Masterchef Stock and Sauces

Noodle Cook's great tasting dishes centre around well made clear, flavoursome, gelatinous stocks. For the audition dishes, the bulk of the budget ends up in quality bones leaving next to no budget for the dishes. Sadly, there is no budget for a nice Margaret River shiraz for the planned quandong gastrique, nor a quality white wine for a mountain pepperleaf jus, and a lemon myrtle vinaigrette.

If taste is what makes a great cook, then Noodle Cook has what it takes, a natural talent to combine disparate ingredients, a skill that turns a disastrous meal into one fit for a dinner party or a top restaurant.

No budget is no excuse for Noodle Cook, more determine than ever to be a real Masterchef. Fillet steak is out, but beef shin only costs $6.50 per kg. Is braised beef shin, better known as gravy beef, a cut popularize by grandma's generation, a dish for Masterchef? Perhaps not.

Suddenly, a light flashes at the end of the tunnel. Beef shin slow roasted at low temperature using Neil Perry's technique produces a steak like roast, with a beautiful moist pink texture, and sumptuous, melt in the mouth gelatin. With time for salt curing of about 72 hours, a confit in flavoured oil at the same low temperature produces a similar moist texture.

Now back on track, Noodle Cook, with confidence back, finishes planning the dish that will impress the judges. There is no time for a trial run since slow roasting takes 6 hours for 600 g of meat. Really, the trial looks like a time waster, since Noodle Cook makes very few mistakes: every disaster can be fixed with a great tool like Photoshop.