Former Master Chef Australia judge Gary Mehigan called the show “too professional” in its aspirations for restaurant-level cuisine.
Speaking to the media during a visit to India, he said: “To be honest, it’s too professional for my taste. I think the first season for me is always special because it was unexpected and I think the level of the home cooks seemed genuine and certain for their hunger… The first good part of the 11 years I was there we found really honest, genuine, you know, moms and dads and people who wanted to change careers and they were honest, their food was pretty basic.
“I mean, the season 1 finale dessert was a chocolate tart with a chocolate heart made with tempered chocolate and the drama around that was incredible,” she said.
“And then you jump forward 10 years and then I remember Kirsten Tibballs, who is one of our top pastry chefs in Australia, making a dessert. I even got bored reading the recipe. There were so many processes. I’m just like, you can’t follow that. I am not interested. You know what I mean? It was just like beyond.
Mehigan said an honest home cook with simple cooking was preferable to aspiring to restaurant-quality food.
This no doubt contradicts the judgment of many of his 11 seasons onwards Master Chef Australiaending in 2019 when 10 cut ties with him, Matt Preston and Gary Colambaris.
He also revealed that the negotiations mostly broke down during the 7 months of filming that was to pass Master Chef -this was previously cited in the media fallout in 2019.
“We’ve done 16 seasons in all, including Juniors, All Stars, etc,” he continued. “And I remember asking the head of Channel 10, which is the free-to-air network we’ve been working for, ‘How long do you think the show will run?’ And he said, “I think it’s going to be another 10 years.” And I looked him in the eye and said, ‘But definitely not with us, like, you know, when it comes to this we’re going to find ourselves sucking food through the straw!’ …. I think he was quite shocked to find out.
He added, “I promised myself very early on that once I felt like it wasn’t my thing, that it was time to move on. I mean, the way we parted ways with Channel 10 was a little bit different. Channel 10 decided to take the narrative and do it about, you know, the “greedy judges”. But it wasn’t.
10 declined to comment.
Source: India Forum
