LLY McCord had many supporters in Langholm last Friday as she took part in the final of the BBC Masterchef competition 2019.
It was the first all-women final and each competitor cooked their own food for the last time in the competition.
Jilly, who grew up in Langholm, was one of 56 amateur cooks who participated in the competition this year and to make it all the way to the final was a fantastic achievement. Jilly is a teacher at Dollar Academy.
Her fellow finalists were Irini Tzortzoglou, a retired banker who lives in Cartmel in Cumbria, and Delia Maria Asser, who is a police constable in Essex.
Jilly cooked seared tuna fillet, carpaccio of tuna, with a black olive tapenade as her starter served with a banya chowder, a caper and anchovy sauce.
Praise
The dish earned a lot of praise from the presenters because of the combination of flavours.
Gregg said he felt like he was sitting in the south of France.
This was followed by a partridge pithivier which included black pudding and mushrooms, roasted breast of partridge, braised red cabbage, parsnip puree, cavolo nero and pear with a partridge sauce.
Her sweet was a lemon tart, topped with lemon and raspberry jelly, confit lemon cream with raspberry powder, a raspberry sorbet, raspberry sauce and a sugar tuille.
John said the raspberry and lemon were sharp and sour and not for the faint-hearted but worked amazingly well. After the presenter’s comments, Jilly said she was very, very happy.
All three women were very supportive of one another in the competition and, after an exciting final, Irini was declared the 2019 winner.
Winner
For the people of Langholm Jilly was undoubtedly the winner and there were lots of very positive comments about her success on social media.
In the final episode the programme did a profile of Jilly, including her upbringing in Langholm and her time spent playing at the rugby club.
Jilly is paying a visit to Langholm Academy tomorrow.