"As a little kid I used to eat everything. I would not stop eating. To the point mum took me to the clinic thinking there was something wrong with me," says Sarah Wilson. Call it fate then, that the former restaurant reviewer and editor of Cosmo magazine, 35, has the chance to tickle her taste buds as host of Ten's new reality series, MasterChef Australia; a local adaptation of the popular UK series which aims to find the nation's best amateur chef.

Unaccustomed to TV cameras, the Bondi-based journalist wasn't nervous when invited to audition for the role, which sees her guide 20 chefs through 11 weeks of challenges towards a grand prize of $100, 000. "I've spent my career telling other peoples' life stories, so moving into TV was a natural extension of that," explains Wilson, who wrote features for the Sunday Magazine after her three years at the helm of the women's title ended in 2007. Her recipe for success? "I live by the mantra, 'Where the mind goes,' the energy flows,' " says the keen environmentalist, who begins her 17-hour days at 5.30am with mediation in her make-up trailer.

Being surrounded by food all day is not unlike her childhood, where she grew up as the eldest of six siblings to Michael and Clare Wilson, both public servants, eating fresh produce from her family farm outside Canberra. "Dinner time was where everything happened," explains the Jamie Oliver fan, who dreamt of becoming Australia's first female Prime Minister. She earned a graduate diploma in professional writing after becoming "bored" halfway through a law degree.

When she's not spicing up the cameras, an ideal night is spent indulging "in really robust conversation with a whole bunch of friends at a dinner party." Does she rate her culinary skills? "I'm not a flamboyant or ego-oriented cook-I don't use a recipe," says Wilson, who has palated horse in Italy and guinea pig in Peru, but dislikes marzipan or banana chips.

Despite all the food on offer with MasterChef, Wilson is not concerned with that age old adage that the camera adds 10 pounds. Keeping her body fit with mountainbike riding, swimming, yoga and weekend bush walks with girlfriends, "My approach is to eat whatever your body is crying out for, and if that's not a size eight, that's just the way it is," says the self-proclaimed tom-boy through a mouthful of chocolate-coated Gogi berries. "I'm certainly not the skinniest host on television, and I think that's a good thing."