Caramelized Onion Tarte Tatin
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Caramelized Onion Tarte Tatin with Blue Cheese, Candied Pecans, Goat's Cheese Mousse, and Pickled Figs.
Returning for the cook-off with no meat or fish permitted, Polly drew on a dish taught to her by her head chef. {name}: "I started out with something with the mushrooms and the potatoes and the blue cheese, but it wasn't quite a whole dish. I'm actually doing one of the dishes my head chef first kind of taught me: caramelized onion tarte tatin. Caramelized onions, cheese board, cheese board flavours. Yeah. Amazing." A judge during cooking: {Judge}: "There's a wow factor with the tarte tatin, but is it just going to be onion and caramel? She could possibly put in some spices. It's got to be seasoned, and I want the pastry to be perfectly cooked." Another noted: {Judge}: "She's got a goat's cheese mousse, creamy and silky smooth. She's pickling the figs down so you're going to get your sweet and sour. You don't want it to be too sour. She's also got some candied pecans." {Judge}: "I'm really excited about Polly's dish. She's got all those flavours of the cheese board, and hopefully if she does this right, this is something special." Polly on focus: {name}: "Done a lot of competitions, and you learn how to forget about the judges, forget about the other contestants, but just get into your zone. Just cook." The narrator described the finished dish: inspired by the flavours of a cheese board, Polly served caramelized onion tarte tatin topped with blue cheese and candied pecans, goat's cheese mousse, and lightly pickled figs.
{Judge}: "Nice presentation, but you should maybe move it a bit more to the centre." {Judge}: "Your onions are beautifully caramelized. I like the pecans. They're bringing a lovely little nutty sweetness to it. Problem I'm having with this is your pastry. It's not cooked enough, it's really soft. I think you could have done a little bit more adding flavour into the caramel to make it a little more exciting." {Judge}: "I love the addition of the blue cheese. It gives you that nice kind of saltiness to go with the sweetness of the onions. The pickled fig really works and again offsets the sweetness." {Judge}: "I wish you had put more of that goat's cheese mousse, because it's delicious and it is needed. It's a lot of onion. You need that mousse. At this level you need all three elements firing together." In post-cook discussion: {Judge}: "Polly gave us her onion tarte tatin. I love the goat's cheese, but I thought she should have put more on the plate." {Judge}: "Tarte tatin pastry: it's got to be crispy, caramelized, and delicious. It didn't quite hit that." Polly was eliminated from the competition.
