MasterChef Junior Season 6 contestant Ariana Feygin
MasterChef Junior—the Gordon Ramsay-led show that inspires elementary school children to flambé and sauté—a young cook from Minnesota is in the running.
Ariana Feygin of Excelsior, a seventh grader at Minnetonka Middle School West, is one of 40 kids vying for an apron on the first episode. She’s sworn to secrecy on details of the show, which taped more than a year ago. But let’s just say the precocious home cook, who has turned 13 since the show taped, is positioned for the big leagues with an @juniorchefariana Instagram handle and her own private dining company called Ariana’s Kitchen.
We're anticipating plenty of primetime to get to know Ariana, but here’s your first course.
She’s already got Chef Gavin Kaysen on speed dial. “We met through a family friend,” says Ariana, who has cooked with the James Beard Award-winner in his Spoon and Stable kitchen. “He’s a huge mentor.”
Her parents don’t like to cook, and neither do her three younger siblings. “Sometimes they peel potatoes for me,” says Ariana, who makes dinner for the family most nights—“when I don’t have too much homework.”
She’s never taken a cooking class. “The ones for kids are, well, too easy,” she says. “And I’m not allowed in classes for adults. Liability issues. It’s so annoying.”
She usually gets school lunch. But when she packs a lunch from home, it’s not PB&J. “I’ll fill a thermos with soup or roasted duck—whatever I made the night before.”
Her parents are from Belarus. Those eastern European roots inspired her love of meat and potatoes and traditional dishes such as borscht (beet soup), which her grandmother taught her to make.
She worked in the kitchen at 6Smith in Wayzata before trying out for MasterChef Junior.
Her favorite MasterChef winner is Addison from Season 4. “I loved her passion, and her technique.”
She’s not much for junk food, but loves a good churro.
MasterChef Junior premieres Friday, March 2 at 7 p.m. on Fox
