Vinnie Gibaldi and Petro Papathomas have responded after MasterChef Australia’s demanding Grand Finale pressure test divided viewers. But their own view of the five-hour challenge tells a surprisingly different story.
The MasterChef Australia 2026 Grand Finale pushed finalists Vinnie Gibaldi and Petro Papathomas through one of the most demanding nights of the competition — and its final five-hour pressure test quickly became one of the biggest talking points among viewers.
After fans questioned whether the challenge had simply gone too far, both Vinnie and Petro have now shared what it was actually like to face the test from inside the MasterChef kitchen.
MasterChef’s five-hour finale challenge divides viewers
Before reaching the final pressure test, Vinnie and Petro had already completed a 75-minute challenge inspired by some of the guest judges who had appeared throughout the season.
They were then confronted with an entirely different task from renowned pastry chef Cherish Finden.
The finalists were asked to recreate Finden’s elaborate Chinese Afternoon Tea — a technically demanding creation featuring nine intricate petit gateaux and a recipe containing more than 100 steps.
They had five hours to complete it.
The scale and precision required quickly sparked debate among MasterChef viewers, with some questioning whether such an elaborate pastry challenge was appropriate for amateur cooks competing in the Grand Finale.
One viewer described the pressure test as “ridiculous”, while another argued that even a trained pastry chef would have found the task challenging.
Others suggested the finale should instead have featured a service challenge, giving the finalists the opportunity to create their own multi-course menus and demonstrate how far they had developed throughout the competition.
But not everyone agreed.
Some fans argued that reaching the Grand Finale should mean being tested across every discipline in the kitchen — no matter how difficult the final challenge might be.
Petro says the Grand Finale should be difficult
Despite the criticism surrounding the pressure test, Petro Papathomas had no issue with the intensity of what he and Vinnie were asked to do.
Speaking to WHO after the finale, the runner-up said the difficulty was exactly what he expected from the final stage of the competition.
“Ah no, look, it’s Grand Finale, that’s what it should be – it should be super intense – so I’ve got no issues with that,” Petro said.
For him, making the final challenge considerably easier would have taken away from what the Grand Finale was supposed to represent.
“It is meant to be the hardest challenge there is, so if it wasn’t intense, I think it wouldn’t be right.”
His response offered a very different perspective from viewers who believed the challenge had asked too much of the finalists.
Vinnie admits the challenge was outside his comfort zone
Vinnie Gibaldi was just as candid about his reaction when Cherish Finden’s creation was revealed.
Unlike Petro, however, the eventual winner admitted it was not a challenge he had been hoping to face.
“I feel like it was not a challenge that I was looking forward to,” Vinnie said.
Desserts were already outside his strongest area, and the small, highly precise creations presented an additional challenge.
“Obviously desserts, not my strong suit, and then seeing how small and precise they were was also just not me and that was really difficult.”
Faced with five hours of intricate pastry work, Vinnie said he made a conscious decision not to become overwhelmed by what was in front of him.
“But you could either stress about it or I felt like you could just get on with it and I feel like that’s what I did.”
Instead, he focused on the work he had already put in throughout the competition.
“I’ve been practising and working hard the whole competition… everything was leading up to that moment, and I just said to myself, ‘You know, this is what you’ve been working towards, and now you just need to pull it off.’”
A very different view from inside the MasterChef kitchen
The pressure test may continue to divide viewers, but the responses from the two finalists reveal a more nuanced picture of what unfolded during the Grand Finale.
Petro believed such intensity belonged at the very end of the competition, while Vinnie openly admitted the challenge took him well outside his comfort zone.
Yet despite approaching it from different positions, both ultimately accepted the difficulty as part of reaching the final stage of MasterChef Australia.
For Vinnie in particular, the challenge represented the culmination of everything he had been working towards throughout the season — even if it arrived in a form he would never have chosen for himself.
