My Kitchen Rules descended into chaos on Tuesday with pescatarian Zoe’s arrival.
Best friends Zoe and Zac, from NSW, entered as a gatecrasher team, but Zoe’s dietary requirements sparked outrage.
The “OG” teams, particularly Angus and Simon, questioned why she had signed up for the show if she doesn’t eat meat.
Now, Zoe tells New Idea she was floored by the criticism, particularly considering vegetarian Jacinta competed on MKR last year.
“It was pretty brutal, honestly. I think Zac and I were just put in the hot seat as soon as we rocked up,” she admits.
“Obviously, on TV it goes for an hour, but [it was] 14 hours of being scrutinised, [that] was pretty brutal.”
While Zoe understood their concerns over her not being able to eat certain dishes, she felt like she was an “easy target” for the OG teams.
“I think people saw me or us as a point of difference at the table as a weakness,” she insists.
“It seemed like all the teams just hated the gatecrashers and just did not want us there. It wasn’t a very warm welcome, I would say.”
Zoe’s dietary requirements were revealed for the first time on camera but she doesn’t reckon things would have been better if the teams had known in advance.
“I don’t think any way that I approached it, we would have come out on top,” she says.
“I think it was inevitable for them to throw their big opinions at us. If they truly thought it was unfair, why go at me? Why not go at production instead?”
Her teammate, Zac, argues that they jumped through “all the same hoops” as their rivals during casting, so any criticism should have been irrelevant.
“How can you sit there and completely invalidate our position? Like it really didn’t make sense,” he adds.
Their fellow gatecrashers, Ted and Sheridan, only found out about Zoe’s dietary restrictions midway through cooking, which did put a spanner in the works.
“It probably did throw us a bit,” Sheridan admits. “I remember being a little bit concerned about what on earth she was going to have been able to eat, which was basically nothing.
“When you put food down in front of people, you’re really keen to see everyone eat it. When we found out that Zoe’s pescatarian, that made it clear why she hadn’t touched our food.”
Once they found out, they were more than happy to cater for her needs.
“We did our best to try and cater to her dietary needs,” Ted adds, while Sheridan jokes she was just thankful Zoe didn’t “hate” their food.
And Zoe and Zac were thankful of their support.
“We definitely bonded with Sheridan and Ted as soon as we met them,” Zoe insists.
“They didn’t have any qualms about me being a pescatarian, and they seemed like they always had our back.”
For Zoe and Zac, they didn’t sign up for MKR for the drama; they simply wanted to show what you can do in the kitchen within dietary parameters.
But while they’ll serve a pescatarian-friendly menu at their Instant Restaurant, they haven’t got a blanket ban on cooking meat at Kitchen HQ (though Zoe won’t be sampling any).
“We expected there to be challenges where we might have to cook meat,” Zoe explains.
“We knew that was something that could happen when you got to HQ. But ideally, we didn’t want to have to.
“Zac obviously cooks meat all the time. We wanted to showcase what you can do in our margins.”
