'Masterchef' Season 6 Episode 11 Recap: Moo-vers and Bakers

In this week’s episode of “Masterchef,” the top 10 best home cooks in America remain. In an episode titled “Moo-vers and Bakers,” the contestants face a steak challenge in a ranch 70 miles north of the Masterchef Kitchen. In the dreaded pressure test, the losing team needs to create a perfect fruit tart. The competition marks a notable moment as this episode ends in something that has never been seen in six seasons of “Masterchef.”

The top 10 remaining cooks head up to a ranch to perform their team challenge. Each team of five cooks will need to serve 101 cowboys and ranchers. They need to provide a good steak complemented by one sauce and two sides.

Hetal and Katrina made the top two dishes in the previous challenge and have earned the right to be team captains. They are given the opportunity to choose the other team’s members instead of their own. Hetal chooses Claudia, Tommy, Nick and Derrick to join Katrina's blue team. For the red team, Katrina gave Hetal the company of Shelley, Olivia, Christopher and Stephen.

Hetal chose to cook a hanger steak under the advice of Stephen who says that it has more flavor. This leaves the blue team with the more familiar New York strip. The red team chooses to complement their hanger steak with a chimichurri sauce, a warm potato salad and grilled zucchini. Shelly isn’t pleased and suggests a barbeque sauce, She also protests about the zucchini, but Hetal stands her ground. Gordon comes around and reviews the red team’s menu. He says that grilled zucchini isn’t only time-consuming, it doesn’t fit the bill of what cowboys and ranchers want to eat in a hearty meal.

Hetal starts to panic and become indecisive. She leaves the decision at the last minute and tells Olivia to sauté the zucchini. But Olivia didn’t have enough time to be ready by the start of service. The red team immediately loses a string of votes when they are unable to serve the first guests in line.

Over at the blue team, Katrina has everything under control with a menu consisting of the New York strip steak, some green beans and a sweet potato mash. Gordon tells her to give the menu a bit of a kick to make it more suitable and appealing to the consumers. Katrina tells Derrick to add a dash of cayenne and cumin to the mash and tells Claudia to switch to a roasted red pepper sauce instead of a demi-glace. The blue team breezes through service with their perfectly organized assembly line.

Back with the red team, Chris and Stephen clash on the grill and Hetal is unable to take command of the team. Olivia decides to do what she can with the zucchini and they finally manage to adapt and churn out good plates.

In the end, the 101 men and women from the ranch cast their votes. The blue team comes out with a landslide victory and the red team ends up facing the dreaded pressure test.

Back in the Masterchef Kitchen, Hetal, Shelley, Olivia, Christopher and Stephen face the judges ahead of the pressure test. The blue team has to choose one member of the red team to save and they choose Olivia.

Christina shows the remaining four contestants a beautiful fruit tart. She explains that in the pressure test, the contestants need to use finesse and perfect technique in creating a beautiful fruit tart.

Stephen is on his first pressure test and he starts to freak out. He becomes sarcastic, noisy and flamboyant. He becomes agitated and worries the judges. When the crust of his tart cracks, he ends up on the floor crying. Time runs out and the contestants present their tarts.

Stephen’s blueberry tart with apricot glaze has a broken crust and the pastry cream is leaking out. The saving grace is that it tastes delicious, but he says he feels completely sick. Shelly made a classic tart with berries and vanilla pastry cream. She missed the glaze on most of the berries and the shell is slightly under-baked.

Christopher made a strawberry, blueberry, mint and lemon tart. He made an amazing pastry crust, but his cream didn’t set. It was runny but it tastes good. Lastly, Hetal made a cardamom vanilla cream tart with a raspberry jam glaze. It was good, but the crust needed more time in the oven.

The judges face a tough decision as no one has perfected the tart. There was no obvious disaster either. After a short discussion, they send Shelly and Hetal up to the safety of the balcony. Stephen and Christopher are left. In an unprecedented decision in “Masterchef” history, the judges decide not to eliminate anyone. It was too close to call and no one deserved to go home. The top 10 contestants remain when the series returns next week.

“Masterchef” stars award-winning chefs Gordon Ramsey, Graham Elliot and Christina Tosi. The series airs every Wednesday at 8 pm EDT on Fox.