Tell Dave McKinnon and Tony Price to cook a deconstructed duck curry and they’ll have no problems. Ask them to construct a deck and you might be waiting longer than it takes for a casserole in the slow cooker.
The two MasterChef buddies are building a brand-new deck for Dave’s earthquake-hit home in Christchurch. Actually, Auckland-based Tony’s building Dave’s deck. Dave, who has now been eliminated from the top-rating TV One show, has been relegated to providing the entertainment. “Yeah, it was supposed to be finished by now,” grins Tony somewhat sheepishly.
While Tony (34) has built many a deck in his time, Dave’s relative inexperience with anything related to construction means progress has been slow. “I’m just not handy!” Dave (31) laughs. “I’ve never been good with this type of thing, so I took it upon myself to annoy and distract Tony as much as possible.”
Even though they’re slightly behind schedule, the dynamic duo have had a riot of a time. “Dave’s absolutely hilarious, he’s mad!” says Tony. “We spend most of the time laughing our heads off. If we were builders on someone else’s site, we would have been sacked by now, with no written warning. The neighbours must think we’re insane.”
What started off as a simple construction job has quickly turned into what Dave calls “absolute chaos”, as Tony essentially tried to construct the deck by himself. However, Tony refuses to call the project a disaster and says he’s determined to finish the job. He’s so keen that he’s flying back to Christchurch from Auckland soon to get it all done – and Dave is banished from the site.
“We’ve come to an agreement that I’ll stay inside for the first few days, but I’ll be on hand with some good food and a cold beer at five o’clock,” says Dave. “But I’ll still stick my head out the window and try to distract him.”
“Once I’ve got to a certain point, then he can come back,” says Tony. The fact that the deck only consists of a few planks of wood so far didn’t stop former MasterChef contestants Andy Currin, Matt Gilray and Andrea Bathgate stopping in for a few drinks. Tony says he and Dave got bit of stick from the others about their progress. “We wind each other up all the time,” he grins.
Although the two chefs haven’t quite become master builders, they’re looking forward to hosting a barbecue when they finally hammer in the last nail. “I’m always on a mission to cook the perfect steak and I can’t think of a better place to do it than on the barbecue on my brand-new finished deck!” says Dave.
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