lifestyle

What did you do on the weekend?

Think of this as your water cooler, your tea room or your local coffee shop- just the place you gather to chat about your weekend.

Kevin Rudd has a new job – foreign minister in the new minority Gillard Government. A new baby elephant made his debut at Melbourne zoo. And Junior Masterchef premiered, intimidating adults all over Australia.

What happened on your weekend – was it a busy one or a quiet one? Do you have anything to share? An experience? An opinion?

Did you watch Junior Masterchef?

According to The Australian

Junior MasterChef on Ten has exceeded all expectations, launching with 2.2 million people last night and doubling the audience of The X Factor.

With its exuberant spirit and impressive display of the cooking skills of kids aged eight to 12, Junior Masterchef proved just as irresistible to viewers as MasterChef Australia, the most popular program in television history.

Junior MasterChef was the top program on Sunday night – and at 2.2 million was an incredible 600,000 viewers ahead of the second placed program, Seven News, on 1.6 million.

The program, which auditioned 5000 lids to come up with last night’s top 50, put to rest any fears some critics may have had about being exploitative reality TV.

There were only tears of joy, no-one was humiliated and the proud parents sat in the audience, encouraging their kids and administering hugs and high fives.

Producers Shine Australian claim to be making television history by staging the first TV contest featuring children to be scheduled in prime time for a general audience.

The multicultural casting of MasterChef was again there in this spin-off, with children from a myriad of cultures proudly cooking their parents’ food, such as Ricotta Gnocchi with Eggplant Sauce.

The program was immaculately planned with producers working with health and safety experts, child psychologists, chaperones, timekeepers and the NSW Commission for Children and Young People.

Safety platforms were built so the kids could reach the benchtops, the gas stoves were replaced with induction cooktops, and brightly coloured safety knives were the tools of choice.

What did you think?

or maybe you went to see the beautiful baby elephant – the first male Asian elephant born at Melbourne Zoo

And did you see that Staci Child, the daughter of Julia Gillard’s partner Tim Mathieson has posed in a bikini wrapped in an Australian flag for Zoo Weekly