Panel beater Nicholas Bartolo cruised to MasterChef Malta victory cooking dishes he found in a small recipe book his wife left behind before she died of cancer two years ago.

Speaking to Times of Malta days after he was crowned winner of the TV show’s second season, Bartolo, 53, said he never expected he would win and initially did not even want to take part in the cooking competition.

But his daughter applied on his behalf and when he was told he was chosen as a contestant he had no option but to go for it, and with very little time to prepare, his late wife’s book was crucial.

“She would write her own recipes in the book – her own creations or recipes she heard about from her friends, and she would often use it in the kitchen,” Bartolo recalled from his kitchen, nostalgically flipping through the small diary filled with her carefully hand-written recipes.

“And my daughter encouraged me to cook dishes from it for the competition. Initially I thought nobody would like these recipes but when I tried them on the show the judges seemed impressed.”

He had never attempted to cook any of the dishes at home before, and he was bringing them to life, using his wife’s recipes during the intense competition.

And the recipes were apparently so good that judge Victor Borg – who is the executive chef of two Michelin-rated restaurants – jokingly asked if he could get a copy of the book during the show’s final episode last Sunday.

Chef Letizia Vella – another award-winning judge on the show – also said she would serve them at her restaurant, Bartolo added, hiding a shy smile.

His wife’s illness

Bartolo was already somewhat of a culinary enthusiast before joining the acclaimed television show but was a panel beater and car sprayer by profession and would only cook in private settings for family and friends.

“At home I would cook all the time after work. I would ask my wife to buy the ingredients and I’d go home and prepare dinner for us all after I close the garage,” he said, adding that his family – especially his mother and brother – were ardent cooks.

“I loved it.”

Their love story started at a very early age when she was just 13 and he was 15.

Bartolo and his wife.

Nine years later they got married and had two children and were married for 29 years before they got the shock of their life.

“We would often spend weekends in our caravan, and I would cook for our friends who joined us there – sometimes as many as 20 people,” he said.

“Then one time, two years ago, my wife didn’t want to eat. She told me she had lost her appetite for quite a while and had lost eight kilograms and didn’t know what was happening.

“A doctor’s checkup revealed she had a cyst that needed to be removed and that’s when they told her she had cancer,” he said.

“I remember she asked the doctor whether there was any hope of a cure and he simply pointed upwards, as if to tell us only a miracle could save her.”

After the surgery the disease spread aggressively and after just three months she died. She was 49.

 “I miss her a lot. When I’m sometimes alone at home I feel lost without her.”

‘She saved my life, but I couldn’t save hers’

Bartolo said a year before her diagnosis, his wife saved his life after he had a heart attack.

He would sometimes play football with his friends after work, and one day, when he returned from a match, his wife noticed something was not right and immediately suspected he was having a heart attack.

He brushed off the concerns, saying he felt well and had just played football –  he simply had a burning feeling in his stomach.

She called for an ambulance and by the time it arrived, Nicholas had already collapsed on the floor and was getting weaker by the minute.

“As soon as I got to hospital my heart stopped but they managed to resuscitate me,” he recalled.

“That incident brought us even closer in our relationship.”

“She saved my life, but I wasn’t able to save hers,” he said.

Bartolo has been through a lot in his life, but nobody could have told him that his wife’s little recipe book would lead him to win the cooking competition

“That’s what I would tell her before she died, and she would always say that what mattered was that I loved her till the end.”

Bartolo being congratulated after winning MasterChef Malta. Photo: Albert Camilleri

Bartolo has been through a lot in his life, but nobody could have told him that his wife’s little recipe book would lead him to win the cooking competition.

Among the most successful recipes he tried were coconut pastries and rock cakes, he said, as he flipped through the pages to take another look at his wife’s handwriting.

 “I’m very happy I won, and the support has been overwhelming throughout the journey,” he said.

“The judges were very helpful, our friends and family and the people who were following the show were very supportive.”

But his joy is about to grow even bigger. As the Times of Malta crew was filming the interview, Bartolo was waiting to become a grandfather “any moment” as his daughter was about to give birth.

With his newfound enthusiasm for food and his new role as a grandfather, Bartolo said he had decided to close the panel beating business and is planning to spend more time with the family and venture into cooking.