Maja Veit became the fifth contestant eliminated from the MasterChef Australia kitchen this week, after a rather intense pressure test elimination.
WATCH BELOW: MasterChef’s Maja Veit reveals what she wished she cooked on the show
After failing to impress the judges, Melissa Leong, Andy Allen and Jock Zonfrillo, with her take on a sweet-tart, it was the “little things” that ultimately lead to her being sent home.
“It was a really tough challenge and I think it just came down to like a few slight errors that I’d made,” Maja told New Idea.
On the flip side, Maja reveals her time on the show taught her a lot about her herself, including how “resilient” she is.
“I do have a certain amount of resilience and I think I showed that through maybe like one or two of my cooks where I really pushed myself and got to the end and I got something up that I was really proud of,” she said.

One of the other things she took with her from the show is the connections and friendships she formed with the other contestants.
“Everyone is so amazing and so supportive and so lovely and it’s such a genuine connection that you build,” she said.
“It becomes almost hard to compete against people as well because you know they’re your really good mates and you spend every single day with them for like a long, long time,” she explained.
“It’s really heartbreaking knowing that one of your really close contestants/friends who you cooked with so recently will be going home, and unfortunately that person was me.”

Watching it all back, Maja added that while she believes the show to be “well portrayed” so far, there are a certain things and situations that happened which didn’t make it to air.
“Sometimes there’s maybe an extra emotional thing that happened or someone’s really struggling or it didn’t work out quite as seamless as what they made it look on TV,” she said.
“No one just goes to the pantry, selects their ingredients and has a really smooth cook it just doesn’t happen,” she added.

And while her time in the MasterChef kitchen was cut short, Maja said that being a part of the show gave room for “personal growth”, and to also prove to not only the judges, but also to herself that she “really can cook”.
“I really just wanted to prove to myself that I’m worthy to wear a white apron, and also to just give it my best shot and see if I can win this.
“I mean sadly I’ve been eliminated and that’s just how it works… obviously I was hoping to make it a lot further, I was hoping to make it till the end,” she said.