The 32-year-old is one of the home cooks testing the sharpness of their culinary skills before judges Andy Allen and Poh Ling Yeow (both MasterChef alumni), food critic Sofia Levin and chef Jean-Christophe Novelli in the upcoming season.

Dinh applied for MasterChef Australia with her older sister Melissa, who she described as "pretty much the only person I let cook with me in the kitchen and I trust, other than my mum and dad".

"We just thought, why not give it a crack?" she said.

But Dinh never imagined that she would make it through the application process to find herself on screen on her first attempt.

"Still now I pinch myself over it," she said.

Dinh was raised in Berkeley in a family with a love of food, and has been steeped in the deep culinary traditions of her parents' respective cultural backgrounds: Italian on her mum Doreen's side and Vietnamese on her late dad Tommy's side.

"Being Vietnamese, of course, there was so much good food and old flavours, and I think that's where I learnt the most about my palate and being an intuitive cook," she said.

"Whereas Mum being the Italian side, it was always a table full of food... it was the gesture of cooking for people and making sure people were fed."

One of four girls, she describes food and cooking as something that has comforted and bound her family together through tough times, including her father's illness and death.

"[Cooking] was never a chore in our household, it was always something of love ... if friends came over, my mum would always make sure there was food for them," she said.

An artist with her own lettering, signwriting and mural business, Dinh also draws upon her creativity in the kitchen.

"It's funny because when you have a pen or pencil or paintbrush in your hand, or a whisk or wooden spoon or chopsticks, I think it's all the same in the sense... it's still a form of expression of who I am as a person, but also how I want to connect with people," she said.

Despite having skills impressive enough to make the MasterChef cut, Dinh has never worked in hospitality.

"It's funny because I avoided hospitality my whole life, because I always thought that I would either eat too much if I was cooking... or I wouldn't have that same passion for cooking for my family and loved ones if I constantly did it, on a five to six-day basis a week," she said.

But the competition's fast pace and intensity came as no shock: Dinh said her friends would describe her as the "busiest person around".

"And also, I thrive off pressure. I'm an artist, I've been a full-time artist with my business for almost nine years now ... through that, I've had to learn to really push through that fast-paced, high-pressure environment," she said.

"Somehow, I think that's really what's set me up to be able to persevere through that in MasterChef."

Her experience of the MasterChef kitchen has also opened doors to new possibilities - even a career in food.

"I feel like MasterChef has definitely paved that way for me and made me believe that it's not just something that I can do at home, or for friends and family," Dinh said.

"It's something that I can take into a career and give real purpose to my passion, just like art has been able to do for me, and I'm so excited for them to intertwine."

MasterChef Australia premieres at 7.30pm on Monday, April 22 on 10.