I was a little disappointed with the red team winning. They may have had two winning dishes, but one of their dishes wasn’t even edible - the soup.
I’d rather have 4 dishes that may not all be too notch but balanced than have two excellent dishes.
I personally think the blue and green teams did better.
If I am to talk of the dishes individually -
Sindhi mutton cutlet with hummus and pita - this is a classic dish served in the Middle East - meat kebabs, hummus and pita. So there was no innovation. Secondly, the cutlet looked crumbly and oily. As a Sindhi, I’ve seen this cooked at home regularly and even eaten it. This one looked quite unappetizing to me personally.
Tomato chaat - it was good thinking to use plum since they had no tamarind. However a chaat isn’t really a chaat without tamarind chutney.
Jowar Croquettes - a croquette made with a grain is likely to be dense, so it was smart to have a filling inside. It looked good, and I’m sure it tasted good.
Soup
Spinach and almond soup - I was excited for this. I make a spinach and almond soup which could be bettered so was hoping to get some pointers. But it was barely edible. Extremely spicy. Soups are easy to over season.
Corn soup - I love corn, and corn soup is my favourite of all soups. I liked how they added some roasted corn with lemon and masalas for that street side Bhutta feel. Corn soups can be sweetish, so you need to know how to season it well. So roasting was a good idea.
Coconut soup - firstly, kudos to them for coming up with a dish after two changes (no banana flower and couldn’t use methi as a main ingredient). The soup looked nice, and it did receive some good compliments. I actually thought they would win for the soup round as well.
Mains
Khichdi with prawn - I’ve tasted khichdi from Bengal and Orissa and they’re actually quite delicious. Very unlike the khichdi made in the rest of the country. They chose a humble dish and elevated it with the use of prawn and coconut. So it was a combination of comfort with taste. A sure shot winning combination.
The bagara rice with non oily gravy - the rice to me looked interesting. The broth not so much. The judges didn’t give any strong feedback, except saying they tried too hard in elevating a simple dish.
Some kebab - It’s a pity that they didn’t have raw papaya. They should’ve changed the dish to another kebab that didn’t need pasty meat or stuck to making meat differently. I’d like to believe their taste was fine, but texture wasn’t. Maybe they could just give the dish a different name so it was compared to the kebab.
Dessert
Payesh tres leches - I’m not a fan of payesh, but it was innovative. The dish looked very appealing, it reminded me of a rasmalai cake I once had on a trip to India. Dyuti knows her sweets and she created a winning dish.
Blue teams dish - it was beautiful to look at, and had it not been for the extra kewra they could’ve won. Kewra if used excessively makes a dish slightly bitter. Not a good thing for a dessert.
Green teams cheesecake - the texture was all wrong, the presentation was bad. The cheesecake was on the verge of collapse. There was no feedback on the flavour so I guess it was okay taste wise.
According to this, I’d be most inclined to try the blue menu followed by green and then red.
Coming to the captains - I think all of them were pretty calm. The red team everybody was on autopilot. They did have the strongest team.
The blue team - I think they had a good understanding amongst each other.
The green team - I could see some cracks in that team but Sachin handled it well consoling Kamaldeep and telling her to use coconut and that they had a lot of ingredients.
All teams forgot an ingredient or two, but managed quite well.
Deepa is quite a story teller and I liked how she wove a story for her menu and spoke of the silk route. It added to the experience. I’ve seen her do this everytime, and it will soon be her USP.
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