When Sharnee’s old school friends used to visit her at her family home, instead of playing on the computer, she would get them all in the kitchen amongst the pots and pans.

“When I was in high school I was cooking all the time,” says Sharnee, who is in her final year of a law degree. “When friends came over, instead of sitting around playing computer games, we’d cook in the kitchen. It took me a while to realise that that wasn’t a normal thing to do because my friends would be like, ‘why do you want to cook?’ I just thought that’s what everyone did.”

Sharnee has always loved to cook, inheriting her mum’s passion. She is mainly self taught but regularly asks her mum for advice, and fondly remembers her early teens spent waitressing and helping out in a Mediterranean restaurant her mum part-owned on the Sunshine Coast.

In Sharnee’s house, it was a case of tough cooking love when a dish just didn’t work. “It used to be that if I cooked something and screwed up, I had to eat the whole thing - so that made me improve my cooking skills quickly,” she laughs, admitting that cooking for her parents and younger brother is more intimidating than cooking for the MasterChef Australia judges. “My parents were really against wasting food so if I made anything really bad, I paid for it!”

Sharnee applied for MasterChef Australia after becoming disillusioned with studying law.

“I’m feeling a bit lost and I’m hoping that being on MasterChef will give me a better idea of what direction to go,” explains Sharnee, who describes her cooking style as eclectic, and often with seafood, but enjoys cooking desserts and cakes. “I do enjoy law but I love food.”

Being a budget conscious student has allowed Sharnee to experiment with food.

“As I’m cooking on a small budget, I look at what I have in the cupboard and try to turn it into a meal you’d see in a restaurant,” she says. “I could never do two minute noodles or baked beans! I’d rather buy nice food and ingredients than spend all my money on drinks during nights out.”

She is hopeful that she can eventually realise her school girl dream of opening a café.

“It’s been a long term dream since I was 12 to open a café when I’m older,” says Sharnee, who names Shannon Bennett from Melbourne’s Vue de Monde restaurant as her favourite chef. “In maths class I used to write sample menus in the back of my book instead of listening to the teacher. It’s been an absolute passion for me.”