Monday night's My Kitchen Rules brought the first Instant Restaurant round to its final kitchen, with the Blue Mountains couple opening Lyst Haus and Alisha and Deanne nervously sitting at the bottom of the leaderboard on 68.

After the argument over the plates at Hot Mess, this was the dinner where Jane's standards finally had to survive contact with her own cooking. Pretty crockery was only going to get her so far.

A Beautiful Egg With An Awkward Centre

The menu certainly sounded ambitious: duck chawanmushi with king crab and caviar, master stock pigeon with chilli cucumber, samphire and a shallot pancake, then a Tomato Sour for dessert.

Even introducing the first course became uncomfortable. Shane stumbled over the pronunciation of chawanmushi, Jane corrected him sharply, and the table was left with an awkward silence before anyone had tasted a thing.

The duck egg custard arrived looking gorgeous. Served in its shell with crab and caviar, it had the sort of presentation you would expect from a food stylist. Golden was impressed enough to rate its appearance a potential 10, while Angus thought Alisha and Deanne might be heading home.

Then came the texture. The custard had not set consistently, and Alisha gagged at the smell. Suddenly, the team waiting to be eliminated had a reason to hope.

Manu Feildel liked the flavours and presentation, but the technique let the dish down. Colin Fassnidge was happy with the crab and caviar too, with the failed custard underneath spoiling the result. The entrée earned five from Manu and four from Colin.

The Pigeon That Could Not Be Rescued

Things got much worse with the main. Jane and Shane were aiming for an elevated take on a duck pancake, using pigeon alongside the shallot pancake and cucumber and samphire salad.

The idea had promise. The bird itself was badly overcooked and dry.

"The pigeon is mummified," Jane said, before retreating to compose herself. She admitted feeling like a failure, a painful reversal after all the confidence at everyone else's dinners.

A pressure cooker became the last hope, but the rescue did not work. With no successful fix, Jane and Shane served the pigeon anyway, complete with a claw on the plate. It was a fairly confronting finish to a dish that had already gone wrong in the kitchen.

Angus compared his bird to something that had been through a crematorium. Alisha, whose food had previously faced Jane's criticism, accused the pair of ruining their pigeons.

Colin confirmed that the pigeon was overcooked, while Manu could not find a positive thing to say about it. The main received three from Manu and four from Colin, leaving dessert with an enormous amount of repair work.

Tiffany did feel sorry for the couple, recognising how much they had expected from themselves. That made for a gentler response than some of the other diners could manage, but sympathy could not put moisture back into the pigeon.

Tomato Finally Gives Them Something To Smile About

For a couple who are not big dessert eaters, Jane and Shane saved their best cooking for the sweet course.

The Tomato Sour turned a cocktail idea into a dessert, combining tomato mascarpone gelato with strawberry and amaretto jam, peppercorn meringue and finger lime. It looked striking in a coupe glass, with familiar sweet flavours helping the unusual tomato component feel less daunting.

This was the creative risk that paid off. Both judges awarded it seven, giving the couple a respectable finish after two courses that had left them in serious trouble.

There was clearly a good dish in this menu. Unfortunately, MKR was scoring the whole dinner.

Fifty Points Ends Their Run

The guest scores added up to 20 out of 50. Tiffany and Giancarlo gave five; Angus and Simon, Krysten and Lucy, and Mary and Golden each gave four; Alisha and Deanne scored the dinner three.

Manu and Colin each contributed 15 out of 30, taking the judges' total to 30 out of 60. That left Jane and Shane on 50 out of 110, a full 18 points below Alisha and Deanne.

Colin confirmed the elimination, and the South Australian friends survived the round. After all the tension between the two teams, Alisha and Deanne were the ones still in the competition.

Jane left with one culinary commitment: pigeon would not be appearing on their menu again. Fair enough. This dinner had probably supplied enough pigeon memories for a lifetime.

Three Gatecrashers Join The Table

Tiffany and Giancarlo finished first on 86, while Mary and Golden's Filipino feast secured second place on 77. Both teams were fast-tracked to Kitchen HQ.

Krysten and Lucy on 72, Angus and Simon on 70, and Alisha and Deanne on 68 now face another Instant Restaurant round with three fresh teams.

The gatecrashers are NSW mates Harrison and Oliver, WA mother and son Sheridan and Ted, and NSW friends Zoe and Zac. Surviving Jane and Shane's dinner has bought the remaining original teams another chance, but also a whole new set of rivals to impress.

My Kitchen Rules continues tonight at 7.30pm on Seven and 7plus.