MasterChef Australia's Khanh Ong on three recipes to heal a broken heart | Australian food and drink (2024)

Food is the love of my life, and that love began in childhood. My parents came to Australia in the early 1990s after spending four years in an immigration camp in Indonesia where I was born. I grew up in a very Vietnamese household in an even more Vietnamese area in south-east Melbourne. Surrounded by beautiful food and produce, I found myself cooking with my mum and learning all about flavour.

In my late teens I lost my dad to cancer and my mum had less time to cook, so I kinda took over those duties. I’ve gone through a few career changes, from fashion to design to music, but the constant has always been food. Food is my happy place, it reminds me of all the good times. I cook banh xeo or pho bo and think of Dad, or I eat prawns and pork belly and remember after -school meals with my sister. I love how food is able to transport you to a time, place or feeling.

I wrote this because I wanted to remind you how important food is in keeping a healthy balance, how it brings your friends and family together and how it helps you connect with others.

The following dishes are designed to make you feel good after a breakup. I’ve got you covered for whatever point of the emotional rollercoaster you are on. Sometimes that rollercoaster speeds up and then slows down a few dozen times a day, but let’s leave my mental breakdowns for another time.

Cooking for one

Because I’m just out of a four-year relationship.

• Make sure you have staples in your pantry such as canned beans, pasta and grains. Your fridge should have eggs, fats and, for me, protein. Then at the market, get seasonal veg and herbs, ready for your week. But remember to look at your week. If you’re out three days, what’s the point of buying 3kg of greens?

• Remember to love your freezer, too. Obviously sometimes you can’t cook for one but what you can do is freeze things you’ve made for an easy meal later in the week. Just don’t forget the meals or ingredients and leave them in your freezer.

• Another thing: you know how you’re always like, “I need to eat healthy”? Well, you tend to eat what is on hand. So stock your fridge and pantry with healthy foods and cook knowing you’ll snack on these items.

• Lastly, leftover veg is my favourite end-of-the-week meal. It’s like, chop that sh*t up, throw it on a baking tray and pop it in the oven with garlic, onion and hearty herbs for yum roast veg. Or brown off some onions and sauté any root veg and celery (there’s always celery) in a pot with oil. Add stock to deglaze and throw in your remaining leftover veg. Cook till tender, blitz it up and you have a soup for lunch for the next four days.

Naughty crispy potatoes

Potatoes are the overachiever of vegetables – bringing us potato chips, fries, baked spuds, mash and even vodka. Who doesn’t love a potato? So versatile and delicious in all its forms, I feel like the other vegetables aren’t even trying. This recipe is for the yummiest, hug-like baked potato, topped with all the trimmings – smoky bacon, salty parmesan, tangy sour cream and obviously chives because ... greens. Make this recipe to accompany a roast, steak or even as a stand-alone dish.

Serves 4

Preheat the oven to 190C.

Place the potatoes in a saucepan of heavily salted water (it’s important to pop them into cold water, as it helps with not overcooking the outside of the potato). Bring to the boil over high heat and cook for 15 to 20 minutes or until they’re easily pierced with a fork.

About five minutes before the potatoes are done, cook the bacon in a frying pan over medium–high heat for three to five minutes until crispy. Throw the bacon over the potatoes along with the parmesan and bake for another five minutes until the parmesan is melted and golden.

Dollop sour cream in all the gaps and crevices between the spuds, top with the chives, then eat it up and moan about being in a food coma.

Fun fact: once I forgot about my potatoes and left them in the oven for about half an hour more than I was supposed to, and they turned out extra crispy. They were a little dry, but even a bad baked potato is good.

Bang bang Sichuan chicken

I have no idea why but when people think of bang bang chicken they seem to think of a fried dish. But I know it as chicken that is very gently poached and then pounded to get out all your frustrations. This dish was an instant favourite after my breakup a few years back. I was angry and I wanted to smash and scream and just be an absolute handful. Anyway, back to the food. The freshness and crunch from the cucumber perfectly balances out the hot, salty, numbing umami flavour of the Sichuan sauce. Don’t worry, it’s hot but not “I can’t taste anything” hot.

Serves 2

Place the ginger, spring onion whites, onion and 500ml of water in a saucepan and bring to the boil over high heat. Add the chicken breasts and bring back to the boil, then cover and turn to the lowest heat to poach gently for 11 to 14 minutes until the chicken is cooked. To test, pierce the chicken with a skewer – the juices should run clear. Plunge the chicken into an ice bath to stop it cooking and set the poaching liquid aside.

To make the Sichuan sauce, combine the ingredients in a bowl with the spring onion greens and 125ml of the poaching liquid and set aside.

Shred the chicken (but not too finely) and pound (bang bang!) with a rolling pin to make flat thin pieces. Arrange the cucumber on two serving plates, then top with the chicken. Pour over the sauce and serve.

Spaghetti for one

Serves 1 (with leftovers for lunch)

1 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1 small onion, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, crushed
250g beef mince
2 tbsp tomato paste
1 tbsp dried oregano
400ml passata
100ml of your favourite red wine, (one that you’ll also be drinking, obvs)
Handful of basil leaves, plus extra to serve (optional)
Sea salt
Freshly ground black pepper
150g dried spaghetti
As much grated parmesan as you want

Start by popping the oil into a large deep saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring, for three minutes or until softened and semi translucent. Add the garlic and cook for 30 seconds.

Throw the beef mince into the pan and cook, stirring, for five to six minutes until the beef is browned and no longer pink. Next goes the tomato paste and oregano – mix well, then add the passata and red wine (and pour yourself a glass to sip while you cook).

•This is an edited extract from A Gay Guy’s Guide to Life, Love, Food by Khanh Ong, published by Plum, RRP $34.99, photography by Lauren Bamford