How Depinder Chhibber Is Using MasterChef Australia To Shift Stereotypes Around Indian Foods

Refinery29

4 days ago

Depinder Chhibber is having a dream run on MasterChef Australia 2025, with a bunch of wins under her belt and one of the most talked about dishes so far: her traditional Indian street food dish, Raj Kachori. In the West, there can be a stigma rooted in racism surrounding South Asian food, where the cuisine is associated with words like 'cheap' and 'simple'. Compare that to French or Italian cuisine, often considered 'elevated' and 'expensive'. This type of thinking is a 'sore spot' for Chhibber, because not only is her identity tied directly to Indian food, but she also tells Refinery29 Australia that people often don't understand how 'technical' traditional Indian recipes are.
'When I make Indian food, I know how much technicality is involved in the recipes that I'm using, which is probably the same, if not more than a French recipe, I would say,' she explains. '[I've] always said that we need to respect the local artisans, the local street food vendors, because they've been doing this for generations… when I go to Delhi, I go to the ones that have been there for like, over 100 years.
These local artisans have had recipes passed down for generations and have spent years perfecting their skills. "The way they do it, they just make it look so easy. But you try and do that at home, and it's impossible to get right,' she adds.
With Chhibber's Raj Kachori dish, she specifically created the street food version rather than a fancy deconstructed version, because she wanted it to be authentic. Part of her mission on MasterChef Australia is to educate Aussies about Indian food, because she believes these racist stereotypes can sometimes come down to 'lack of awareness'.
'I feel like it's my job to make everyone aware of the dishes that I know and do the best in the best possible way, if that makes sense. Because I want to go out there, and I want to create these dishes, and I want to show these dishes to the judges, to the world,' she says.
'
'It's not about the price that you pay. It's about what you get, and it's about flavour, and it's about the experience.'
'
When Chhibber moved to Newcastle as an 11-year-old, she was impacted by the absence of Indian street food. There was one takeout restaurant that everybody would go to… and that was it. 'That kind of got me really interested in food, especially learning techniques and recipes that normally you wouldn't need to when you were living in India, because you could just go down the street [and buy it],' she recalls. 'I think that [food] became like an identity, kind of like a mission for me to master those and showcase those, which is what I'm aiming to do this season.'
The first time Chhibber competed on MasterChef Australia, she didn't expect to have such a reaction from other Indian Australians watching the show. This time around, she's all too aware. 'When I came onto MasterChef [the first time], I was cooking Indian food without realising how much it meant to other people in the community. I honestly didn't realise the importance of that emotion, because I had never felt that before,' she says.
'
'This time around, when I'm making dishes… if I'm tearing up, I know people will be tearing up with me, because they can all feel the same emotion.'
'
Her mission to bring Indian food to Australia won't stop at MasterChef Australia, whether she wins or not, because she has big plans for after the show. She's already opened her own supper club called Ghar in Newcastle, and her next step is to publish a cookbook. 'I would love to put all my recipes together, all of the things that I've learned over the last how many years I've been cooking, and I'd love to put them into a cookbook for local people that are intimidated by Indian food,' she says. 'Indian food can be quite intimidating with its flavours, with its spices, the number of ingredients. But you know what? There is an easy way to do everything.
'I think everyone can learn a little bit of spice work. And I think living in Australia, how multicultural we are, I think it's really important to kind of be across a lot of different cuisines if you're a foodie, especially if you like to call yourself a foodie.'