It's in the news today, but it was actually on TV Reload the podcast last week. They might welcome back to TV Reload. My name's Benjamin Norris and on this podcast I go behind the scenes with the biggest players in television. Each episode you will get a front row seat with content makers like executive producers, writers, editors and casting agents, plus the talent that we see on our screens.
TV Reload reloads the shows that you were currently watching and gives you a better insight at our television industry and streaming services today. On the podcast, I have Master Chef Australia's Gorgeous to Taliano Aldo. I have loved watching Aldo's journey on Master Chef Australia. He cooked with a
lot of heart and gave the competition everything. If he wasn't crying, we certainly were at home as he told stories about his life and shared cooking techniques that allowed us as an audience to wholeheartedly fall in love with him all over again. It was sad to see him go as he went up against fellow Master Chef Australia favorites Billy and Julie. He did his best with a pressure test that included a vegetable that, in his words,
has no flavor. We will talk about his husband and the choices they made for his return to the show. We do discuss the crying and the sweat and thankfully no blood that went into his time in the kitchen. And we will also and he and we in the kitchen and what he thinks needs to happen next for the reality show, which he unconditionally loves. However, let's get started with today's guest. I'd like to welcome Aldo to TV Reload.
I'm very bad, Actually, I'm so bad. Muster Sheriff has produced some of the biggest names in food. I don't know how to fake that.
Actually, the first time ever it's funds versus favorites.
My husband gave me a secret that my mum she was there.
Coming back a second time has clarified the direction that you're cooking has taken.
Seriously, who doesn't want to come back to be a featured ingradient.
Have the biggest heart that I've ever encountered in my life.
But I definitely want to finish Michael book.
Hi Eldo, how are you.
Hey, Ben? I'm very good, Thank you.
Well, congratulations on your time on Mastership Australia. You have played an epic and somewhat of an emotional part in this series. How have you gone watching it over the last few months.
Well, I must say I hated myself with the amount of time that I cried on camera and as much as I wasn't afraid back then to share my emotions, but then watching an over and over and over, I thought, you bloody idiot, you very lay yourself court so easily every single time.
I loved that about you though. I just thought you were so relatable and we probably have an idea of how we want to present ourselves and then it's probably not as it's not as easy as you think not to cry.
No, it's even not there.
I didn't have any single idea or the way that I want to come across on TV. It was just there. It was so intense, and every single thing that I achieved in the kitchen was family related, and not being able to see my family for the past three years always was a ride there back thoughts triggering myself all the time, and then of course my type of start to open up and my start to cry like a baby. I can't do anything Unfortunately, I'm very emotional. I'm an
emotional guy. So has happened so many times. But some say I said, okay, you need to stop, because you actually cried so much, you're gonna be remembered as the crying baby of season fourteen.
What's the saying, Blood, sweat and tears is what you put into that's your Master Chef experience.
That's absolutely right. For sure, I would say that I didn't know myself back. I give one hundred percent of myself from beginning to hand, and that is something that I'm very happy with. I'm proud of, and I'm proud that the message of showcasing the Italian heritage and food that I love so much, it came across very well on the show.
Well, you've done so well and you've made it to the week before finals week. How did this experience this time round go for you?
It actually was so much better than my first stife, and not just in terms of progression in the competition, but also in terms of human connection and bond that I coming out of Master Chef Season fourteen, I got a friend for life, friend that I can seriously call my family now. And you know, it's that's I think. Well, nobody understand about Master Chef. Yes, it is a cooking show.
But when you get locked up in a room with other people that they're speaking your same language, and then when you get down to the end of the competition where the groupe iss more, everybody start to open up and then a new thing comes to life, which is the friendship, the deep connection, the bonds, and you start to see those people really like family, you know.
Julia revealed just this way that she'd consulted her psychologists before agreeing to join Master Chef Australia. Fans versus favorites. What kind of a process did you have to go through before saying yes?
Well, I went through the process of consulting my husband because the first time around that I went away in my first season, it was hard on him because we have been apart and we didn't have a time of phone call of just being able to come out on the weekend seeing each other, and that was hard. So before getting to say yes, I said, look, that's other condition that are a little bit different. I'm going to be able to have my phone, you can reach me anytime,
and are you gonna cope with that? Me for it can be a week, could be up to six months. And because we've got three dogs as well, it's lots of work to do. So are you ready to take it on board? Because along the way, if you're gonna say you're gonna just bring back that I've been away for a month, a week or six months or whatever it is, I don't want to hear that. So make sure that you make peace with that. I don't want
to hear anything once I'm coming back. So you agree on the notes, and then I say, okay, now I can finally agree on going back.
You sound like me with my partner. I'm a big personality in my home, and so it starts off with you know, like, yes, you can go. But then after a while, my partner seems to miss me while I'm gone and he starts to crave that big energy back into the house.
Well, and that's the thing, and I say, make up your mind. I don't want to hear anything along the way. Unfortunately it's a reality and I'm gone. I can't come in and out, in and out as uppened towards the end when with the three round of elimination, and that is something that I didn't go very well on myself. Probably that's what I also as played a big part
in my process. Towards the end. My father in law was just brought to hospital on the day when Tommy got eliminated, and that's why also I didn't feature at the end of his elimination. I need to live set because I need to go and see my housband and just check on his dad as well. And from then Auntie, when I got eliminated, has been all the roller coasta. I was there, but mentally I wasn't there. It was hard and that's all part of myself then going back and say, wow, I missed out on these kind of
things because I was here. I didn't support my husband. But then the other end, he said, I know what was going to happen. I know that you were there, so I couldn't ask for anything from you.
Has he enjoyed watching you on this series.
Well, he's enjoyed the lot. Last night, while we were watching the episode, just at the end, after listening my speech and everybody talking about myself, he went silent and he turned his space around and he was crying. That's he said, But why are you crying? Because you just got eliminated, and everybody spoke so kindly about you, like I can't believe that those people they love you so much and I'm actually take down and you share with those people are just proud of you.
Yeah, that's so nice to hear. Do you know if any potential favorites that were contact to turn the experience down? Do you know if anyone was asked to come back for this format and they said.
It's aarly confidential.
You can't believe that they Even when my mom she came on the shore. It was so funny because I was working on Chapel Street and my husband took her on Chapel Street. Mark called me and said where are you And he said, I'm on Chapel Street. I'm with Mindy and Cliff, which is an assistant producer there.
It's around the house with us.
Said okay, just to let you know, I'm coming to Melbourne tomorrow to see dad, so just so I want to make sure where we are you and if you went around there were five hundred meters away from where I was.
My husband kept.
Me secret that my mom she was there from the Sunday and even my sister to make making sure that my mom she was not giving anything away. She said, Mom, you signed a confidentiality that if you're gonna tell to somebody, gonna be fine. Like that's the thing that they kept away from me until at the very end.
Well, I guess that means it might be highlight of your series. But what was your highlight from returning to the series?
Oh? For sure, and in my mom there go from the other side of the world.
Like when I saw my mom there as just I would have said, you know what, I don't want to cook see everybody, Let me enjoy the time with my mom.
I don't need to cook for her. She knows that I can cook.
So I want to go.
I want to go and have a drink with my mom and in dinner.
It was so special. And consider that I've created and missed even a huk from my mom and my sister from the past three years, there was nothing that could be matching that kind of rewards the gift that I got received by the master production.
You shared a fairly emotional story during the series, and that was I think one of the reasons why I gravitated towards you as much as I did.
My last time.
That I was a home really was for my wedding actually.
To my husband, and that is when my father decided to not show up to the wedding because he thought there was a.
Circus and that's when I cut it off. I cut him out of my life.
But I just do want to remember that part of me being happy, and that's why I want to cook this dish.
Is it hard to have that kind of experience out there for everyone to see or everyone to know.
Well, it's hard. It's very hard to explain as well, Like when you go the kind of I think that's missing, you feel that there is something missing in your life from the past three years, and you constantly they're seeing it,
but you can't have it. And when he manifests, like you just you just got blown away and you release all the stress, anxiety, pressure, all the feeling animotion that just come to surface and the only thing that you can go is can do is just let it come out and then debrief afterwards.
Have you spoken to your dad then, Like, as is this experience back on Master Chef, Is it built any bridges relationships?
No, not at all. I think that the person that biologically is my father, it's that's where it stands to know any connection at all. And unfortunately, sadly for him, he hasn't done anything in eight years that I've been in Australia, So I don't see the need to do anything now. After that I came on a national television just putting everything so openly into the air. There is no way they could clean year with myself. Unfortunately, I'm thirty five going into my thirty six. I'm a very
well funed man. I got an opinion, an idea, and I got a life and it's not going to be part of my life.
If my mom she has moved on from me, what's the point of me going back.
I mean, I just think you're incredibly brave and I appreciated you sharing a story. What's it all allowing us into your life? Like there's nothing better than seeing people being authentically themselves on television because it makes us all feel seene. You know, we've all got things in our life, complicated stories.
Absolutely, and especially for us that we're coming from a reality that I want to suck to say that we are a minority, because we don't need to label us as a minority. We are an existing part of society. We're not minority. We are the society, and the world is rainbow. The world is gay. We got to face the fact that the world is gay. I can't tolerate anymore that there are people that they gotta hide, they gotta not living their life because of people labeling them
or pointing in them. We got to be proud of what we are, first of all, leg human being. We've got to be proud of of being able to be comfortable and living our life. There is nobody out there there is more pressure than you. You just specialize everybody else. And that has to be a message that needs to be spread across the globe because people they've got just
one life. And if you're missing out because you're too scared or too afraid to show you truly are, because you don't want to feel attacked, fuck everybody.
Just be you.
There's no time to waste because there are stupid people out there. Just surround yourself with people that they love you, we love.
There's some great messages in that. Again, you know, you just keep delivering, you know, pieces from your own heart. And I think that that's a really amazing currency that you've had with connecting to your audience and the people that love you.
Well, I think that be myself has been the thing that pened me the most, and I will never be anybody else.
I wouldn't be anything different.
One thing we could all aspire to is Hugh Allen's hair amazing moment last night where Alvin said that he was like a Disney Prince.
Oh my gosh, Hugh Allan, he's an amazing talent, a twenty seven year old executive chief and one of the best restaurants in Melbourne, and he looks like a Disney Prince.
Was he really like a Disney Prince?
Well, you know it's I'm gonna sound so terrible, but I didn't find the kind of magic of Disney Prince.
It probably could be good looking, but for me, it's no.
It's just a pretty thing to look at it, but it doesn't have any salt. It's just a nice piece of fish. But we're not seasoning. I'm so bad. I'm very bad. Actually, I'm so bad. And you if you heard my thing, please just discard what I'm saying. Don't bother by myself because you don't have to worry about it. But that's my opinion. Sorry, I like people with the That's the people that I'm drawn to, people that I can have fun. I don't need to be shying, has to be myself. I can be myself over the top.
Who is your favorite special guest amongst the cooking legends that we've said?
Curtistone all the way, Curtistone all the way. When Kedston walked in again one more time, thank Girling, I scrawled the lots like, oh my god, it's just so good to look at it. It's huge.
And then as well as marcop You're white. In the episode Marco said, arand on my bench so so long talking to me about how much he loved the attachment that I got to food and the history behind it. And as well as Rick Sign. Rick Sign was amazing.
What is the best thing about Master Chef in your mind? You know, why do you think that audiences love this show so much?
Well, it is a cooking show. But at the other end, people that love the backstory of people because you know, sometimes on and off you've got a backstory that it gets shown and you learn much more about people's personality, and you show your personality. People definitely in love with you. I'm apart from a good cook your or I'm not a great cook, you are. You can sure that through the passion that you have during the cook or supporting your teammates. And that's why this is one of the
best shots ever. And I will encourage everybody in their love to get through the process of applying for marsh because it's once in your lifetime. I have the pleasure to do it twice. If I would be called in for the third time, for sure, tick the box.
I'm in again every series from now on.
No, that would be too much, actually would be very too much. Every four years.
Probably consult your husband first away.
Always, always, always, always consult the husband.
Is there anything that you would change about the format of the show? You know, you've done two different seasons and you know they've tried different things, you know, is there anything that you would change about Master Chef?
Well, I think that Machev is kind of sure that now it's got to the fourteenth season, they need to do something new and probably with the weather, I would
see it. It's to not eliminate anybody, but will be going onto a score record because by the end of the day, people that they're winning that just can get pushed through an elimination, but then them in short, are you just killed all the way through or them and had great moments all the way through, but they're just coming up at the very point the end of the competition.
You know, you can get pushed through because people they they filled or you know, it would be great to see that all the twenty four people they start together and they finished together, and then there is a scoreboard and then you get winning from scoreboard.
It's like it's like a tennis tournament.
I think, you know, fourteen seasons in they could do something different. I mean, it was great when they mixed up the judges. I thought that was a great refresh. But yeah, you yes, Well there's been a few sickies over the season because you guys were filming through COVID. Filming through COVID proved to be quite difficult.
Look, we actually had been very good because we were getting tested daily and masked up until the very end. But the issues that when we had our Christmas break, you know, people coming back and then they didn't show symptoms, and then they show symptoms after that. We all together in the same green room on set, built together. You know,
we share we shared the gems. We shared the lot, we shared the germs as well, So but that was odd actually because to be blocked in an apartment, surrounded by those four white walls and nothing to do, it was just instantly hard. I went through all the Netflix series that I stopped watching. I watched a lot of The Ring three times, all the three in all the
three movies. And then I was constantly on the phone with people that they were in Sydney or calling back home, facetiming all the time, and I was eating a lot. I put so much wetter on that week.
Were you surrounded by all these amazing cooks cooking for you as well?
Surely there was.
Some No nobody could ever brought your food in. That's the issue, because yeah, the people that can't take anything to you. So the assistant producer was asking in the morning, guys, what would you need? Did you need anything from the pantry? You leave your shopping list, knock at the door, or leave the back there and see you later. That's what it's been very hard.
In your final episode, you revealed that cucumber. I was like, this must be like standing on a c cucumber, which no one ever wants.
No, nothing, but like, seriously, who doesn't want a cucumber to be a featured in radient? What can you do with cucumber? Let's talk about how borrowing it is your cucumber, and then you will understand my situation last night, Like I tried to do on my best with what I got, and I think that I did it.
It was a great dish, So no fault, which is great, happy happy time.
Well, you were up against some really tough competition, you know, with that all in cook and you know as the numbers dwindled down, did you think at any time during that pressure test that you were going to go home?
Look, I always start the elimination called putting myself in the worst case scenario that I'm going GOLM. So whatever comes above that, it's a bonus. That has been always my theory. You go in thinking that you're going gom but then you cook your best and you cook your way out.
Do you think you could have done anything different? I mean, I felt like what you did was so impressive. It was so impressive. I didn't feel like you could have given that anything anything else or anything more.
Look, Jock said that I should have pushed the boat. But like in world way, I could have pushed the boat out with cucumber, and as far as I want to be creative, I could have come up with something else, for sure. But there's something else would have been a good dish as the dish that I've been eliminated on, I'm not sure about it. So I'm happier to go out on a good dish that it's a strong dish
against a past winner. Billy McKay. Billy Bloody mackay. She got me eliminated, but I still do love her so much.
She's so beautiful, amazing television. I just think Billy's doing so well. I'm just in awe of her calmness. You know, not only is she come, she's also cooking so well.
You know, it is mesmerizing, but at the same time it's so unbelievable. She can stay so calm and collect and focus in pressure tests or elimination challenge. She is what My Chef represents, like everything that a winner has really shares it Or.
Have you envisioned what you want your experience to be like now?
Like?
What what's what have your planned coming off? You know your second series of Master Chef, What does your future look like within the food world.
I don't like to plan ahead. So whatever we're going to come out after night. It's so as I said, it's always a bonus, it's always a plus. I always got my job to go back and which I was happy before and I will be happy now. But I definitely want to finish my cookbook, which most likely I want to put it out on the market by Christmas, so December will be a deadline. And then I really want to look in to start a food guide too
of the side of Italy. So they start from Campania region, going Paga, Calabri, Sicily, Sicilia and sad as well those other kind of region there. Unfortunately they don't get that much traction from overseas. They sell part of the country that hasn't been discovered. There is such a huge food scene which is above and beyond that represents here the true essence of Italian food, and that's what I would love to do.
How do I already? I mean, I mean, I love, I mean, I love Italian food. My family have always whenever it's someone's birthday, we're like, where do we want to go? And everyone's like Italian food, So.
What's your what's your go in Melbourne.
Oh, I'm so upset about this. I don't know if have you been to Topo Judio Interac No? Okay, So it's been an institution Intoac for a really long time and it's my favorite restaurant and they've just closed and it's well, my grandfather actually was the Commonwealth Bank manager in to Irak and he actually gave the guy the loan to start the restaurant. So it's been there for I'd be making it up anyway, it's been there for a long time and it's very sad because it's the best Italian food ever.
So well, I will encourage you to go and try this bit steadier in Carton.
I love very Next time, next time you're around, we'll have to go. We'll have to I.
Will message you.
We're going to decide a bit set up beautiful.
I love it. You know, at this stage of the competition, you're getting down to the very end of it. Who do you think is going to win? Probably you might know more because you know you may do. Who did you think at this time leaving the competition, who did you think was going to win?
Uh?
For myself living I wish that on the finale, I will see Saratore and Mindy Wood Saratoor when she won the Fusion Challenge and she got greater three Michelen start dish like you know that you can't talk there and for her coming out with the kind of style of food that she really wants to do now. She brings to the Australian scene. It's a way to go now and she's a brilliant cook, She's a brilliant person and she saw down to her a big art.
Mindy.
I got no words for Mindy. She has been my first kicking in. She knows everything inside out of myself. We shaid so much sorry and information. I would love Mindy to win because she will representing so proudly Australia. Marsha Fit is a show that gave so much vision to winners and she deserved the vision because she needs to celebrate what Australia is about it. Australia it's the continent of everyone, but most importantly Australians got fundamental, very
strong basis food wise. All the native ingredients that're getting on the market now and all the use of native ingredients done in many different cuisines. It's so great the people that finally embrace it, and what a better person rather than mendieval to represent their kind of culture when she's first nation born Australian. So I would really would love to see it lifting up the trophy because she's so deserving.
Well, it was a beautiful moment last night when we got to see you, as you believe in the competition, be able to share the friendship that you've been able to build. And it was palpable. You know, you could see it. The audience could see that friendship right in front of their eyes. It was a great moment.
Yeah, it is.
It is interesting because you think that you're there for the competition, but then everything get put behind and you just get to know those people so deeply, and what you want to do is just being around us people all the time, because so much fun. You're sharing cook you're sharing are you sharing food, You're sharing your passion. You got a similar connection on multi level, So it's friendship for life and then those friendship that would transform
into family. That's where I met with Mindya and Sarah No that part of my family.
Beautiful girls. You know something I ask everyone who joins the podcast as a guest, what is something from behind the scenes that we as an audience did not say that we will not see, but something from maybe a behind the scenes secret from Mastership Australia.
I will give you juicy one.
It is very not as easy as it looks.
So you see just the hour and a half of cook, which is great fun, but then you work up early in the morning. When you see us walking in the kitchen, you're doing their routine probably seven to eight times because
camera they need to film from different angles. When we're finishing the cook we're having a break because the kitchen must be cleaned down, so all the benches clean down, and then we have at least an hour and alf to a lot of the amazing production of people that they are inertically enough for us messy book that we just create a bombing there and I'm feel so sorry, but we try to help as much as we can.
So it's but that there is so much of their timing in between, so the hour and a half of recording of filming is stretched out in twelve thirteen hours, and that's where you get to know so much more about people.
So it's all part of the big picture of Mastership.
Well, I have absolutely loved watching you on this series. It is and it has been such an amazing series of Mastership Australia. So thank you so much for coming on TV Reload and sharing some of your stories from behind the scenes.
It's been been a joy, absolutely Ben, thank you so much for having me and looking forward that in now lunch whatever it's going to be at this Dasio, I lock at it.