Yes, I confess to watching both the Masterchef Finale and the Gillard/Abbott debate Sunday night a week ago. If I hadn’t I would have gone to bed feeling like a complete ignoramus with nothing to discuss with colleagues and clients the next day. Masterchef is truly an undeniable phenomenon and it has inspired one of my four children to share the load in the kitchen. Eventually she will realise that a small heavy based pan of perfectly caramelised pecans probably won’t feed a family of six plus her boyfriend and older brother’s girlfriend. 

I only have two misgivings about Masterchef. One is the poor modelling of healthy eating exhibited by Matt’s growing number of chins throughout the series and two, that every other woman at our table at a function last night said they now felt socially anxious when inviting guests for dinner parties lest they not measure up culinarily.

I have decided one of the great ironies of life is that by the time we have really learnt to accept ourselves with all our jiggly bits, we really will be old, wrinkly and jiggly.

By the time we truly appreciate the extraordinary human beings we have raised when we’re constantly told the Y’s are selfish, demanding and fragile, they will have long since moved out.

And by the time I live up to the lofty standards created by the Masterchef magicians, I will have become thoroughly sick of cooking!

Let’s give ourselves permission to be us … only better!