A self-confessed independent woman, Kate has always challenged herself, be it with work or travel. She sees the MasterChef Australia journey as an opportunity to explore her Sri Lankan heritage and give her a sense of belonging that she's been lacking.

"I always travel on my own, and started with a trip to Argentina on an exchange programme when I was 17," she says. "It was both the best and worst year of my life but it really influenced my cooking. I've travelled through Brazil, Mexico, worked in New York and Canada, and also lived in Italy. I immersed myself in the culture there and learnt to live a rustic lifestyle in regards to food.

"I've had heaps of different jobs in my life, and I'm not a very settled person. I'm a very independent young person. I'm half Sri Lankan and half Australian and I really hope to capture more of my background with MasterChef."

Kate learned to cook watching her mum, and over time she became the primary cook in her household. "I used to love to make up menus for the family for dinner and put them on the table with flowers,” she says. “I was the one in charge after school, and because I stayed at home during university, I continued this as I grew up."

Now a secondary school teacher in Melbourne, Kate loves to teach but has felt that in the past few years her passion has waned. After suffering a major health scare at the end of last year through a deep vein thrombosis blood clot, it was the push Kate needed to follow her dream.

"I tore a ligament playing netball and had my foot in a moonboot to recover,” explains Kate. “Within two weeks a deep vein thrombosis had developed and I was rushed to the emergency room. I spent over a month in a wheelchair while I was working as a teacher and was on crutches for about six months until I was able to walk on my ankle again. The students and staff were great because they would wheel me around the school.”

Getting into the Top 24 has been a huge achievement for Kate but she explains that she can be her own worst critic.

"My biggest weakness is that I think too much, and put myself down, I make myself sick with it,” she says. “I think it comes from being overweight in my teens and twenties. I've achieved so much, and I need to remember that. The judges have said that my determination and passion put me through.

"I want to make my dad proud. He doesn't say much, but he wrote me a card when I got through to the Top 24 and that meant a lot to me. He's a boxer and doesn't have a son so I want to make him proud of me."