{"id":487887,"date":"2026-06-21T03:17:17","date_gmt":"2026-06-21T03:17:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/487887\/"},"modified":"2026-06-21T03:17:17","modified_gmt":"2026-06-21T03:17:17","slug":"masterchef-contestants-from-regional-wa-heat-up-competition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/487887\/","title":{"rendered":"MasterChef contestants from regional WA heat up competition"},"content":{"rendered":"

From a young age, Luke Harris felt a magnetic pull to letting his creativity run wild in the kitchen.<\/p>\n

“[At the shops] Luke would pick all of these things from the shelves. I had no idea what these ingredients were, but we’d bring them home and he’d cook us up a beautiful feast,” his mother Eugenie Harris said.<\/p>\n

Now the 20-year-old is heating up competition on a national stage as the youngest contestant on this year’s season of MasterChef, a television show where the country’s best up-and-coming chefs battle it out in the kitchen.<\/p>\n

“It does feel a bit weird \u2026 a year ago I was just some random bloke who likes cooking and now I’m on TV,” Mr Harris said.\"Luke<\/p>\n

Luke Harris says he dubbed himself “chef squid” whenever he would cook for friends and family. (Supplied: Harris family)<\/p>\n

Cooking more than a hobby<\/p>\n

Mr Harris said there were many people who encouraged him to follow his passion of cooking.<\/p>\n

“My love for cooking definitely came from Mum and Dad, but there was definitely a few people who kind of fanned the flame into a full-blown fire,” he said.<\/p>\n

Growing up in Geraldton, 400 kilometres north of Perth, his family said it was school where their son began to test the boundaries of his cooking ability.<\/p>\n

Mr Harris said a catalyst moment was at school when he was tasked to make Indonesian-style fried rice.<\/p>\n

“That was the first time I reckon where I didn’t have someone [completely] watching over me [when cooking],” he said.<\/p>\n

“I got to experiment and put my own spin on it.”<\/p>\n

\"Derek<\/p>\n

Derek Goforth says he knew his former student Luke would go far.\u00a0 (Supplied: Derek Goforth)<\/p>\n

His former food technology teacher, Derek Goforth, said Mr Harris was always on a path of his own.<\/p>\n

“One of his strengths, but also one of his weaknesses, was working under his own inspiration,” Mr Goforth said.<\/p>\n

He said in one lesson where students were tasked with creating their own meat box, Mr Harris said he would “play it by ear”.<\/p>\n

“What [Luke] produced at the end, I don’t know what it was, it certainly wasn’t a meat box and it certainly wasn’t edible,” Mr Goforth said.<\/p>\n

“But this was the same period where off his own back he also made a croquembouche \u2026 and it was absolutely phenomenal.”\"Luke<\/p>\n

Luke’s food and technology teacher says the croquembouche was “phenomenal”. (Supplied: Harris family)<\/p>\n

Mr Goforth said his former student had a knack for turning a simple dish into something magnificent.<\/p>\n

“He wouldn’t be one to make a simple cheese sandwich. It would have to be a croque monsieur,” he said.<\/p>\n

“It wouldn’t be just a cake, it would have to be a macaron \u2026 nothing was too complicated.”<\/p>\n

Now proudly watching on national television, Mr Goforth said his former student was going to be “a big star”.<\/p>\n

“[Luke] has far surpassed any skill that I could teach him. I would just encourage him to be exactly who he is,” Mr Goforth said.<\/p>\n

“Regardless of where he finishes [on MasterChef], whether it’s 10th, fifth or first, I think he’s got a massive future.”<\/p>\n

Regional connection<\/p>\n

Mr Harris’s parents, Khim and Eugenie, said raising their son in Geraldton had a major influence on his cooking.<\/p>\n

“Geraldton was a great place for things like crayfish \u2026 [our friend] would turn up on our doorstep with a bag full of crays,” Ms Harris said.<\/p>\n

“It was complete chaos in the kitchen, but then Luke would [cook up] the beautiful crays.<\/p>\n

“It takes a village to raise a child and Geraldton was that village.”\"Image<\/p>\n

Esperance local Hannah Johnson is another contestant on MasterChef from regional Western Australia.\u00a0 (Supplied: David Dougherty)<\/p>\n

Also battling it out on MasterChef is Esperance local Hannah Johnson, who hails from the coastal town 696 kilometres south of Perth.<\/p>\n

Ms Johnson previously enjoyed cooking for farmers during seeding and harvest.<\/p>\n

“I always think when someone’s out there working long hours, food is always something people look forward to,” she said.<\/p>\n

“So I always wanted to make the meals [for farmers] quite diverse and different every day, so they’re not getting the same thing.<\/p>\n

“[The farmers] would often give me feedback, so maybe that was my starting point of my MasterChef journey of getting critiqued on food.”\"Hannah<\/p>\n

Hannah Johnson cooking on MasterChef. (Supplied: David Dougherty\/ Channel 10)<\/p>\n

Ms Johnson said going from cooking for farmers during seeding to critically acclaimed chefs now was a big change.<\/p>\n

“It’s a little bit of a sea change \u2026 a bit of a challenge, but it’s been pretty amazing,” she said.<\/p>\n

“I do think maybe my food journey is heading into a different direction now after MasterChef.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"From a young age, Luke Harris felt a magnetic pull to letting his creativity run wild in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":487888,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[91005,169,132204,244660,244664,244663,156,244659,244657,244658,111,139,69,244661,437,244662,5013],"class_list":["post-487887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-channel-10","tag-chef","tag-cooking-competition","tag-cooking-on-television","tag-croquembouche","tag-culinary-skills","tag-entertainment","tag-hannah-johnson-masterchef","tag-luke-harris-masterchef","tag-masterchef-australia-contestants","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-regional-representation","tag-tv","tag-wa-masterchef-contestants","tag-wa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=487887"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487887\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/487888"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=487887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=487887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=487887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}