Reprinted with permission from www.healthywaytocook.com

It’s the Mystery Sausage Box Challenge! Or, as Gordon calls it, “a delicious sausage machine!” The remaining contestants have sixty minutes to use their meat machines to make their own sausage using any kind of meat you could dream of (or some bland and blah vegetarian proteins) and cook one incredible entrée.

The judges ask to taste Natasha’s dish. She made breakfast with chicken sausage, fried egg, and potato hash. Gordon calls it a “posh breakfast” seasoned beautifully. Graham agrees, and Joe calls the sausage “a winner.” The next dish they want a bigger taste of is from Eddie. He made pork sausage with purple cabbage and apple chutney. Graham thinks it’s a “stellar dish,” and Gordon gives it a “wow, wowwowwow,” followed by a bonus “wow.” Krissi is the final dish the judges want to taste. She made Italian sausage with peppers and polenta. Joe calls it, “simple, but elevated.”

The winner of the Mystery Box Challenge is Eddie. He gets an advantage in the Elimination Challenege. He is safe from elimination, and he gets to choose which ingredient his competitors have to use: ham, mushrooms, or shrimp. He selects mushrooms since they are not usually the main ingredient in a dish. But that’s not all—half of Eddie’s competitors will get fresh, delicious wild mushrooms, and the other half will get canned.

Eddie gives James, Jordan, Bethy and Bri the fresh mushrooms, and sticks Jessie, Krissi, Natasha, and Luca with the canned pellets of disgustingness. Eddie explains that his strategy was to give James and Jordan the fresh mushrooms so that they’d do something way too complicated and forget that the mushrooms are supposed to be the star of the dish.

First up is Bethy. She presents the judges with Szechuan noodles with wild mushrooms. Graham is overwhelmed by the sesame and ginger, so he never tastes the mushrooms. Joe is thoroughly confused by the dish, and also can’t get past the sesame oil.  Next is Natasha. She made canned mushroom ravioli with crispy pancetta. Joe says the tarragon is a good decoy for the canned mushrooms. Gordon is similarly impressed with how she masked the icky gross eew food. James made wild mushroom chowder with crème fraiche and arugula. Graham finds it too rich and heavy, and Joe is amazed at the way Eddie played to James’s inability to edit.

Jessie had canned mushrooms and made mushroom risotto with pancetta and risotto. Gordon likes the risotto! Luca used the canned mushrooms to make cream of mushroom soup with vegetables and croutons. It’s a little thick for a soup, but Graham thinks it’s tasty. Krissi made canned mushroom cassoulet with eggplant and pancetta and, like everyone else who made pancetta (seriously, what’s with the multi-pancetta?), she masked the taste of the canned mushrooms. Bri made grilled sage wild mushrooms with beet and goat cheese salad. Graham calls it delicious, and Joe calls it “fabulous.” Jordan made mushroom ravioli with beet cream sauce and fried mushrooms. The problem Gordon has with it is that he abused the fresh mushrooms so much that they may as well have been canned. Joe is not impressed with his pasta.

After giving props to Natasha’s canned mushroom extravaganza, the judges give the win to Bri. Both will be team captains in the next Team Challenge. Up for elimination are Jordan, James, and Bethy. James is safe and sent back to his station as Jordon and Bethy sweat it out. Gordon does his long-pause-between-words thing and eliminates Bethy.

Next week, the contestants go camping and cook in the wilderness.