By Patrick Cremona

Published: Thursday, 05 May 2022 at 12:00 am

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Another season of MasterChef has come to an end, with Eddie Scott crowned as the 18th winner of the amateur cookery competition.

The marine pilot described winning the contest as “the best feeling ever”, after his three-course meal – which consisted of a turbot starter, a Hyderabadi Dum main, and a St Emilion au Chocolat dessert – wowed judges John Torode and Gregg Wallace.

“It’s everything,” he said. “My whole life I feel has been building up to this moment. I can’t believe I’m standing here as the MasterChef champion.

“It’s just been the most stressful and the most enjoyable! I feel like I’ve just discovered who I am as cook. It’s the best feeling ever.”

He added: “I sat watching the show for years telling myself to apply. I wanted to go up in front of John and Gregg to see what I could really do.

“I think every amateur cook secretly dreams of having the chance to go onto a show like MasterChef – to have that one chance of totally changing your life in what you love doing!”

“Eddie is nothing short of a culinary powerhouse,” said Torode. “His love of classic French food blended with the spices of India, has made us really stand up and take notice. He’s daring, he’s adventurous, he doesn’t play it safe.”

“I think we’ve just seen the birth of a future great chef,” Wallace added. “Eddie impressed from the moment he set foot in this kitchen. He’s hardly put a foot wrong throughout the competition.”

Eddie came up against two very strong finalists in runners-up Pookie Tredell and Radha Kaushal-Bolland, after Sarah Rankin and Ioan Jones had left the competition earlier in the final week.

The final week saw him go from strength to strength – travelling to Ballymaloe House and Cookery School in the South-West of Ireland, working with celebrated chef Gordon Ramsay, and finally cooking the “best three-course meal of his life”.

All three of the courses were greeted with rapturous enthusiasm from the judges, with Gregg saying of his starter, “You are cooking to a standard, here, that many professional chefs haven’t reached.”

Meanwhile, John described his main course – a caraway and nigella seed pastry-topped chicken biryani – as “extraordinary and addictive”, while Gregg said of his dessert: “It’s naughty but it’s absolutely delicious.”

Speaking about his future after winning the competition, Eddie said: “Everything in my life has been building up to doing something in food. It would be amazing to be able to cook in a top restaurant and with the most famous royal Awadhi chefs in Lucknow.

“It would also be exciting to write about food or even do some more TV. What I’d really love is to own my own restaurant – sharing my food memories and nostalgia. I always knew one day I wanted to pursue a career in food and now MasterChef has made me realise that this can be a reality.”

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