This week we are jumping across the country from Yorkshire and Leeds to visit three chefs in the North West heat of Great British Menu 2015.

Returning chef Mark Ellis,  head chef at 1851 Restaurant at Peckforton Castle, GBM’s youngest chef Matt Worswick, head chef at The Lawns, and Eve Townson, executive chef at the Eagle and Child, who lives, breathes and cooks Lancashire.

Judging this week’s trio was veteran chef Sat Bains, who expected a lot from the chefs right from the get go. Asking for everyone’s inspiration behind the entire menu, we heard the usual “inspired by the WI’s frugality” from Mark, who probably skipped out on breakfast that morning and therefore decided to turn this year’s sponsored vegetable, Jerusalem artichokes, into scrambled eggs, although Sat wondered why Mark didn’t just “make scrambled eggs”. It’s a banquet, Sat!

Eve, who was basing her entire menu on local Lancashire produce, brought a corn fed chicken from a lady called Winnie. She confit the chicken legs in order to create croquettes, which Sat thought were nice and moist. The beetroot ketchup was more like a beetroot sand, and the Lancashire hard (otherwise known as an oatcake) was undercooked as Eve was late to the pass, which is where one of the few-and-far-between females of the competition lost points. Matt was inspired by his granny, who watched over the chefs in the kitchen throughout the week.

His dish featured the third bird of the day – partridge which we hadn’t seen much of in the show so far but Matt appeased Sat by delivering a refined bread sauce. Mark, who featured on the show last year, but left the competition after adding artificial flavours to his dishes, gave Matt some advice on how “risky it is to bring modern elements” to the competition. That didn’t faze him though, and the blackberry caviar Matt served up was received well. No pressure on the chefs, but last year Sat judged what turned out to be the winning fish course.

With this in mind everyone packed the most enormous fish into their boxes. Turning a turbot into a mousse, Mark took a twist on a classic bread and butter pudding, using liver butter sauce as custard, and cockles for raisins. Or at least he wanted to, but after a disastrous first batch, Mark forgot to put the faux raisins in the second mousse. Thanks to GBM, I feel that I can never trust a simple cake without thinking that there might be fish or meat hidden inside.

Severely unhappy with his dish, Mark scored himself a 3. Although Sat saw potential in the dish: “If you pulled it off, it would have been a triumph”; so there was at least some credit there. Eve’s comically named ‘Twinset and Pearls’ utilised local produce once more with her Halibut fillet. Using a spherification technique, similar to Matt’s dish the day before, Eve created lemon pearls, which got lost in the creamy shellfish sauce covering the entire meal. Miscalculating her timings again, Matt offered to take his dish to the pass first with his gallantry being a possible reason for a lack of seasoning, and a cloying mint sauce.

Taking inspiration from his “Grandma’s Garden”, Liverpudlian Matt used ingredients you would find in the garden; but you’ll probably only find lobster in an Octopus’ Garden. The main courses saw all of the chefs produce their best dishes. Both Eve and Matt made lamb the star, while Mark dropped the ‘gimmicky’ dishes and chose to cook up a classic steak and kidney with corned beef hash and beans. Initially, there was a fear of this course coming across as two separate dishes, but thankfully for Mark, the dish all came together.

For her main course, Eve adapted an old family recipe for the banquet. Her ‘A Quintessential English Countryside’ dish was late to the pass and without the aid of Matt and Mark might not have been served hot. Cooking her own pastry for the WI was a brave decision, which cost her a point for timing, as the cooking took longer than expected. But once it was dished up, the meal was “one of the nicest things” Mark had tasted all week.

The first ten of the week was awarded to Matt for his ‘Shall I Be Mother?’ Using his gran’s recipe, Matt stuffed a best end of lamb with minced kidney, liver, lamb shoulder and apricots and to accompany the dish, Matt whipped up a hotpot as homage to his gran. The chefs ate their meals from a miniature farm made from vegetables, which would certainly bring