MasterChef recap: A two-minute noodle boilover sees an unlikely contender crack the top 10

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It's an immunity challenge, but not just any immunity challenge. The winner of this immunity challenge will gain a guaranteed place in the top 10. Which is a completely arbitrary point at which to declare a challenge "special", but in this base-0 world of ours what can you do, right?

The top four cooks from the mystery box challenge are Depinder, Justin, Pete and Tommy, a diverse group whose talents range from bold Asian flavours to being blond. In the first round of the immunity challenge they must use a packet of two-minute noodles. BUT, and here's the twist, they cannot use the noodles as they were intended. The noodles were intended to be used as food, so logically the cooks should turn them into something that cannot be eaten. And yet, bizarrely, they do not.

Justin begins cutting up a chicken, for lack of anything better to do. Scott calls him out for using the thigh of the chicken. "Breast is best!" he calls from the balcony, in that classically bawdy style that we would all have come to know and love had we really paid any attention to Scott during the series.

Pete explains to Melissa and Andy that he is going to turn his noodles into gnocchi, which was actually the premise Mary Shelley's first draft of Frankenstein. He does this by cooking the noodles and turning them into a paste. Melissa asks why he doesn't blitz the noodles into a flour and make gnocchi out of it like a normal person. Pete replies he's not doing this because he didn't think of it but that would be a much better idea wouldn't it THANK YOU MELISSA.

Meanwhile, Justin is blitzing his noodles and laughing and laughing and laughing.

Andy and Melissa visit Depinder and try to make her feel bad. She's using noodles instead of breadcrumbs to coat her chicken. Melissa and Andy tell her that her dish is really easy and boring and honestly what a loser she must be. Depinder takes the feedback on board and dies a little inside. Melissa and Andy go back to Jock to laugh like hyenas at the concept of fried chicken.

Pete has produced gnocchi with his perverted methods. "I just have to make a REALLY nice sauce," he says cheerfully, musing on how revolting the gnocchi tastes. But at least he's not a boring loser using the noodles as a crumb like Depinder, geez, how embarrassing would that be. Meanwhile Justin reveals that there is a thing called a tortilla press that you can use to make tortillas! How wonderful.

The noodle phase of the challenge comes to an end. Tommy comes forward with his prawns wrapped in noodles, a dish that has a name of some kind. We will have to take the word of the judges when they say that Tommy has ushered in a glorious new era of two-minute noodles.

Depinder serves her boring chicken thing. The judges consider saying it sucks but then they remember it's Depinder and say it's fantastic. "You could build a store around that," says Jock. Building a store OUT of noodles, now THAT would've been creative.

Pete fears his gnocchi could be a disaster, but is relieved to discover that it's just not very nice. The judges compliment him on making something weird. Justin brings forth tortillas and they are simply divine. It just goes to show you can make a really beautiful dish when all you have is a packet of two-minute noodles and an entire pantry full of expensive ingredients to choose from to disguise the noodles with. Inspiring.

The top two cooks are Justin and – in accordance with MasterChef rules – Depinder. They cook off for immunity in the second round, in which they must take a common pantry item and use it in an unconventional way, eg replacing the chicken in a chicken parma with a Mars Bar, or building a doll out of allspice.

Justin grabs a couple of cans of Coke, and the possibility of a truly amazing lasagne raises its head. But no, he's just doing ice-cream, the spoilsport. Meanwhile Depinder is making sriracha ice-cream, making both cooks' ideas seem less "unconventional" than "basically what 90 per cent of the last five seasons of this show have been".

Justin tastes his crème anglaise, a technical term for the slop that will turn into ice-cream later. It doesn't taste Cokey enough for him, and yet if he puts more Coke in it the texture will go wrong. He has only one choice: rethink his entire life. Wait, no, he has only one choice: make Coke jelly. As they say, when life gives you Coke and gelatin…

Depinder is making a coriander granita to go with the sriracha ice-cream, to ensure there is no chance of anyone finding anything good to eat anywhere in her dish. She admits she never thought she'd make the top 10, but now that she's learnt it's actually in the judges' contracts to keep her in the competition, she's determined to get there.

There are only 15 minutes to go, and it's becoming increasingly clear that this part of the challenge has been drastically edited because it wasn't interesting enough. Justin completes his Coke jelly and is overjoyed at how much like fake vomit it looks. Depinder tops her coriander granita with pieces of pineapple core to really bring out the inedibility of the dish. "One spot in the top 10, one minute to go!" yells Jock dishonestly: there are of course 10 spots available in the top 10, hence the name.

Time is up and the judges taste Depinder's dish for the sake of appearances. They tell her she's brilliant and a genius and their favourite person in the whole world, although Andy has doubts about the garlic, which is going to earn him a reprimand from the producers. Next, Justin brings forth his Cokey things. "This is amazing," says Melissa, lauding Justin for creating a dish that brings back her childhood memories of eating Coke.

Due to Depinder's dodgy garlic, Justin wins the challenge and becomes the first amateur through to the top ten, which is a hell of a shock, not least to Depinder.

Tune in next week, when Depinder gets into the top 10.

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