Serving up the perfect dish is like watching a great rock band play. For the performance to be a crowd pleaser, all elements of the dish must work together. That Aaron has spent most of his career as a band manager bodes well for this cook, who wants to be Australia’s next MasterChef.

“If my favourite dish, three cheese tortellini, was a rock band, then the singer would be the white truffle ricotta tortellini filling because it satisfies the senses, the gorgonzola and pecorino sauce would be on drums as it’s the meal’s engine room, and the pasta would be on guitar,” he laughs.

While Aaron’s first love is music, he’s now ready for a career sea change.

“My stepfather had a heart attack and a quadruple bypass last year,” he says. “We have always been close – cooking brought us together and we can talk for hours on the phone about food – and he basically said to me that if I’m not happy with what I’m doing, then do the things that you want to do now while you have the time before you have regrets later in life.”

Aaron’s love of cooking began as a teenager living in Queensland with his mum and stepfather. “In my teens I got into cooking and realised it was quite unusual among my friends,” says Aaron, who gained the nickname ‘Gloria’ at school because of his long hair and extra-curricular activities such as classical ballet and equestrian sports. “At school, the boys did woodwork and metalwork while the girls did home economics. It wasn’t until I was a bit older, and single, that I figured it was a great way to meet women if I could cook.”

Knowing his way around a kitchen has helped him find the love of his life and he recently popped the question to his partner of 11 years, Natalie.

“Natalie is totally supportive of me coming onto MasterChef,” says Aaron, who dreams of opening a restaurant specialising in pasta and produce a line of high end pasta sauces. “We’ve had to make some big sacrifices. We were meant to be getting married in February, but we’ve postponed the wedding until October after filming finishes.”

Luckily for Aaron, his fiancée appreciates his love of food.

“We have a nice ritual in our house where we plan a menu together, go shopping on Sundays, and then cook for hours,” says Aaron. “We really fell in love with the act of cooking together.”