Sundae Roast: Some of my best friends are vegetar... oh forget it

Robert Jacobs was the second to be eliminated from the Masterchef kitchen.

When is an advantage not an advantage? Actually that's one of those stupid questions writers use to try and jazz-up the first line.

Of course Cameron had an advantage knowing this week's challenge was making pasta. The real question is how contestants handle that extra pressure.

It must make for an uncomfortable week in the mansion. Everyone knowing you know. You knowing everyone knows you know. Would they ask pointed questions to make you let something slip? Would they take note of what cook books you read? What you cooked?

Like most processes in cooking, there is only so much you can get out of reading the technique - you need to practice. Would Cameron actually have smuggled a pasta machine under his duvet to roll one out?

As TimeOut writer Scott Kara pointed out this week, they seem too nice a bunch to enter into that kind of clandestine behaviour, but Petley sheepishly admitted he had indeed been practising. Fiona was gobsmacked.

"Although the other morning I woke up at 2.30am and there was some crashing around in the kitchen." I bet next time she sneaks a peek.

Guest chef Gaetano Spinosa of Auckland's O'Sarracino had two bits of advice. Keep the flavours simple and go easy on the cream.

Nadia, of course, decides to use multiple types of fish, saffron, wine, lemon and cream. "Which to me is quite a simple thing." Brilliant.

Cameron - who appears to be everyone's favourite - pleasingly proves there is more to him than meat and chooses mushrooms, and he's not the only one stepping outside his comfort zone.

Robert, who last week narrowly escaped elimination with a bad nachos dish, chose to add prawns (he's vegetarian) to his sun-dried tomato, beetroot and feta tagliatelle.

"I need to prove myself after last week, I'm here to win," he told Emett and Gault, whose faces said it all. Bigots, both of them. At least that's what Robert's fanclub will be furiously writing in, if the response to last week's blog is any indication.

I'd dared to suggest the tiresome attitude Robert fired off every time he received negative feedback was annoying. I also made the mistake of calling him - get this - a vegetarian.

"Brutal!" They chanted. "Insolent!", "narrow minded" they wailed. Two people even likened me to John Campbell and - worse - one called me a journalist.

The truth of course, is a vegetarian (that is, someone who does not eat meat) entered a cooking competition that involves cooking - and therefore tasting - meat and fish. He cooked a bad dish, only to whine at being singled out "by their carnivore standards".

Haters - welcome to reality TV. If you really want to protect your mates, stop them from going on it.

Back in the real world, Gaetano Spinosa was anything but tongue tied when it came to the ladies.

"Beautiful women, beautiful food." He repeatedly said of dairy farmer Michelle, before Ray McVinnie moved him on to Fiona, who was making a mushroom and goat's cheese ravioli with hazelnut puree.

"Did you put all your love inside?" Spinosa asked, eyes locked on her pasta machine, or thereabouts.

Meanwhile, Cameron's ravioli looked full of love. So much so that some of it was coming out the sides. He'd only made three, but calmly binned one and finished plating up.

"I was quite panicky at that stage," he said, calmly.

Time was called - STEP AWAY FROM YOUR BENCH! - and presentation was a mixed bag. Robert didn't think his plate was pretty, but it was a picnic compared to Traceylee's meatballs.

Nadia's tortoloni looked like it was painted by Karl Maughan, but she still thought her cucumber was in the wrong place.

Cameron was first to the judging cauldron. Gault was ready to dish out some Italian he'd prepared earlier.

"Do you know what molto buono means?" Gault asked, continuing his favourite pastime of asking Cameron if he knows what things mean. Last week: "Do you know what saffron is?"

Jax also got a molto buono for her prawn and pumpkin ravioli, and along with Cameron an ovation from the rest of the bunch.

At the other end, Robert's comments went from bad to worse.

"I think I was concentrating so much on trying to cook meat that everything else was just an extra," he said.

"The meat might just be the best thing about the dish," came Emett's reply.

To Robert's credit, he knew something his email support network didn't manage to grasp.

"I did crap last time and I did crap today, you don't get to do that twice."

Episode 4

Best line: "It is disappointing when you forget your peas for a pea soup." Cameron Petley
Worst line: "You literally have to cook your heart out." - Traceylee invents a rather morbid dish.
Current favourites: Cameron Petley, Nadia Lim