As MasterChef Australia 2016 fires up, the contestants are out to prove they can stand the heat before they’re booted from the kitchen.

For the first official cooking challenge of 2016, the top 24 were greet by last year’s winner and delicious. contributor, Billie McKay.

So what did we see from the former contestant tonight? A diabolically hard challenge as a baptism of fire (we’re looking at you, Shannon Bennett’s chocolate peanut bar), or a softer, ease-you-in type situation?

McKay went for the latter, with a mystery box full of her favourite ingredients that just happen to work beautifully together, across sweet and savory recipes. The box included a whole duck (a nod to Heston Blumenthal’s The Fat Duck, where she currently works), beetroot, fennel, sago, as well as a few fun items including cornflakes, black tea and ginger wine.

Oh, and the contestants have a whooping 75 minutes (in previous seasons contestants had 20, 30 or 60 minutes) to create a dish, plus a pantry of staples such as flour, cream, vinegar, sugar and milk.

Tonight we lost count of the number of pan-seared duck breasts with roasted beetroot and fennel that were plated up, but some of the contestants created some seriously nice offerings to the MasterChef judges.

Trent, the farm boy turned electrician, made his own ricotta for a delicate pickled fennel salad to go with the duck.

Waitress Karmen made a pink beetroot tuille for her milk tea creme brulee, paired with ginger sorbet.

As well as making their own cheese and pastries from scratch, the contestants tea-smoked, confited and made broth from the poultry, hand-pulled noodles, set perfect panna cottas, and even stuffed a mushroom with duck-fat crisped cornflakes (the judges verdict? delicious).

Nidhi’s tea parfait with cornflake crumble and sago pudding was another winner. Her food looks great, and her commentary is even better.

When she arrived in the MasterChef kitchen for the first time:

“Being in the top 25 is like being on top of the world , I’m blessed, baby!”

When she found out Billie was in the house:

“I was so excited, I was like, OMG! Billie is here!”

And when she meet Billie:

“I was watching you the other night, you’re so adorable,  I can’t tell you how much I like you.”… before breaking to try and compare childhoods, mid-challenge.

When she found herself questioning her dish:

“I’m taking my food to the judges and I’m feeling a bit nervous, but my heart was saying, don’t worry girl, your flavours are good.”

Girl, they totally were.

#NidhiforMasterChef2016 #teamNidhi