TV

NYC boy reaches finals in Fox’s ‘MasterChef Junior’

An eighth-grade Manhattan culinary enthusiast will duke it out in the finals of “MasterChef Junior” under the watchful eye of Gordon Ramsay, who’s swapped his F-bombs for encouragement on the Fox reality show.

Alexander Weiss, 13, is one of two finalists vying for the $100,000 prize in Friday’s finale. He impressed show judges Ramsay, Graham Elliot and Joe Bastianich early on with his complex dishes — including baking pistachio macarons with a vanilla bean dulce de leche filling for a dessert challenge.

“To be able to pull those off, out of thin air — most chefs have issues in a professional kitchen doing that,” says Elliot.

Alexander started cooking with his parents (mom Susie Kerr is a decorator, dad Mark Weiss is a photographer) at the age of 5 or 6, but his culinary skills — honed by thousands of hours hunting recipes online or watching the Food Network — long ago surpassed theirs.

“Being in New York, the cultural capital of the country, the amount and breadth of restaurants, museums, music, all those things — to be in that town gives you an advantage for sure,” Elliot says.

The skill level of all the initial 24 contestants, ages 8 to 13, surprised the three “MasterChef” judges, who have 10 children among them.

“You would never know there was an age difference between ‘Junior’ and the regular ‘MasterChef’ based on the food on the plate,” Elliot says.

“We never realized in a million years that they were going to be as talented as they were. With the food we saw, we knew we needed to go back to the drawing board and make the challenges harder and raise the bar.”

While the dishes this season might have rivaled those of older chefs, producers did make some changes from the original “MasterChef” because of the age of the contestants — like eliminating two kids each episode so no one got sent home feeling like a “loser.”

“It completely changes how you judge someone,” Elliot says. “You know that they’re at this budding stage, and the last thing in the world that you want to do is stifle somebody or make them think that they’re not good at it and they should just find something new to do.”

On Friday’s finale, Alexander and fellow finalist Dara Yu, 12, of Culver City, Calif., will prepare a three-course meal that represents their personal style, and Elliot teases it was a clear-cut decision to crown the show’s first champion.

“You will see clearly who is deserving of the first ‘MasterChef Junior’ title.”