MasterChef Season 10 episode 10 review: Wedding bells for Gerron

In this review of MasterChef, everyone pitches in to help a former winner embark on the next chapter of his life. Will his new beginning have a rough start or smooth sailing?

The contestants enter the kitchen to find it decked in flowers. There are pink flowering trees in pots, pink and white roses everywhere, and the MasterChef judges stand on their stage which is now pink and covered with a floral trellis. Gordon states the obvious when he explains that we will see our first ever wedding in the MasterChef kitchen.

MasterChef Season 9 winner, Gerron Hurt, has returned to his place of triumph to wed his bride. And because no wedding would be complete without yelling, stress, and competition, our contestants will host the reception in a team challenge.

The judges elect two contestants that they want to test- Bri and Wuta. Both have done well so far but have not necessarily stood out as leaders yet. Bri will captain the blue team and cook filet mignon. Wuta will captain the red team and cook lobster. Each captain gets to pick their own team with Wuta starting the selections.

According to Bri, Wuta’s strategy is to pick the strongest contestants and that seems to pan out. He selects Noah, Jamie, Micah, Sarah, Dorian, and Keturah. In general, these are the contestants that we have seen the most from, for good or bad. Bri believes this is a recipe for disaster given the strong personalities and voices he has picked.

Bri tells us she wants to pick people who can mesh together and will support her as captain, which kind of sounds like a nice way of saying she wants the quieter, pushover cooks that she can control. She selects Fred, Nick, Shari, Sam and Renee. Gordon specifically asks Renee where she wants to be and though she says she wants to be on Wuta’s team, she ends up on Bri’s.

Because Wuta got first pick, he also gets last. In picking Keturah, he leaves Subha to join Bri’s team by default. He is understandably upset that he is the last pick, though he does have a bad track record with team challenges. So, while Wuta has strong personalities to wrangle, Bri has two team members who are not happy before the challenge has even begun.

MASTERCHEF: L-R: Contestant Sam, Judge Aarón Sánchez and contestant Nick in the “Gerron’s Wedding” episode of MASTERCHEF airing Wednesday, July 17 (8:00-9:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX. © FOX MEDIA LLC. CR: Greg Gayne/ FOX. © 2019 FOX MEDIA LLC.

The teams have a few minutes to conceive a dish around their protein. Over on Wuta’s red team, he wants to roast their lobster tail but Jamie suggests they stuff the lobster with breadcrumbs. As he is our resident fish expert, Wuta agrees to that preparation. Dorian voices a concern that, as they are serving a wedding, the presentation needs to be elegant, clean, and with light flavors. She is clearly worried about the stuffed lobster. Meanwhile, Noah reveals he is the inevitable contestant that is deathly allergic to shellfish.

Bri handles her team differently. She has a clear vision for the dish and tells her team the components, allowing them to volunteer to cook various parts. Fred agrees to cook pomme puree. Shari will make the pickled clamshell mushrooms. Subha will create a red wine reduction sauce. Sam, Nick, and Renee are all on the filet mignon.

Though she anticipated arguments on Wuta’s team, we actually get our first tension from Bri’s side. Sam and Renee have a very tense conversation about how to cook the steak. Renee won her apron with a steak and wants to be respected on meat cookery.

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However, in the first team challenge, she was tossed off cooking the burgers and she is still smarting over that. Sam, though quiet, also digs in his heels when it comes to cooking. Remember in the last challenge that he insisted on cooking fish in a stainless steel pan until his team captain gave up and cooked his own fish in a cast iron.

Nick voices a concern that filet mignon can lack flavor and suggests using bacon fat. Renee adamantly refuses and insists that they need to butter baste the beef. Sam counters that butter basting forty-five steaks is not realistic in their timeframe, and he’s not wrong. He wants to do a hard sear on both sides but Renee tells him this will turn the meat grainy.

Renee and Sam continue to go at it, with Sam talking over Renee and her getting more and more aggravated. Sam appeals to Bri to select a lead for the steak, which she does not do. Their spat is interrupted by Aaron who lets them know the guests have arrived. Renee very tightly says, “we got this. Team blue, guys!”

As the guests arrive, we see various former contestants including Shaun from season five and Lindsay from season nine. Wuta is bursting with excitement to cook for Gerron as he says Gerron is the reason he is on MasterChef. He tells us he saw a chef that looks like him and that does what he does (Gerron is an English teacher as well) and that inspired him to try out.

MASTERCHEF: Host/ Judge Gordon Ramsay (C) officiates the Hurt and Beckham wedding in the “Gerron’s Wedding” episode of MASTERCHEF airing Wednesday, July 17 (8:00-9:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX. © FOX MEDIA LLC. CR: Greg Gayne/ FOX. © 2019 FOX MEDIA LLC.

The wedding begins. The whole thing is surreal. As the bride walks the aisle in the kitchen, Joe plays the guitar. Gordon officiates. It’s all something of a fever dream. After the wedding, the guests go for cocktails behind the large doors that usually guard the pantry and private dining area of the judges. The contestants now have ninety minutes to produce forty-five plates which must all be ready simultaneously. At the thirty minute mark, they must present a single complete plate for the judges to critique.

MASTERCHEF: Judge Joe Bastianich in the “Gerron’s Wedding” episode of MASTERCHEF airing Wednesday, July 17 (8:00-9:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX. © FOX MEDIA LLC. CR: Greg Gayne/ FOX. © 2019 FOX MEDIA LLC.

Over on Wuta’s team, Dorian asks Wuta if they are going to discuss things as a team at all. Wuta assures her they are fine. He tells us that he trusts the cooks on his team and doesn’t want to micromanage them. He appears to just want everyone to cook as an individual, a strategy that will never work when trying to produce a bunch of identical plates with all components done at the same time.

Jamie takes the lead on lobster preparation. He instructs everyone on how he wants the lobsters prepared for cooking. Meanwhile, Wuta the vegetarian has stepped away to help Dorian make asparagus wrapped in prosciutto. We see Dorian bossing him around, reminding him to be neater and demanding that he fetch her a lemon.

Noah, who is not participating in lobster prep due to his allergy, observes Wuta and tells us, “right outta the gate, as a leader Wuta’s taking a back seat. Our leader’s not establishing a game plan. We did not set the lines- you do this, you do that. Everyone’s just kind of throwing things on like a buffet.”

MASTERCHEF: Contestant Wuta in the “Gerron’s Wedding” episode of MASTERCHEF airing Wednesday, July 17 (8:00-9:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX. © FOX MEDIA LLC. CR: Greg Gayne/ FOX. © 2019 FOX MEDIA LLC.

Gordon stops by to visit the team and asks Wuta about their dish. Wuta stumbles over the description a little so Gordon goes station to station, finding faults. Keturah and Micah are working on both a potato puree and a fennel puree. They plan to pick whichever one seems to go best with the dish.

Gordon tells them that the fennel is the obvious choice for lobster, plus he points out that the other team is making a potato puree. I’m not sure this really matters as you typically don’t order both entrees at a wedding, but he does convince them to stick with fennel for time sake.

He then critiques them for the large chunks of fennel they are using which will never cook down in time for a smooth puree. Gordon then berates Jamie for cutting all the lobsters and then leaving them to sit and dry out before being cooked. Gordon again tries to talk to Wuta, asking him if he is in control and knows what is going on. Gordon calls their efforts “dinner for divorce.”

Over on Bri’s team, the steak debate continues. Sam wants to tie the steaks but Renee says it is a waste of time. When he pushes back, she immediately caves in and tells him to do whatever he wants because no one listens to her. Over the bickering, Bri tells them, “no fighting, please.”

Renee then goes to Bri to complain and the whole thing comes off like children complaining to mom. Bri is clearly not in the mood as she tells Renee they need to focus on the judge’s tasting plate and brushes off her concerns. Renee tells us that “Bri is being influenced by Nick and Sam because they are masculine men and oh, they know meat.” I get her frustration, but behaving like a petulant, tattle tale child is not helping her case.

MASTERCHEF: L-R: Contestants Renee and Bri in the “Gerron’s Wedding” episode of MASTERCHEF airing Wednesday, July 17 (8:00-9:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX. © FOX MEDIA LLC. CR: Greg Gayne/ FOX. © 2019 FOX MEDIA LLC.

It is time for the judges to sample the dishes. They start with Bri’s team. Gordon doesn’t like the little splash of green herb oil so Bri decides they will add a vegetable to the plate instead.

Ironically, Sam has not gotten the sear he insisted on and Gordon says the meat looks poached. Worse, he finds twine on the steak. “What’s that for? Flossing my *** teeth?” On the plus side, the seasoning on the steak is on point and the sauce tastes good but needs to be further reduced.

Bri returns to her team and immediately tells them not to tie the steaks. Renee yells “thank you!” and then sticks out her tongue in a mature display of teamwork. Her triumph is short-lived as Bri asks to put Renee on her “own little task.” Bri wants a vegetable and asks Renee to come up with that. She then goes on to tell Renee to make asparagus and says, “can you handle that, Renee?”

At this point, Renee is fuming about being kicked off meat in yet another team challenge. To make things worse, she decides to roast the asparagus but Bri tells her to blanch and shock it so Renee just throws her hands up and tells everyone she’s just going to be quiet. Shari senses the resentment rolling off Renee and tries to tell her to have a positive attitude but Renee pushes past her and tells us she doesn’t give a damn anymore.

MASTERCHEF: L-R: Contestant Bri and Subha in the “Gerron’s Wedding” episode of MASTERCHEF airing Wednesday, July 17 (8:00-9:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX. © FOX MEDIA LLC. CR: Greg Gayne/ FOX. © 2019 FOX MEDIA LLC.

The judges move on to Wuta’s dish. It tastes delicious, but as Dorian pointed out, it lacks finesse. Wuta returns to the team and tells them they need to rethink things. His goal is to make the dish easily eaten with nothing more than a fork. Before, they had split the lobsters down the middle, leaving on one uncracked claw and the small legs. He wants all of that removed and the meat released from the shell.

Sarah decides to take the lead on preparing the lobster, showing everyone how to release the uncooked meat. Everyone is frustrated as this is time consuming and they are already over a third of the way through their time.

Soon six team members are attempting to prep the lobsters, including Noah. Noah immediately starts to feel the effects of his allergy and tells us his throat is closing up. They finally get the lobsters prepared but in the oven, they curl and push all their stuffing off. So now they try to come up with a third plan with just twenty minutes left.

Over on Bri’s team, Gordon finds raw steak and throws a perfectly good filet mignon across the room. He then takes over as captain so that he can get the plates out on time. This seems like a death knell for the team. I’m hoping for Gerron’s sake that a thrown steak is good luck at a MasterChef wedding.

At last it is time to serve. The red presents their baked stuffed lobster with fennel puree and prosciutto wrapped asparagus. The blue team delivers their peppercorn crusted filet mignon with pomme puree, pickled mushrooms, and asparagus.

MASTERCHEF: Judge Joe Bastianich (C) with Gerron (L) and Brandi (R) in the “Gerron’s Wedding” episode of MASTERCHEF airing Wednesday, July 17 (8:00-9:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX. © FOX MEDIA LLC. CR: Greg Gayne/ FOX. © 2019 FOX MEDIA LLC.

Initially everyone seems to like the lobster best. People love the stuffing. But then the tide turns suddenly when guests start to find that some of their lobster is raw. Things go downhill as more and more guests call the lobster mushy, butchered, and undercooked.

It is no surprise that the red team loses. Some of the steaks do seem to be a little undercooked, but an undercooked filet mignon is still tasty. A partially raw lobster is gross. Wuta’s refusal to lead the team has lead to chaos, with three preparations of lobster. Wuta is crushed and blames himself while Jamie feels it is his fault for selecting the wrong method in the first place.

Next time, Wuta’s team faces elimination in a grilling challenge. Tonight was a wedding; tomorrow will be a separation for at least one contestant. Who will have to turn in their apron and go?