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Meet two Indonesians competing in MasterChef Asia
Two Indonesians are competing for the title of MasterChef in the first season of MasterChef Asia
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Two Indonesians are competing for the title of MasterChef in the first season of MasterChef Asia.
Twenty-six-year-old Stefan Pratama and 20-year-old Vonny Lestari are among 15 contestants competing for the title and the chance to release their own cookbook and receive a US$50,000 cash prize.
Stefan and Vonny will compete with other finalists hailing from China, India, the Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan and Vietnam.
Stefan said he had doubts before deciding to enter the competition.
'The submission deadline was only five days away. I was a bit confused but I decided to submit anyway,' he told tempo.co recently.
The man, who works as sales representative, said he did not expect that he would become one of the MasterChef contestants.
'Before, I could only see it on TV starting with MasterChef Indonesia, Australia and now it is me, who is on the TV,' he said.
Stefan said that his interest in cooking started when he went to Singapore and the US to study.
'When I lived there, I missed Indonesian food, and because of that I decided to learn to cook,' he said. 'But when I went home, I sometimes missed Singaporean and Western food, so I learned to cook those foods as well.'
Meanwhile Vonny, the youngest contestant in the competition, said at first she was not really confident about her cooking skills.
'Other contestants from other countries look very professional,' she said.
The college student, however, said her confidence returned when one of the judges, Susur Lee, praised her cooking.
Born and bred in Bali, Vonny studies the culinary business in one of the private universities in Surabaya, East Java. She said she fell in love with cooking after her father taught her to make pancakes.
MasterChef Asia will premier on Sept. 3. Three judges in the competition are Hong-Kong-born restaurateur Lee, three-Michelin-starred chef Bruno Menard and Singapore-born MasterChef Australia finalist Audra Morrice. (ika)
