'It's very exposing' says Margate’s MasterChef: The Professionals finalist

Not all good experiences are easy, as chef Mark O’Brien found out during his time on MasterChef: The Professionals. The head chef of Willy's in Margate was part of the latest cohort of chefs to enter the show.

In a competition designed to push the contestants beyond their limits, what Irish born Mark found the hardest was battling his imposter syndrome and the sense of vulnerability that comes with putting yourself out there, for all of Britain to see. 

“There was so much of it I enjoyed and loved, and so much of it I found clarifying in terms of my own cooking and my own capabilities,” Mark says of his time on the show. “But so much of it was incredibly hard and very tough.

“It's very exposing cooking at that level,” he adds, when there are “cameras on you the whole time.”

Aside from the pressure of cooking your best, he says that thoughts about how the show will be edited together later were also running through his mind the whole time. He found himself fearing he would “come off looking like an idiot” or that social media would be flooded with “silly memes of me failing.”

With a love of American-style BBQ and as chef owner of whole animal live fire pop up outfit Snake Oil Barbecue, Mark prides himself on his meat cookery and butchery skills. So he worried throughout the filming that he would serve up a raw bit of beef or overcooked lamb on the show. 

“I was constantly afraid that I'd make an arse myself on national television,” he admits.

Yet no meme worthy moments appeared for Mark in any of his episodes and he went from one of 32 chefs to one of three, as he smoked, grilled, pureed and blitzed his way to the finals.

“It feels so wild that I got that far and that I've done so well,” he says. “It's pretty amazing considering the quality of talent that was in the room. I don't take that lightly.”

But that success came because “I pushed myself so hard,” he goes on.

“I think I cooked well beyond my normal level. It’s really only now, having seen the episodes and the reaction from people, that the gravity of what I was able to do has started to sink in.”

Praised for his bold flavours but critiqued over his refinement, Mark, along with Portsmouth head chef Luke Emmess, lost out to Manchester-based private chef Gareth Baty, whose final menu made up of dishes inspired by and dedicated to members of his family won the judges over. 

For Mark’s final cook and with a time limit of three hours, he prepared an elaborate three courses based on some of his favourite things to eat - a seafood platter, an American-style barbecued pork with a hispi cabbage and crayfish tail roll and a riff on coffee and doughnuts for dessert. 

Despite running out of time to finish cooking his beignets (a lighter, more airier cousin to the doughnut) that were to go with his malted milk bavarois (a custard-like cream), the judges were full of praise for Mark's dishes. 

“I was really proud of how it came out,” he says, reflecting on his final cook. “Of course, the dessert didn’t quite go my way, but that was because I was being so ambitious in so many other areas of the cook.

“It could have gone a lot worse.”

The chef with “the biggest highs and the biggest lows”, according to judge Matt Tebbutt, Mark had many successes during the show as well as some rough patches.

The pop up challenge, in which Mark was able to cook his style of American barbecue using recipes he had “absolutely nailed” from his pop up days, was one high. He breezed through the challenge like it was “just a day of work”, comfortable knowing it would all come together. 

He also received high praise for two dishes close to his heart - an elevated version of the dan dan noodles he often makes his wife at home, and a pigeon pithivier made in honour of his late uncle Dermot. Also a chef, Dermot piqued Mark’s interest in cooking and was his gateway into American cuisine. 

One of his toughest days, however, was also a turning point for Mark. In the zero waste challenge, he cooked trout loin with various additions which received strong negative feedback. Judge Monica Galetti said of the dish, “presentation wise, there’s a lot going on”, while for Marcus Wareing there were “too many flavours just banging around with each other”. Mark was sent back to the kitchen to save himself. 

Disappointed to be negatively critiqued when cooking Irish food for the first time in the competition and exhausted at having to cook twice, Mark recalls that he was wiped out by the end of the day.

“[I was] so stressed, so tired, so in my feelings about the whole thing. By the end I was like, I'm going home.”

Resigned that the eggy brunch dish he then cooked wasn’t going to save him, Mark felt a “complete sense of relief” when he made it through. 

Taking on board the feedback of the day, Mark reconsidered how he had been approaching his dishes. 

“I had done very well up to that point and I wanted to keep that going so I was pushing myself to do more,” Mark says. “That manifested with more things on the plate; [with me thinking] I've got to do this and I've got to do that. 

“But it's not about going wide and shallow, it's about going narrower and deeper,” he continues. “If there are three things on the plate, how many techniques and how many elements of flavour and story can I build into each of those things?”

While camaraderie between chefs was strong and the show’s editing was kind, MasterChef: The Professionals is a pressure cooker environment with an array of stressors ensuring a high level of intensity at all times. 

Constant filming, using ingredients chefs haven’t bought themselves, working in unfamiliar kitchens and in time frames that “just don’t exist in a natural kitchen space” create a pressurised environment. This pressure is ramped up by increasingly difficult challenges designed to push the chefs further out of their comfort zones, leaving competitors to find a balance between playing it safe and taking risks - a situation Mark found was “really tough to square the circle”. 

On the one hand, Mark wanted to push himself to make each dish “more complicated and more intricate” but also “had to be able to achieve it perfectly within the time frame and within the restrictions given in the challenge”.

“It was really, really tough,” he says. “I think [the balance] was always making sure that [I was making] food I would be happy to cook in a restaurant setting and that I never took it too far.”

Receiving negative feedback could be hard Mark says, although the dynamic between chefs offered some support.

“When one person gets bad feedback, you know how exposing it can feel and how personal it can feel,” he says. “So there was a huge amount of support between the group for those moments of criticism.” 

Yet despite feeling tough at times, Mark says the feedback was always “pretty fair” and always given to push the chefs further and with an air of investment.

“It's hard to find good criticism when you get to a certain stage of your career,” he says. “To find people that are willing to invest the time and energy into telling you honest breakdowns of how you're doing.”

Looking back on the show, Mark says that it was mentally and physically exhausting but still a fantastic experience. 

Now that it is over, he’s focussing on bringing back his pop up in time for summer and then securing a restaurant space for a barbecue steakhouse beyond that. And as Mark continues to look ahead, he’ll bring a little bit of Masterchef along for the ride, as the competition has changed him as a chef. 

“Not necessarily completely different,” he says, “but I've definitely matured a lot in my cooking and brought a new level of refinement and rigor to my cooking and my menu planning. 

“I've definitely tried to bring a lot of that into my day-to-day cooking now.”

Series 18 of Masterchef: The Professionals is available to watch on BBC iPlayer now.