Kiwi chef's sweet romance 'I BAKED MY WAY TO WEDDED BLISS!'

Snack Masters NZ star Maxine reveals her rocky road to finding true love

- Florence Hartigan

The reality series throws all sorts of challenges Maxine's way.

She'd never set foot in France, but at the tender age of 19, just one week after completing her culinary course in Wellington, Snack Masters NZ chef Maxine Scheckter was off on a solo adventure worthy of Emily In Paris after gaining a place in the famous French pastry school Ferrandi L'ecole Gastronomie.

Using all her savings from working in her parents' deli since she was eight, Maxine, now 26, recalls, "Paris is a glamorous place and an amazingly beautiful place to live - more so if you have more funds than I had at the time! To save money, I walked everywhere and pretty much just ate fresh baguettes, which were cheap but delicious."

Maxine quickly bonded with her classmates as they explored Paris together. "One of my favourite memories is the Christmas markets," she grins. “We bought ridiculous giant earmuffs and ran down the Champs-Élysées eating huge sticks of cotton candyfloss bigger than our heads."

Maxine and Ben tying the knot at his parents' place in Taupo.

But the French capital wasn't all fun and games. “A man I'd thought was my neighbour kicked my door down and robbed my apartment," remembers Maxine. “I couldn't go back in for three days while the police took fingerprints.

“My classmates and I had left that day's baking at my place while we went out, but the burglar didn't take any of it, so there were 10 amazing chocolate tarts just sitting there and none of us could eat them. If you're going to break in, at least steal a chocolate tart!"