My Masterchef Career - how I know it's totally rigged.

I think I'm allowed to share this now. I was in the audience for Masterchef, on two recent occasions. We had to sign agreements not to disclose ANYTHING. Gosh, cos there was some juicy info. Like, how to make a cake. We didn't see the contestants at any time, so no danger of leaking any info about the competition.

The first time I got to see Gary make rice paper rolls, Matt make a pudding, and the judges doing an opening talk. We got to applaud madly for Curtis Stone (who was NOT there at the time we applauded).

The second time, I was a bit smarter. When they asked if anyone would like to wear a microphone and ask a question, I jumped up and down saying "ME ME ME!" And I got to see Gary make a cheesecake, and I asked questions, sniffed a rose geranium leaf, and got to taste the dessert (and it was truly great, and I'm not just saying that). That was pretty cool! We also got to see Kirsten Tibballs make a fabulous cake. Her demo was excellent.

It was fun but tiring, and I was super excited about seeing myself on telly, especially that second time. I heard about a call for audience on a third occasion, and it was on my day off, but I gave it a miss. Really too tiring, and I'd had my fun.

So finally, the air dates rolled around. I saw the first episode. Hey, where's the rice paper rolls? Gary made a curry instead! I was really looking forward to that recipe too. You could see me in the opening, so at least I could prove to my mum that I'd done it.

Then the second episode rolled around. There's that terrific cake. And Gary's making the wrong thing again! WHERE'S MY CHEESECAKE? I was barely visible in that episode. Bah! My bragging rights instantly dissolved.

Still, I got a few photos from the audience-wrangling area, which I thought was pretty fun. Makes up for the fact that Masterchef is clearly totally rigged, rigged to feature ME as little as possible.

Oh, and that third episode just aired, the one I decided not to bother with. Turns out it was only Heston Blumenthal for the whole episode, so it's not like I missed out on meeting anyone awesome or anything!

Check it out, mystery boxes ready for use!

Now THAT is a lot of oil!