DAM: Today we’re excited to be sitting down with My Kitchen Rules Season 12 Winners – Janelle & Monzir. Janelle, Monzir, where would you say your love for food began?
J: I’m Turkish-Filipino and I guess my love for food started with my grandmother, she loves to cook. She looked after me when I was young so she cooked for me and we would pick strawberries together as a kid and I loved it. It’s like her job but it’s not her job . We’ve got this beautiful wood fire oven in my backyard that my grandfather built so she would always be making bread and I would be outside with them. They’d also grow their own vegetables so I’ve always been around the foundations of food. Both of my cultures are very big on food and every celebration is about food – what are we making? What are we eating? I couldn’t really get away from it.
“Both of my cultures are very big on food and every celebration is about food – what are we making? What are we eating? I couldn’t really get away from it.”
Janelle
It was just inevitable that I was going to do something with food. That’s where it kind of sparked my interest, cakes came a lot later because obviously within my family, no one cake decorates. That passion really started when I was a teenager, I didn’t really have much to do on the weekends so I gave it a go. I found my first cake decorating video on YouTube and could not believe people do this at home. I thought you would just buy and order it from a shop. So I made this orange Wilton cake, for those of you who are into cake decorating you’d probably know which video it is. I did it and I fell in love with it afterwards and that’s where cakes happened. Food has been the dominant thing in my life.
M: For me, my background is Sudanese, I was born there and then we fled from Sudan to Egypt and then came to Australia as Refugees. My love for food began back home, watching my mum and dad cook. I have a big family, back then there were eight of us, so mum would always be in the kitchen cooking for us. My aunts and uncles would also come over and they would sit there and talk and cook and everyone would share food. I loved how food can bring people together and there’s a sense of community because we all eat from the same plate.
“I loved how food can bring people together and there’s a sense of community because we all eat from
monzir
the same plate.”
During dinner time we would just sit down and catch up but other than that everyones just running around. I learnt some styles of cooking from my mum because she was in the kitchen cooking curries and stuff. For my dad, he taught me how to cook outdoors like barbecues and stuff. My dad loves barbecuing, we would go to the farms and then from the farm it would go straight to the table. That’s where my love of food came from.
DAM: Well we’re dying to know… How did you both meet?
M: We met on a night out clubbing. I went out with my brothers to celebrate one of our friends’ birthdays. I met Janelle who was with her sister and her friends.
J: I was with my sister, it was the first time I had ever taken her out clubbing. She just turned eighteen and I was like, ‘let’s go out, we’ve never gone out’ and then I met Monsey. It was also pre COVID so we had the experience of pre COVID dating. Everyone assumed we met online because of the timing of it but no, we met in person, in the club.
M: Yeah I saw Janelle and I was like ‘hey, come through’ and then I picked her up…
J: That’s not how it happened at all! [laughs] He was smiling and being all nice and I was like ‘I want to go’ but he insisted on talking to me.
“I saw Janelle and I was like ‘hey, come through’.” – Monzir
“That’s not how it happened at all!” – Janelle
DAM: Where was the first date?
M: First date was actually during daytime. I wanted to get to know her properly so we went to get ice cream and went for a walk and enjoyed the weather. We also went on the ferris wheel in Darling Harbour.
J: I just remember the ferris wheel because he’d never gone on one before that.
M: Do you have to tell them that?
J: Yes! It’s very important because we’ve introduced each other to things that are so very childlike but in a positive sense because it’s like inner child healing kind of thing. He wanted to go on his first ride with me and I was like, ‘What are you talking about?’ but he just goes, ‘I’ve just never been on one’ so I thought OK let’s go on the Ferris wheel. He was so scared… I was too, I’m not going to lie.
DAM: So what was the big decision then to go on the show [MKR]?
M: For Janelle it was her dream. She just watched the previous season and she always wanted to go on the show. For me, I just got a phone call from her asking if I would do it. I wasn’t sure but I knew how badly she wanted to do it so I wanted to do it for her.
J: The context for that is I originally applied with a friend but she could no longer continue with the application process. I spoke to someone from the network and told them that I still really wanted to do it and they said if I could find someone else to do it with then they’ll review the application. I told Monsey and I said this is my one chance, this is the first time I’ve ever applied, this is so weird that they even called me back so soon and I was so upset that I might not do it. He’s like, ‘Oh, I’ll do it’, and I’m like, ’No, it’s a very big commitment and why would you go on the show?’. I’m just thinking, he can’t really cook, he’s made me nice food and he enjoys barbecuing but I totally disregarded that at the time. I kept telling him no but he insisted, he’s like ‘This is what you want. I really want this for you.’ In the end I agreed and approached the network so they asked me to send us photos of Monsey. As soon as I did they loved him and asked if he could audition.
M: So, for the audition I cooked for them and as soon as they tasted the food they were like – ‘Wow’.
J: That’s not what happened! They said that they liked my personality and my food and they said he just looked nice.
DAM: Were you nervous to go on Monsey?
M: I’ve always watched the show here and there but I’ve never been on TV so I just took a leap of faith because I wanted to support Janelle. After I said yes and hung up I was like, ‘…What did I agree to?’
After I said yes and hung up I was like,
monzir
‘…What did I agree to?‘”
I was nervous because I had never been on TV. Also, the cooking that I usually did at home with my own cultural food was very different from cooking Aussie food and my knowledge for it wasn’t that great, I’d never done any fine dining either. In the end I just decided to do it and let Janelle take the lead.
DAM: I want to talk about like the first instant restaurant you guys did. Because you know, as a viewer everyone’s like, ‘Oh, that’s so easy! Like why do they always mess up?‘
J: There’s a lot of cameras on you at that moment and not just that, but if you say [for example] ‘I’m going to start putting the rice on’, they’ll stop you and start rolling the camera before you can do it. They don’t just chase you around and hope that they get it, this is TV, they’re spending a lot of money to get this footage.
M: The pressure was full on especially in the first instant restaurant because it’s like the first one you’re cooking and then you don’t know how it’s going to go and it’s the first time we’re working together like this. The cameras are on, there’s a lot of people behind the scenes and people are waiting for the food, all the stuff builds up.
J: The whole day as well is very long. You have to be up and kind of ready by 7:00 AM and you don’t stop filming until you’ve gotten the whole episode. You’ve gotta shop, you’ve gotta get ready, you’ve got to get your table ready, you’ve got to prep your food, you’ve got to do all that on the day. By the time we were finished, we were so tired and we hadn’t had much time to really grasp it. We also had the most terrible night sleep ever. We stayed in my auntie’s house because we used it for the instant restaurant so we’ve never really slept there before so I was pretty anxious the day before.
M: Janelle’s a perfectionist so she was sitting up all night, so I stayed up with her too just writing the checklist of what we’re going to do. We started filming from 7:00 AM until 3:00AM in the morning.
DAM: Oh wow, really?
M: Yeah, like everyone sees the episodes for an hour and thinks the filming takes place in that time but it actually takes about fourteen hours. The actual dinner itself can last up to fourteen hours.
J: For the instant restaurants, they film you doing your walk-ins, right? Each couple has to do a walk in and then come back and do a group one. Then you walk in, sit down and they’d film us admiring the food. We’ll be there sitting and waiting while we wait for the judges, then they filmed all the stuff that we did. OK, now it’s time for Entree. Put it down, pick it up, put it down, pick up. Do this, do that. Oh, it’s a very intense filming thing.
DAM: How do you feel looking back on it now?
J: I watched it the other day because the new season is here and I’m like, OK, let me just re-watch mine. I just want to see if it’s, you know, different. I’m watching it. And then the eggplant part comes up and I still cringe and my mum’s, like ’You won the competition, you don’t have to worry about it.’ And I was like, no, I do.
DAM: Were there any particular challenges that stood out to you when filming the show?
J: I found it a bit challenging to be Ethnic on a show like this because the way that we cook food and prepare food is different at home.
“I found it a bit challenging to be Ethnic on a show like this because the way that we cook and prepare food is different at home.”
janelle
Like for the eggplant, this is an everyday dish, it’s not a special dish. The way we cook this at home is without charcoal because who’s got time to do that? The way we eat this is the way that I prepared it in the oven, but the way the people on the show described it was that we needed to take these steps or use another method. [But] I’m thinking that’s not how we make it at home. So I think when it comes to Ethnic food, like the way that we eat and prepare it, there probably needs to be a little bit more knowledge in that sense.
M: Yeah, that’s where the knowledge of food comes in. We need to educate viewers about Ethnic food because there are a lot of similar foods around the world that are prepared differently in different cultures. You take Sudanese and Turkish food which is influenced by each other but at the same time it’s different and eaten in a different way.
J: I’m actually from Cyprus and I mentioned that a couple of times, so we do it differently there because obviously we also have access to different vegetables there. We have different things that grow and our vegetables taste different. Over there it is different to here. Here you probably need the fire for certain things, but over there some things are sweeter so it’s not going to need that kind of cooking, which is why my grandma doesn’t cook it that way. When you go into a cooking competition, they don’t judge you based on that, they judge you based on what they’re eating now and it’s not actually based on technique, I feel it’s also just based on taste buds – do they like it or not?
DAM: So did you feel that moving through the competition, you had to alter things to sort of fit that?
J: Yeah, we did. I kind of understood after that eggplant like, oh okay – you don’t actually want our food, you want our food that you get in a restaurant, you know? We still made beautiful food that I was very proud of, but it needed to be finessed and jazzed up because if we didn’t then I don’t know if it would be received as well.
M: One thing I learned as well, people deal with their eyes before their mouths, like if you put black garnish over something and have a nice plate then people would want to eat it, but if you put it on a plate the way you do at home instead, then it’s completely different, it gets a bit ugly. When you try to show them your own way then you still get in trouble for it, you can’t win sometimes.
DAM: Speaking on that point, do you think there are misconceptions in Western culture when it comes to Ethnic food, for example – that the way we plate it at home ‘isn’t proper’, or the feeling of needing to change how you would normally make something in order to cater for someone else’s palate? What do you think needs to be done to keep the authenticity?
M: I think people need to learn more about the culture and if you’re going to go to someone else’s home and eat their food then you should at least research what you are eating. If you just jumped into it and then judged it and preferred it that way then it loses that cultural importance. In the end you have to have respect for other people’s cultures.
J: I think there’s not enough representation with food. For example, if you open up a food magazine, you see there’s heaps of recipes and they’re saying things like, ‘This is Greek but we’ve added this to it’, and it’s like, you’re watering it down, you’re making it more palatable for people. I understand it’s also about accessibility, but if you show someone authentically what that dish is meant to look or taste like, they won’t be so shocked or confused next time they have it.
“If you show someone authentically what that dish is meant to look or taste like, they won’t be so confused next time they have it.”
janelle
Presenting food in its natural form needs to be a little bit more highlighted instead of it always being, you know, food photography and all this stuff because then people have that idea of, ‘Oh, that’s not how I’ve had it or how I like it.‘
M: That’s what we tried to do on the show as well, we tried to stay authentic and I think that’s what helped us on the show.
“We tried to stay authentic and I think that’s what helped us on the show.”
monzir
We gave it to them raw, like for my okra recipe and Janelle’s baklava, we left it the way it was and explained that this is how it’s made. It’s good because the viewers watching at home are being educated on the authenticity of the dishes.
J: The Okra beef based dish – everyone was really concerned about and they kept saying to Monsey, ‘You really need to get that Curry on ’cause the meat’s not gonna break down’ but he didn’t want it to. They were like ‘But it’s going to be soft right?’ but that was their interpretation of it. For this dish, the meat is not meant to fall off the bone and be all like that, there still needs to have some integrity in the meat.
M: And that’s how it is because everything is soggy so you need some texture. You get food like that sometimes that adds the crunch so it can balance it out. With ours we also like the meat to be chewy because Okra is slimy, the bread is soggy so it needs a bit of that. So they were like ‘You gotta cook it now!’ I was chilling because I was making it my own way. I was blocking out the noise.
J: I’m thinking, yeah, but he’s made it so many times and it’s good, so I’m just going to leave it. So at that moment I learned to trust you right at the end.
DAM: With the show then, I know it’s a whirlwind experience. But what was your fondest memory from it?
M: When we were given the 10/10’s.
J: That was definitely a turning point, not just the show but our place in the competition. I was expecting to walk in there and get a lower score because we did it our way but then when they gave us all that positive feedback, I was shocked.
M: If you’re a viewer watching the show and you see me you would think, ‘Oh this guy’s very calm and quiet, like he’s very mysterious’ and maybe because of that some people misjudged me and didn’t believe that I could cook. I felt like the underdog but I was set out to prove all of them wrong.
J: He really did, I’ve never said this in an interview but I went on his phone one day just to look up something on YouTube and I found that he had all these saved search things in there, like ‘how to get medium rare’ and ‘different knife skills’, like he was researching and I’m like, ‘Oh my God, he’s doing work’.
M: Why were you going through my phone?
J: I was just going on YouTube! Anyways, here I am thinking I’m doing all this work and he’s just not taking it as serious but he was.
M: I was taking it very seriously. I’m not much of a talker but I walk the walk so I was just like, I don’t care what people say or what they think about me, I’m just going to do my thing. I just went out there with the mindset that I was going to smash it. That gave me a lot of self esteem and built up my confidence as well. After that, I felt like we belonged in this competition, if they wanted something from us then we could deliver. We also learned to trust each other more during the show which was a big step up for our relationship. It was huge.
“We also learned to trust each other more during the show which was a big step up for our relationship.”
monzir
J: My fondest memory has to be the semi-finals. I loved cooking every time but that was different. We had a perfect cook that day and we cooked so well together. No issues that day in the kitchen, no stress and we finished before the clock, which was amazing. I felt like it was my redemption because we cooked Turkish food before that and it didn’t go the way that I planned so I knew I had to bring it back. We had confidence but also we prepped so much for it, like we lost sleep the night before. In the end the hard work paid off. We also were saying to ourselves we don’t care if we don’t make it to the grand final. This is our last cook, I want it to be amazing.
M: We made it so far in the show which we didn’t expect but it only motivated us to work harder on our recipes. You see, some of the people who watch the TV show think that what the contestants do is easy and there’s not much behind it, that’s not true. Whatever days that we had free we would just continually practise like we didn’t relax. We didn’t go and relax at the hotels or go sightseeing. I would wake up early, go grocery shopping, and then she’ll be like staying up all night doing recipe development. After that we would spend the entire day cooking the recipe, it was a lot.
J: I cannot tell you how many times we ate our cook off dish, it was chicken, I don’t want to see chicken ever again. I think we ate that about 80 times during the practice. On the day we were confident about it because he had practised so much but still things didn’t go 100% to plan.
“On the day we were confident because we had practised so much but still things didn’t go 100% to plan.”
janelle
J: You have to remember we’ve never used these kitchens before, their ovens are just being turned on for the first time and if you know anything about cooking, your oven needs to burn through. You can’t just switch a brand new oven on and expect it to be perfect the first time, it needs to burn through a few times for it to really, like, get the heat distributed and everything like that so things go wrong. You’re also really stressed. You’ve got cameras in your face. You’re not cooking in your calm, nice environment. You’re there on camera, whatever you say, whatever you do, everyone’s yelling, everyone’s watching. And that cook off was so stressful because three teams were going home that day. Only one team is going through so you’ve got one opportunity only and that’s it.
DAM: What was the response like?
J: The biggest controversy of our season was that it was so short. We’ve seen online comments saying that in other seasons they cooked more and deserved it and that we didn’t. I feel like that’s a really stupid, ignorant comment because we worked really hard to be on the show. If anything we had less of a chance to even prove ourselves because it was so high pressure. I feel like that puts you in a head space of – this is do or die. And that’s very hard to be in, especially for the other teams that did get eliminated in the cook off. With all the comments online about it, we would really love a bit more compassion, not just for us but also the other teams got kicked out.
M: But there’s a lot of keyboard warriors out there [laughs].
DAM: [laughs] Yes there are!
M: There’s always going to be people out there talking. The best thing to do is to shut it out. Even after the show I don’t go on and look at the negative comments, it is what it is. The other thing is never judge a book by its cover, you need to see it for yourself.
J: Like our experience was definitely not what everyone thought. They saw a very small glimpse of the show. We had 16 episodes and everyone saw that version, unfortunately some people thought, ‘Yep. Well, I’ve determined they didn’t cook enough to deserve that win.’
M: I still have people I know thinking it was a fluke but we were there for three months filming, three months, working on it everyday.
DAM: Well, hearing your story and what went on behind the scenes, it’s clear that this was a well deserved win for you both. I‘m sure this all brought you both closer together right?
J: Yeah, closer than I would have liked.
DAM: [laughs]
J: We are very close now. Yeah, we’re extremely close, you know, joined at the hip. We’ve actually built a very strong foundation because we were friends before we dated as well, for about a year and a bit. We were actually just friends. And then after we started dating and then this came along and I think it cemented the relationship and I’ve always said to Monsey, complete transparency, you don’t have to be with me because of MKR – and that’s a big thing. I don’t want anyone to ever feel pressured. And he’s the same. He’s like, no, we don’t have to stay together just because we did a cooking competition or a show, but we chose to because we actually, we actually like each other. We’re actually like best friends and we’re so close and we still enjoy cooking together so yeah, it’s actually a true story, we actually do cook together.
M: Sometimes.
DAM: What’s what’s next for you both?
M: As individuals we have different goals but we also have goals together. We want to build something for ourselves and get a house.
J: We live kind of house to house. He’s got his own place with his brother and I live with my grandparents and my mom. Everyone was like, what do you do with the money can you buy a house? I was like, I might need to win a few more MKR’s before that one. But you know, like we’ve got individual goals career wise, I feel like it’s always kind of aligned, but also very different. Monsey has different interests when it comes to food, I have different interests when it comes to food. I love baking and cake decorating and I love my cultural food as well, whereas he loves barbecues and meats in marinades and sauces and chilli and things like that. I’m also starting, in the very baby steps of writing my baking book. Monsey is going to help me, aren’t you?
M: Of course! Also for me I’ve just packaged my product which is a spice mix so if Woolies is listening to this, then they’ll take it. So Janelle and I started making an ebook and we used my dad’s secret spices to create a spice mix with a bit of a touch to it. We finessed it, created it and then got it packaged to put on our E-store, so now you can buy it online. We’ve been hoping to get it in stores maybe this year, or next year hopefully, so that would be one of our businesses. I’m also chasing other career goals as well like I wanted to get into modelling and fitness so that’s another thing. Studying too.
J: We dabble in a few things, I’m actually a provisional Psychologist, so I do that part time, I’m still studying and I’m still trying to finish that off. I’m very different when it comes to that job, when I’m at that job I feel like I’m in my zen zone. I’m very just toned down quite a lot but yeah, there’s a lot of things that we need to do and accomplish because we’re still quite young.
M: We have different stuff behind the scenes, like not just cooking, not just MKR. We have day jobs and we have our own passion.
J: Everyone asks us, ‘After the show did you guys quit your jobs?’. I’m like, No? For what?
M: Like I still gotta pay my bills!
J: The goal is I want the whole thing. Like I want the book. I want to do a show. I would love that. I would love that opportunity because I loved being on TV. But that takes time and it takes work and you gotta build that, it doesn’t come to you just because you’re a winner. That is a privilege, and it’s something that we were very lucky to have, but it doesn’t come too easily and I don’t want it to come easily. I don’t want it to be something someone hands to me and goes, ‘Here go, you just deserve it’. I don’t feel like I do right now. I feel like eventually I will. But for right now I want to work my way there so that when it does happen for me, I feel like I really earned that.
“I don’t want it to be something someone hands me and goes, ‘Here, go, you deserve it’. I dont feel like I do right now. Eventually I will, but for now I want to work my way there so when it does happen, I feel like I really earned it.”
janelle
DAM: After learning what you have through these experiences, what words of advice would you give to others?
J: I watched this movie today and it was essentially about this girl. She was very smart but she didn’t follow her dreams of baking. Yet she kept shying away from it, not doing it. In the end, she follows through and comes through for it, and she follows her dream of baking. For me this resonates a lot, because I was full time with my cakes before and then I stopped because of COVID and I went back to psych now. I love psych but my passion is cooking and baking and I think a lot of the time in this life and in this economy, we take life very seriously and we tend to think that our dreams and things as ‘silly’. For me, and especially being in an Ethnic household, those kinds of dreams are silly in that sense. A lot of households are like, no, you gotta be serious about money in houses and buying things like, ‘Being a Baker? What the hell are you going to do? Do something like being a psychologist or doctor or, you know, a lawyer. Something like that is worth doing’, but your own dreams aren’t important? What people don’t understand is when you’re happy, your life is happy and it doesn’t matter what you’re doing. I would say specifically to Ethnic girls as well, please follow your dreams because it will take you places and I feel like you’ll grow as a person.
“I would say specifically to Ethnic girls as well, please follow your dreams because it will take you places and you’ll grow as a person.”
janelle
J: Don’t just do what everyone wants you to do because they expect it of you, just do what you want. Also be with who you want too, that’s really important. What we did was a little bit scandalous in the beginning but if your family is loving and supportive, they will come through for you in the end. And if they don’t, then, you need to be happy first.
M: Don’t let anyone determine your future, you gotta do what you gotta do. Just be yourself and fight really hard because if you make it, everyone else around you is making it too.
“Just be yourself and fight really hard because if you make it, everyone else around you is making it too.”
monzir
Also do it for your family and do it for you. Follow your dream, be who you are, be strong and don’t let all this other stuff stop you. The world’s cruel, but you gotta take it as it comes.
J: Ooh, you should get that on a T-shirt! [laughs]
DAM: [laughs] Yes! The whole thing.
J: The whole quote! [laughs]
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Find more on Janelle & Monzir here:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/monzirandjanellemkr/
Website: https://monzelle.com.au/
Shop their secret spice mix ‘Agashe’: https://monzelle.com.au/collections/all
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Photos by NOAH Creative
Published by Sangeetha Gowda & Marshall-Weishuai Yuan
Diversity Australia Magazine 