Winning MasterChef… One year later
Today, 31 March marks one year since I was crowned winner of MasterChef South Africa.
What has happened since winning MasterChef?
I became a Pick n Pay brand ambassador, featured in a few @home adverts and catalogues, and collaborated with Mercedes, Everdure, Veldskoen, Lifetree Collection and other brands.
I’ve had a pop-up restaurant, have run cooking demos, cooked at 360on62, designed the menu for the DTK wine 60 year celebration. I’ve judged a potjie competition alongside Pete Geoff-Wood and Arno Carstens. I’ve cooked for the mayor of Cape Town, the CEO of Investec and many others at a number of private events.
Last Friday, a menu I designed went live on a Lift Airlines flight. Business class passengers get served a MasterChef-inspired menu.
The win enabled me to do what I love most: travel to extraordinary locations, across South Africa and beyond - I made a promise to my wife that if I won MasterChef, I’d take the family on an overseas trip, and so we traveled across the Greek islands with our then four and two year old as well as our 5 month old.
Mercedes Benz lent us their GLS so we could travel in style across the Cape. We’ve traveled to Pilanesberg, Montagu, Paternoster, George, Matjiesfontein, Riebeek-Kasteel, and many other South African gems.
I’ve eaten at Beyond, Wolfgat, Le Chêne, Chorus and am still looking forward to eating at Dusk and others in the near future. I also traveled to Copenhagen, eating at a few Michelin star restaurants which made my foodie dream come true!
Where am I now?
I’m running private cheffing events in Cape Town and Johannesburg, running my Instagram account The Roasted Dad and collaborating with Pick n Pay, Everdure and Lift Airlines in the process.
Beyond the food venture, I still run a lighting company, in fact I was appointed CEO during the airing of the show and have since almost doubled the company with over a hundred staff members.
What’s next for The Roasted Dad?
I’ll be at the Pick n Pay food & wine festival in April, Lift Airlines is launching a new Roasted menu to be served on board in May, I’ll be a judge in South Africa’s best burger competition. We are traveling to Bali in a few months’ time so I’m looking forward to some downtime as well whilst experiencing the island’s food scene.
Ultimately, my focus going forward will be on food consultancy and private exclusive cheffing events.
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About Shawn Godfrey
Photo credit: Niki M Photography
Shawn Godfrey is an entrepreneur based in Cape Town, South Africa. After the Covid-19 lockdown saw his business in financial distress, cooking was the creative outlet that helped to keep him sane. To keep track of his recipes, and encourage friends and families to join him, he starts his instagram account The Roasted Dad.
Fast-forward to late 2021 - on a whim Shawn (encouraged by his wife Lianne) enters MasterChef South Africa. It is a crazy time of life: running a 200 people business and struggling to keep it profitable, two small children with a third on the way, and about to move into a new house. But when Shawn gets selected to be one of the 20 contestants participating in the fourth season of MasterChef South Africa, he decides to go all in. Leaving his 7-month-pregnant wife to look after their then three and one-year-old children, he battles it out and comes back home five weeks later with the trophy and a million rand prize money in his pocket.
It all started with an Instagram account, but The Roasted Dad is so much more now. Shawn has stayed his entrepreneurial self and whilst he hosts Private Dinner Parties and Cook-with-Me Demos, does Restaurant Take-Overs, he still runs the lighting company and several other businesses.
On his blog, Shawn shares Restaurant Reviews and Accommodation Reviews, and gives an insight into the wild and wonderful life he leads together with his wife Lianne, and their three children Aiden (6), Olivia (4) and Harvey (2).
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