MasterChef judge Melissa Leong to embrace change after split from Joe Jones

MasterChef’s Melissa Leong has revealed her new mantra for life after stepping back into the spotlight following her marriage split.

Melissa Leong at the L'Oreal Professionnel Colour Trophy Awards. Picture: Josie Hayden

Stunning, strong and newly-single, Melissa Leong says her next steps in life will revolve around gratitude, connection, power and change.

Leong, the popular MasterChef judge, hosted the L’Oreal Professionnel Colour Trophy Awards in Melbourne on Monday, marking a return to the spotlight since announcing her split from husband Joe Jones.

Melissa Leong at the Professionnel Colour Trophy Awards. Picture: Josie Hayden

Leong with Joe Jones. Picture: Christian Gilles

Leong said her mantra for 2021 will be “gratitude, connection, power and change”, adding; ‘I think they’re very apt. Those words, I definitely consider are at the heart of what’s going on in my life.”

Leong said her style choices in the spotlight reflects her desire to be “bold and strong and confident.”

Leong and Jones were married for four years.

She announced the split on social media in December, saying: “It has brought us such happiness to walk together, but the time has come for Joe and I to part ways and walk on, apart.”

Asked if she’s ever had a bad hair day, Leong said she had a dreaded bowl haircut as a child. “If you have that hairstyle, nothing can possibly hurt you,’ she said, laughing. “I’m strong

and resilient from those bad hair days.”

But she is still haunted by a random snip while being cared for by her grandmother.

“She was babysitting me, and it was a really hot day, and I’d grown enough hair to have two tiny little pig tails, and my grandmother cut them off because she thought I was too hot.

“I was 18-months-old!”