South Africa's youngest Masterchef winner

DW (English)

At only 20 years old, Bridget Mangwandi is the youngest, and the first, black woman to win the South African MasterChef competition. Let's find out what this 1 million rand woman is all about!

Transcript

00:00How did this young culinary star win over hearts and big bucks with a dish

00:04inspired by her mother, becoming South Africa's first black female MasterChef winner?

00:10One person to win the cash prize of 1 million rand and the title of

00:18MasterChef South Africa Season 5. And that person is...

00:25Meet 20-year-old Bridget Mwangwandi, who is 1 million rands or about 50,000 euros richer,

00:33after cooking her heart out on television and winning one of South Africa's most popular

00:37cooking competitions. The interest in food and cooking came from me, well first of all,

00:49starting to wanting to help at home. My mom working a lot and me having to put things together,

00:56making food after school and then from that I was taking a lot of my lunch boxes to school and

01:00everybody knew I had the best lunch. From watching kids cooking shows and experimenting with recipes

01:05in the kitchen, to wanting to help her single mom who was working two jobs at the time,

01:09she began cooking meals for herself and her sister. I remember I actually have it on my

01:15Facebook page, this picture she did that she made a quiche, but it was just a simple quiche,

01:21I mean spinach quiche, nothing fancy, but she made the pastry from scratch. How, which, what,

01:29I don't know, but it was really flaky, very nice and I was so proud. I remember like proud mom moments

01:35and little did I know that this would actually grow to be something bigger as we see it today.

01:42Before we get to the recipe that led to Bridget becoming the youngest contestant and first black

01:46woman to win MasterChef South Africa, let's explore how she came to compete for one of

01:51reality television's most coveted titles in the first place.

01:56When it comes to food, it's definitely come across in so many areas of my life. I mean I study it,

02:01I decided to enter MasterChef, before that I was catering and it's just been something I've really

02:06enjoyed and had a passion for. I just started growing more in that, cooking more and experimenting

02:12a lot more and that experimenting actually led me to food science, which is what I decided I

02:16wanted to study around grade 10, started doing my catering around grade 11, 12 and went to varsity

02:22two years later. So upon entering MasterChef, that was also just me trying to challenge myself and

02:26see what I can do outside of the already food-related ventures or opportunities I already do.

02:36For me, top five was literally like, okay we've won. And for her to literally be the MasterChef,

02:42I'm actually getting goosebumps. There's no words that I can use to describe it.

02:51As her biggest supporter, Bridget's mother inspired the winning recipe.

02:55But what else helped her win this popular international show for amateur cooks?

03:00Having studied consumer sciences in food and nutrition, it was definitely something that

03:04was a strength of mine because I knew that with consumer science, you get recipes that

03:09demonstrate how food science works. So it's not exactly cooking, but you're demonstrating how

03:13certain processes work. So knowing those processes helped me know what things go well together,

03:18especially when you had a mystery box and had ingredients that were probably unrelated with

03:23each other. And there was even a food science episode where I got to demonstrate a lot of

03:26the gastronomy that I already knew and experimented at home and at school with.

03:31A champion's journey is never without its challenges.

03:34What difficulties did she have to overcome in the kitchen?

03:39I was chopping mushrooms and I partially severed my thumb and then I had to go to

03:44have it stitched together and all of that. So that was a bit nasty. And then the next morning,

03:49the next challenge was, so it had to happen and you have to pick yourself up from it. Did I cry?

03:54Yes, after in my privacy. But it was definitely a key moment of the MasterChef challenge that I was

04:01like, OK, this is now getting intense. I need to be ready no matter what, because the next challenge,

04:05then I was at the bottom and that was even more tough. That is where I really felt it.

04:09But as I said before, you have to pick yourself up and push forward.

04:14Bridget's winning dish was a delicious apricot king-clipped fish.

04:18My final winning dish was an apricot king-clipped derived from an apricot chicken, which I learned

04:23from my mum. And that's something that was sentimental, especially after being on

04:27set for so long and going through all these rigorous challenges. I wanted it to be very

04:30sentimental and meaningful to me. At least I tried, you know. So that's definitely what I

04:35had in mind. And I had always kept that recipe for the last moment where I could possibly use it.

04:40So I'm glad I got to even use that recipe because it's from a humble dish. But elevating it was

04:46definitely the goal and the key part of making it a success in MasterChef.

04:51And what does the future hold for Bridget? Well,

04:54she would love to work in food product development and dreams of having her own cooking show.

05:01Winning a million rand was amazing. I'm really happy I got to win it.

05:05And I'm glad that I've got something to show for this entire competition.

05:09And apart from the million rand, I know there's a lot more

05:11opportunities and adventures I'm going to take, especially

05:14travelling-wise, culinary-wise. There's so much I want to do in terms of that.

05:19Bridget may have had a natural talent for cooking, but it's her hard work that carried

05:23her to the top. At just 20 years old, she's proven that even in the face of fierce competition,

05:29dreams are attainable with passion and perseverance.

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