Sussex's MasterChef finalist: '˜I did lose about a stone out in Peru'

From 25,000 entries to the final four '“ Sussex bank manager Kenny Tutt is in touching distance to the MasterChef final.
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Last night he paid tribute to the south coast with his seafood dish – “It was representative of the coast and I made sure when I chose the fish I got the piece from around Worthing,” Kenny reveals.

However, it was unclear whether he had done enough to make the final four, with Alex, Kenny and Moonira all in the potential danger zone.

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“The dish was not perfect,” Kenny, 36, says. “I think they said it was a squeeze of lemon away from a perfect dish.”

Watch Kenny on MasterChef tomorrow at 8pm on BBC OneWatch Kenny on MasterChef tomorrow at 8pm on BBC One
Watch Kenny on MasterChef tomorrow at 8pm on BBC One

So was Kenny worried about who would be safe?

“I knew there were two guys who did phenomenally and the other dishes received a little bit of critique. You never know and I am not bolshy enough to say ‘yeah I will fly through’.

“Whatever happened at that point I was just chuffed to have got that far.”

It was clear to viewers that Kenny was ‘really excited’ when he got into the final four, pulling out a ‘small silly dance’ to celebrate.

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Find out more about Kenny hereAnd the excitement did not end there, with the four told to pack their bags as they were off to Peru to cook.

“We did not expect them to say that,” the dad-of-two reveals. “All I thought [when I heard about it] was Paddington Bear and deepest, darkest Peru.

“It was an amazing place. It has got a climate where everything grows ten times as big – it is mad. It is really vibrant with lovely people.”

However, it was not an easy ride when they were out there.

“The heat was ferocious. You did not notice it at first as it was a bit overcast, but we all got a bit sunburnt. It was really hot and it stayed hot all the time – that made it tough.

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“I did lose about a stone out there and we were there for about a week.”

Tomorrow night (Wednesday, April 11) at 8pm, viewers will see the four contestants take on three challenges in Peru’s capital Lima.

Then on Thursday (April 12), the contestants are back in the UK and cook alongside internationally renowned chef Ashley Palmer-Watts, who has worked alongside one of Britain’s most famous chefs, Heston Blumenthal, for the last 18 years.

As head chef at the three-Michelin-starred Fat Duck in Bray, Ashley helped create some of the world’s most revered dishes before working with Heston to open London restaurant Dinner in 2011.

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Within months of opening, Dinner won a Michelin star and was awarded its second a year later.

In the show, the four finalists gain a unique insight into Ashley’s cuisine as they learn directly from him and his head chef Jonny Glass in the MasterChef kitchen.

Each amateur cook has five hours to recreate an iconic dish from Ashley’s menu at Dinner, and some of Dinner’s recipes have as many as 120 stages of preparation.

Once the four finalists have prepared their complex and precise dishes, they must serve them to Ashley and to judges John Torode and Gregg Wallace.

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Finally the four amateurs are tasked with creating one exceptional dish for John and Gregg that showcases their growing cooking talent. Only three can make it through to the final, which is aired on Friday night (April 13).

Where were the chips? Kenny explains why he cooked the dish in the previous round here

Kenny has had many successful dishes while on MasterChef – see which ones were popular on social media here

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