with a “Sky” sticker on them. With that, the judges left to the back and I was left to be the referee for the challenge. Chanel chose “Sky” and needed to cook with duck, whilst Herman Lensing was given lamb.

With the ninth episode we reached the halfway mark of the competition. The top 10 walked in in white aprons and were challenged with making a plant-based dish using the humble cabbage as the hero ingredient. Amo, Nabila and Shreya found themselves in the bottom three, but were safe from elimination due to it being a non-elimination challenge. Refe, Chanel and Lona were in the Top 3 and Lona won 50,000 rand to the best dish.

In the tenth episode, Shreya announced that she would be leaving the MasterChef kitchen without participating in the next challenge. She had been struggling with anxiety throughout the competition, and after receiving “some unfortunate news” from her family, she left, calling it “an act of self-love and an act of self-care.”

After Shreya walked out, the the MasterChef contestants welcomed celebrity chef Alessandro Khojane, “Sotho Italian” (owner of Gemelli in Bryanston). Contestants are given two hours to create an Italian-South African dish. Naledi won the challenge with her chicken roulade.

In the eleventh episode, Naledi spent the challenge on the gantry after winning the challenge in the previous episode. As the contestants soon found out, it was a A Mystery Box Team Challenge. They were divided up in teams of two, with Chanel alone in the yellow team after Shreya had pulled out of the competition in the last episode. To even things out, the judges brought back Refe, who was only just eliminated one episode prior. Each team is provided a different meat parcel and they are each tasked to making 1.5 kgs of wors, cooking it on the hibachi, and serving their with modern side dish of a heritage starch and a tasty sauce or gravy. Last but not least, they are required to make a true South African delicacy: skilpadjies. All of this, needed to be done within the 2.5 hour time frame. The wors needs to be made the old fashioned way: using a manual meat grinder found in their mystery boxes. In the end, the Green Team made up of Nabila and Lona took home the victory. This means that they will be safe from the next challenge, spending it on the gantry, and can’t be eliminated from the competition during the next episode.

In the twelfth episode, Penny, Chanel, Refe, Amo, Bridget, Nash and Naledi had to pass a blind taste challenge. After being blindfolded, they were each given a variety of ingredients which had been cut into identically sized cubes. Penny, Chanel, Bridget, Amo and Refe make a mistake whereas all of Naledi’s guesses are correct. As a result, Naledi gets to join Nabila and Lona on the gantry and also can’t be eliminated from the competition during the next challenge. They have to create two tiny dishes: an amuse bouche, usually served at the beginning of the meal as a gift from the chef to awaken the pallet, and a bonbon (or a friandise, or mignardise), usually served at the end of a meal. Their sweet dish had to contain chocolate and they needed to make six of each.

Amo’s savoury tart with caramelised onion purée and quail breast was criticised for the crumbly and overcooked pastry, and he was eliminated from the competition.

In the thirteenth episode, Chanel watched from the gantry whilst the remaining seven contestants (Nabila, Lona, Penny, Refe, Bridget, Nash and Naledi) had to replicate Chef Moses Moloi’s “Enchanted Forest Elegance” in two and a half hours. There are quite a few techniques in the intricate dish and the contestants visibly struggled with the race against time. The episode is action-packed: Bridget cuts her finger, Lona struggles to switch on his Taurus Kitchen Machine and Nash doesn’t start plating until the countdown begins. This as it turns out is his downfall. Managing to put just one or two elements on the plate was not enough and Nash was eliminated from MasterChef season 5.

In episode 14, the seven remaining contestants (Chanel, Nabila, Lona, Penny, Refe, Bridget and Naledi) cook off against each other in the MasterChef kitchen. The studio has been transformed to showcase the theme of the week: bougie brunch. A car boot has been filled with avocado, loaves of bread, cut up oranges and grapefruits and a variety of different liquors.

The Brunch Trend

Judge Justine explains that ‘brunch’ is a derivative of the words breakfast and lunch. Traditionally starting around 11:00 am, if it’s a good brunch it can carry on for a long time. Zola explains that although brunch is not a new concept, it has gained in popularity over the last few years. particularly amongst affluent millennials and Gen Z. After this short introduction of the episode’s theme, Katlego introduces the guest judge of the episode to the contestants:

MasterChef Guest Judge: Ebie Du Toit

The guest judge for this elimination challenge is introduced by Katlego as the head chef of “one of the swankiest restaurants" in Johannesburg”: The Pot Luck Club. It is none other than Chef Ebie Du Toit (@chefebiii). Ebie is quite a character and makes the judges laugh on a number of occasions throughout the episode.

Who is Ebie Du Toit?

Ebie Du Toit’s story is the South African version of the ‘American Dream’. After growing up in Mitchell’s Plain and dropping out of school after Grade 7, Ebie got caught up in the world of gangs and drugs. But when he was working in Chef Luke Dale Roberts’ The Taste Kitchen as a scullar, Roberts recognised Ebie’s potential and enrolled him at Silwood Kitchen to qualify as a chef. Since then, Chef Ebie has worked alongside world-class chefs in Luke’s various restaurants and is currently the Head Chef at Pot Luck Club Johannesburg kitchen. 

The Challenge: a Bougie Brunch Spread

Chef Ebie Du Toit reveals his own bougie brunch dishes: homemade nougat, salted caramel, corn roasted in butter, spicy oysters with daikon celery strips and a few other bougie brunch bites. He advises contestants to make small bit-size dishes to play with the stomach.

The MasterChef challenge of the week is to make a bougie brunch spread consisting of three dishes: a brunch classic with a twist, a reinvented classic cocktail presented as a dish, and a fresh take on avocado toast. Their dishes must appeal to the demanding millennial brunch aficionado and so contestants are reminded to apply both their technical and plating skills. They are given two hours and an open pantry with all ingredients from Pick ‘n Pay available to use.

The contestants are all quite intimidated by the prospect of having to cook three dishes in two hours, and whilst familiar with the concept of a brunch, to elevate the usual brunch classics including avo toast is not an easy task.

The MasterChef Contestants’ Dishes

Nabila’s Dishes

Nabila is up first to take her dishes to the judges. She is most concerned about her avo toast dish: “Leaving it right til the end I did not necessarily complete all the elements that I wanted to put on it so I know that it is an unfinished dish.” She has made a salmon ceviche with red onion and French bread, an Aperol Spritz dessert with orange & cranberry sponge and her avocado toast she put on pepper flatbread with honey mustard and quail egg.

Zola: “You can definitely seen Nabila’s design influence in the plating of certainly the sweet dish and her salmon ceviche. The avo toast I’m not sure what went wrong there. The avo wasn’t seasoned at all, it wasn’t cut beautifully.“

Chef Ebie du Toit thought the plating was beautiful but the flavours lacking, and the other judges agreed.

Refe’s Dishes

Up next, Refe brings her version of a bougie brunch spread. She has made a shakshuka with chorizo & quail eggs and her take on the classic avo toast is a creamy avocado with quail eggs, parsley oil, all of which -she explains- can to be mopped up with the bread. For her classic cocktail Refe has made a grapefruit mimosa granita with Durbanville Hills Sparkling Honeysuckle Demi Sec. To finish off she has made avo & dark chocolate truffles.

Justine is impressed with Refe’s “delicious” shakshuka, and whilst Zola compliments her rich tomato sauce which is seasoned wonderfully, Zola finds it too spicy but Justine argues it’s perfect when you have a hangover which is when you have brunch.

Zola thinks the avo cream was a creative way to interpret avo toast, but all judges agree with Chef Ebie that the truffle doesn’t really work.

The granita is loved by all the judges, as the acidity of the cocktail goes well after the spicyness of the shakshuka. Chef Ebie even jokes that he is going to start serving it in his restaurant.

Lona’s Dishees

Looking at Lona’s dish, it seems he has listened to Chef Ebie who asked for bite-sized. His three bites are on one plate: Toasted shiitake mushrooms with parmesan, an avocado rose filled with guacamole mousse and his take on a Bloody Mary which he has served inside a tomato.

Katlego was surprised that he loved the “deviled egg mushroom situation” and he called the bloody mary "a vibe”.

Chanel’s Dishes

Chanel is up next. She made her reinterpreted avocado toast with toasted sourdough, avocado mousse, pomegranate salsa and fried quail, classic oysters with onions and red wine vinegar and a spicy avocado crema and cinnamon sugar crêpe with strawberry and sparkling wine sauce. Her dishes “definitely look the part,” as Zola said “visually she hit the bougie brunch brief 100%”.

Penny’s Dishes

Then it’s Penny’s turn. She made avocado mousse with a langoustine on a chilli brioche and French toast, a smoked salmon quiche and an Espresso Martini with pears, coffee and wine syrup with mini macarons and bananas.

Her smoked salmon quiche was “dry” and “lacks flavour” according to Chef Ebie whilst Justine said it was “completely overcooked”.

Bridget’s Dishes

After the other contestants have brought their dishes to the judges with a high dose of insecurity, Bridget is very confident about her dishes, rating her own dishes highly: an 8.5 out of 10 for her reinterpreted avocado toast for which she made crayfish wrapped in pancetta with truffle oil and hollandaise with truffle butter sauce, an 8 for her tuna mosaic sourdough eggs benedict made with a quail egg and a 9 for her mimosa with orange purée, orange and vanilla créme pâtissière. She is also happy with her presentation, saying her dishes look “quite beautiful'“. Sadly, the judges don’t agree. Chef Ebie even says that “it just looks sad”.

Justine: “I think it just goes to show that whether you have lobster, pancetta and tuna and all the most fabulous ingredients in the world, unless you cook them right, you haven’t got a hope in hell. That kind of portion with this big thick piece of bread, it’s not elegant. It’s just got expensive ingredients. However I do love the desert. She waxed that.

Katlego agrees: “The hollandaise is raw, it’s literally egg.” Katlego calls the dishes overall “clumsy,” and Zola agrees that that is “the most accurate way to describe this - just disappointing”. Chef Ebie’s closing words are “I’m sad,” and so Bridget’s confidence was a judgment error on her side.

Naledi’s Dishes

Naledi is at peace with her dish - “I cooked with my heart today”. She serves the judges an avocado sandwich made with toasted ciabatta, avocado purée, rosemary chicken, caramelised onion & quail egg. She also made french toast with charred corn, shaved truffle, bacon bits and avocado and for her desert she made piña colada with soft porridge, pineapple, cinnamon and star anise.

Katlego reminded the other judges that when Chef Ebi gave contestants the brief, he said he was looking “for flavour, punch and a trip to flavour town”. Unfortunately Naledi did not deliver on this brief: “I think if the bus is going north, this is defintely going south. this is definitely not bougie”. Justine agrees: “Putting a grated or shaved truffle on top of the dish does not make it bougie”. Zola even criticises the toast on the bread as it’s “dry and overtoasted” and says serving the core of a pineapple is “not bougie”.

Zola finds the silver lining: the caramelised onions on the sandwich were ”lovely”.

The Dish of the Day

Overall, the judges were disappointed with most of the contestants’ dishes.

Justine: “Well, that was gutting. with the pick' ‘n pay pantry full of crayfish, truffle, lobster, salmon, fish tuna…we ended up with an enormous disappointing delivery. What we got was confusion. It was almost like they saw all these ingredients, just sort of tossed them altogether, and called them something else. I’m not only disappointed, I’m quite irritated. At this stage of the competition, we expect a bit more.”

Katlego asks Refe to step forward: “We asked you for a bougie brunch and you gave us two offerings. The avo was good but we felt it just needed some seasoning to uplift it. The shakshuka was spicy for Zola but overall delicious. We loved it. it had the depth, the body, the chorizo, it had everything. That granita was flawless. I recall Chef Ebie say that he needs the recipe.” Refe jokes that it is her intellectural property.

Zola: “Well done, Refe. That granita will stay in my memory for a long time. And it cooled down the heat from the shakshuka.”

Justine probably gave the best compliment: “I loved the shakshuka and I loved the heat, and I would eat it all over again, right now.”

With that, Katlego announces that Refe made the dishes of the day.

The Bottom Three

Up next, Katlego asks the bottom three to step forward, starting with Bridget: “I was pretty surprised that my name called for the bottom three. I don’t know what went wrong with my dish at all.”

Naledi and Nabila are also asked to step forward.

Justine starts with Bridget, saying her dishes had highlights (her dessert - “it was delicious, I loved the caremelised orange, the condensed milk, the mousse, it was beautiful” and the tuna mosaic “showed real skill”. But one of the lowlights was that she served her delicate tuna mosaic on “a big piece of dry toast”. And that “would have been okay, if the hollandaise had been cooked. But it was raw.” Whilst the lobster and pancetta was a “lovely idea,” it was “big and clumsy and overcooked”. Bridget is shown in the diary room, saying she is disheartened hearing this feedback as she put a lot of effort into her dishes.

Naledi’s feedback is up next. She had said that brunch is not her thing, and according to Zola “it did show” in her dishes. The judges loved the flavour of her desert (the coconut and flavour). But in terms of technicalities, her knife skills didn’t do her much justice. Putting forward a sandwich for a bougie brunch was not good enough. The bread was overtoasted, the chicken was dry and it lacked seasoning.

Nabila’s dishes were visually striking but when it came to tasting it, the salmon was left a bit too long and overcooked, the avo seemed an wasn’t seasoned and her quail egg was overcooked. Her desert looked good and tasted delicious.

Nabila is asked to step back as she is safe and it’s now between Bridget and Naledi. Bridget is also asked to step back and so it is Naledi for which her time in the MasterChef kitchen has come to an end.

Justine: “You showed beautiful talent. I think one of the bst things you do is bring your heritage into your food and your spirit onto your plate. Today was not your day - today was not your day. Don’t give up” Zola reminds her of all her highlights on the show, being up on the gantry cheering the other contestants on. Please don’t stop cooking, please don’t stop sharing your passion.”

Justine gives the contestants some final input: “It just gets harder and harder from her on out. That’s the game.”

Radio Interviews with eliminated MasterChef Contestants

As has happened with contestants who were previously eliminated, Naledi also appeared in several radio interviews to talk about her MasterChef journey. I have linked some of these interviews below:

Naledi’s interview on ‘Weekend Breakfast with Gugu Mhlungu’

Naledi was interviewed on ‘Weekend Breakfast with Gugu Mhlungu’ on 702 October 13th 2024. You can listen to the radio interview below:

Naledi’s interview on ‘Lunch with Pippa Hudson’

Pippa Hudson also interviewed Naledi on Cape Talk. The radio interview took place on October 14th 2024. You can listen to it below:

After the episode where I rode in on a Pick ‘n Pay ASAP scooter, I also gave a few radio interviews:

• Click here if you want to hear Gugs’ interview with me (or read the transcript).

• Click here if you want to read Pippa Hudson’s interview with me (or read the transcript).

MasterChef South Africa episode 15

Looking ahead, the preview of the fifteenth episode of MasterChef South Africa gave us a hint of what the next episode will be about as contestants will be taken "into the realm of the unexpected”.

Who will win MasterChef South Africa season 5? Time will tell…

MasterChef Season 5 Episode Summaries

Click here read up more about the MasterChef season 5 contestants, or read the summary from the previous MasterChef episodes if you’re trying to catch up:

• Episode 1 - Twenty MasterChef contestants cook a chicken dish, but only 15 remain

• Episode 2 - The MasterChef contestants cook for the the Apple of their Eye in a mystery box challenge

• Episode 3 - Chef Nokx Majozi Signature Pepper Steak Pie

• Episode 4 - Paying tribute to the Judges’ Star Signs

• Episode 5 - Translating Fashion into Food with guest judge Jackie Burger

• Episode 6 - Buffet of New Beginnings at Durbanville Hills wine estate

• Episode 7 - Leftovers and South African staples

• Episode 8 - Potatoes, Air Fryers, an Immunity Pin and two Special Guests

• Episode 9 - Cabbage, cabbage, cabbage!

• Episode 10 - A fusion of South African and Italian

• Episode 11 - Heritage Trinity: Wors, Skilpaadjies on the Hibachi and a Starch

• Episode 12 - Life’s Tiny Pleasures - a Taste Challenge and Micro Fine Dining

• Episode 13 - A Pressure Test cooking Chef Moses Moloi’s “Enchanted Forest Elegance”

• Episode 14 - A Bougie Brunch (this page)

More MasterChef Episode Summaries:

Want to Watch MasterChef South Africa?

MasterChef South Africa Season premiered on Saturday July 13 at 7:30 pm on S3, and new episodes are aired every Saturday.
From November, episodes will air at 8:30 pm every Saturday, with the rebroadcasts on Sundays on S2 at 6:30 pm and on Wednesdays on S3 at 6:00 pm. The last episode (the finale!) airs on 23 November at 8:30 pm on S3, but each episode is available on catchup for about a week (select Saturday and S3 to find it).

Or click here read up more about the MasterChef season 5 contestants.

About Shawn Godfrey

Shawn Godfrey is an entrepreneur based in Cape Town, South Africa. After the Covid-19 lockdown saw his business in financial distress, cooking was the creative outlet that helped to keep him sane. To keep track of his recipes, and encourage friends and families to join him, he starts his instagram account The Roasted Dad.

Fast-forward to late 2021 - on a whim Shawn (encouraged by his wife Lianne) enters MasterChef South Africa. It is a crazy time of life: running a 200 people business and struggling to keep it profitable, two small children with a third on the way, and about to move into a new house. But when Shawn gets selected to be one of the 20 contestants participating in the fourth season of MasterChef South Africa, he decides to go all in. Leaving his 7-month-pregnant wife to look after their then three and one-year-old children, he battles it out and comes back home five weeks later with the trophy and a million rand prize money in his pocket.

It all started with an Instagram account, but The Roasted Dad is so much more now. Shawn has stayed his entrepreneurial self and whilst he hosts Private Dinner Parties and Cook-with-Me Demos, does Restaurant Take-Overs, he still runs the lighting company and several other businesses.

On his blog, Shawn shares Restaurant Reviews and Accommodation Reviews, and gives an insight into the wild and wonderful life he leads together with his wife Lianne, and their three children Aiden (6), Olivia (4) and Harvey (2).

Sign up to the newsletter below to be kept up to date with events, new recipes and reviews, or contact Shawn to chat about recipe creation, restaurant takeovers and public speaking events.