Gary Mehigan’s tips for the reluctant chef

When former MasterChef judge Gary Mehigan felt a flutter in his chest, he ignored it until his heart rate spiked. Now, he’s on a mission to boost health in the kitchen.

Penny TimmsSENIOR HEALTH REPORTER

Celebrity chef Gary Mehigan is launching a new project, designed to get more people cooking healthy dishes at home. Picture: Jake Nowakowski

5 min read

5:00AMJuly 18, 2025

He’s a celebrity chef who understands not everyone may be as keen to light up the stove as he is – although Gary Mehigan thinks those people are missing out and he hopes they have a change of heart.

He even has some tips to get you started on your home-chef journey.

“I think the best advice always is, it’s incremental. It’s small steps that make a big difference,” he says.

“Home cooking trumps everything. I’m always going to say home cooking is best, right?

“If I’ve got one thing that I do, it is to shop carefully. I think about what I’m going to eat and have fresh ingredients in the fridge and well picked ingredients in the pantry, that’s what I’m cooking from.”

Gary Mehigan, left, with fellow former MasterChef judges Matt Preston and George Calombaris. Picture Lachie Millard

It’s something the former MasterChef judge has thought of more than usual in recent years.

“Lockdown was actually the first real break I’ve ever had in my career. MasterChef came to an end in 2019, we sold the last of the restaurants around about the same period and then all of a sudden, the pandemic hit, and I found myself really enjoying this extended break.

“Then I think I became conscious of what was going on in my own body, probably for the first time in a long time, and I almost felt awful, like I just lacked energy. I started noticing that I was getting a fluttering in my chest.”

Much to his disappointment, his chosen tactic of ignoring the flutter did not resolve the problem and it soon escalated.

“One day, my heart rate just spiked through the roof. I think it was about 160 beats a minute, and it, regardless of what I did, it wouldn’t drop,” he recalls.

It was a scare that forced him to seek medical attention and he was diagnosed with atrial fibrillation – the most common type of irregular heartbeat. It causes the heart to work inefficiently, which can reduce a person’s ability to exercise and can lead to heart failure. It also carries an increased risk of stroke.

Mehigan was prescribed medication but he reacted poorly to the drugs. So, he opted for surgical intervention and underwent a cardiac ablation to correct his heart rhythm. It was successful, though he may require a repeat procedure in the future, prompting him to think more about what preventable health measures he could take.

“I don’t want to be going back for my yearly check-up and saying, ‘Yes, I put on weight’, or ‘I’ve been drinking too much’, or all of these lifestyle issues that can affect ‘afib’,” he says.

He started exercising more and also became aware of the independent medical research group, the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute. Impressed by the work of the institute, Mehigan is now an ambassador and is helping to develop easy-to-follow but nutritionally backed healthy recipes.

He has created 12 recipes with one to be released each month, including a grilled sirloin steak and green bean salad with salsa verde and baked snapper. Many are also air-fryer friendly – a tweak he has added to his cooking methods after his daughter gave him one for Christmas.

Though, he quickly corrects the record: “She bought me an air fryer for her at Christmas time.”

Either way, it’s a present he sheepishly admits to adoring.

“I never needed an air fryer. But then all of a sudden I’ve realised that the air fryer is pretty damn good.

“I don’t have to turn the oven on and I can roast little potatoes in the air fryer and they take 15 minutes. It’s great. I can’t believe I would say this about the air fryer.”

An upcoming recipe is a healthy take on a tikka-style dish, which he says harnesses the power of the air fryer to recreate the conditions of a tandoor oven.

“They work brilliantly in the air fryer because it gets really hot and it’s quite intense heat. So, it’s almost like having a mini tandoor – and so these tikka work brilliantly. They come out charred and gorgeous.”

Mehigan believes home-cooking is an important step for people trying to be healthier because you have greater control over the fat, additives, and salt content of a meal.

He also has some tips for people who struggle to cook.

“Cook the things you enjoy. If you really love chucking something on the barbecue, become that person who hits the barbecue once a week. Or, if you love curries, then, become the person we can rely on to make a curry on a Saturday for our night in.”

For those times when you do dine out or buy pre-packaged food from the supermarket, Mehigan says it’s all about making smart choices.

A plate with half vegetables, a quarter protein, and a quarter carbohydrates is used as a guide for a well-balanced serving. Photo: iStock

He points to information sheets developed by the Baker Institute which provide tips such as looking for menus with nutritional information and prioritising healthier cooking styles such as grilled, steamed, or braised dishes.

“If eating takeaway food, split servings in half, add some pre-prepared vegetables or a side salad and enjoy a second meal the next day,” the institute’s fact sheet suggests.

It also lists best-dish choice options for a range of popular cuisines.

Eating at a Chinese restaurant? The Baker Institute recommends picking steamed or boiled dumplings, broth-based soups with noodles or lean meats, steamed or stir-fried seafood or lean meat.

For Indian foods it suggests tikka or tandoori dishes or curries with a tomato, lentil or chickpea base.

If eating Mexican food, it suggests opting for dishes with a vegetable component such as a burrito or soft taco and grilled corn cob.

For Japanese foods, ditch the fried gyoza for steamed ones and opt for sushi filled with vegetables, avocado, tofu, fish or chicken.

“That’s really practical advice I haven’t really seen anywhere else,” Mehigan says.

“Social media is just flooded with everything you should be doing with no factual basis to it at all. There’s so much noise out there that it’s really hard to filter through what’s good advice and what’s not.”

There is also an information sheet to take to the supermarket which includes one for snacking and fridge and pantry staples and one for pre-packaged meals. Though, as Mehigan is at pains to point out again, home-cooked meals are best.

The “convenience meals” fact sheet includes diagrams showing the optimal make-up of a plate of food. “Aim for half of your plate to be vegetables,” the guidance recommends. It also suggests a quarter of the plate be made up of carbohydrates and the remainder of a lean protein, with the aim of “a minimum of 15g of protein per main meal”.