There is just one week to go before the winner of MasterChef Australia 2021 is crowned but sadly, the journey has come to an end for Sabina Newton, the incredibly talented young chef from Tasmania.
Newton was sent home from the competition after completing a challenge at Society Restaurant in Melbourne—with legendary chef Martin Benn tasking the contestants to each make a course for the eatery’s first-ever dinner service. Ultimately, it was Newton’s use of raw, instead of toasted, macadamia nuts that saw her exit the game.
“I think as soon as I walked into Society, I knew that there was going to be a huge challenge,” she told POPSUGAR Australia following her elimination.
“I think doing a service challenge by yourself is also so different to doing it in a team. Obviously, we’ve done quite a few service challenges in a team prior to that, but by yourself, it’s really hard because you just have to pull on your own strengths and not the collective of the team.”
Not only that, but doing a challenge alone and out of the MasterChef kitchen means cooking without the encouragement from fellow contestants up in the gantry.
“I always think of them as my little guardian angels up in the gantry, they are just so supportive,” she said. “I know that sometimes on camera it can look like they are being annoying, but they really do just want the best for you so you definitely need that sense of support when you are cooking in a challenge like that.”
Leaving the competition with only a week to go hasn’t deterred Newton from working towards owning her own restaurant, especially after judge Jock Zonfrillo told her that she was certainly destined to run a kitchen one day.
“That was really special, to get a comment like that,” she said. “I got to know the judges pretty well in the end. So it was really nice that they recognised that. I would love to have my own place someday, but I don’t think that that’s going to happen for a couple of years. But ideally, I’d love to have a really small kitchen, maybe like a 20 seater restaurant, and it’d be a lot more relaxed than something like at Society.”
When asked who, hypothetically, she might call on out of her fellow MasterChef contestants to run that restaurant with, Newton said “I would open up the restaurant side with Elise and then I’d get Scotty and Conor to do all the drinks and wine because they’re amazing.”
Newton said that she formed close bonds with everyone on the show and noted that, being the youngest, they often took her under their wings, but revealed Elise was like a big sister to her while Pete and Brent were like big brothers who would always life her spirits after she had a bad cook.
“And then Kishwar, when I was sick, she would make me the most beautiful Bengali food,” she said. “Everyone really was just amazing.”
Aside from feeling a bit under the weather from time to time, Newton had a good run in the competition in terms of injuries and managed to escape fairly unscathed – at least until she got home.
“It’s so crazy because I never ever cut myself in the MasterChef kitchen,” she said. “I burned myself so many times, which was just really painful, but I never ever cut myself. But then, as soon as I got home from my MasterChef, I totally cut myself in my own kitchen!”
You can follow Sabina’s food journey at @sabinanewton and be sure to watch the MasterChef Australia 2021 finale on Network Ten and 10Play on July 13, 2021, at 7.30pm.
