“As the show will be distributed by the BBC it will be seen worldwide and will be a great advertisement for Melbourne,” Khoo says.

In the eight-part series, the British food writer, cook, and TV hostess says she literally rolled from one Melbourne culinary hotspot to the next. Episodes take in Lygon Street, Brunswick Street, St Kilda, and Chinatown as well as day trips to the Yarra Valley, Bellarine Peninsula and Dandenongs.

“For me it’s important to explore the diversity that Melbourne has and what is on offer is of such good quality,” she enthuses.

“We cooked with an Italian family at their home in the suburbs, we were at the Smokehouse. We filmed at Pellegrini’s Espresso Bar which is old Melbourne. As the first espresso bar it has so much history and I really wanted to capture that - how Melbourne started off and what it has to offer today.”

Khoo explores Melbourne’s ethnic diversity and discovers how it’s culinary past continues to influence its foodie present and future.

“It is very interesting to be able to explore the old Melbourne and what is happening with the second or so generation of immigrants and what Australian food is for them. It is a very interesting dynamic,” she says.

While it seems she shot to fame overnight with the release of her irresistible cooking show Little Paris Kitchen, Khoo is adamant the show was the culmination of years of hard work.

“The Little Paris Cookbook was my third cookbook. Of course TV changes everything but there were many years of hard graft. It didn’t just fall into my lap, I went and looked for it and knocked on those doors.”

Running a restaurant from her apartment to test out the recipes for the book gave her the idea for the TV show and after making a video and pitching it to production companies around London; the BBC took the project on.

While the experience of The Little Paris Kitchen series was three years ago Khoo believed she would never do anything like it again.

Rather disappointingly for avid viewers, Khoo says the tiny apartment used in The Little Paris Kitchen where she also lived was far from ideal.

“They edited the bits when I’m banging my head against the wall,” Khoo jokes now.

The space constraint was one thing, but there was also mould on the ceiling and a window that wouldn’t close.

“It was awful in the winter and the mould would get even worse.”

For Kitchen Notebook – Melbourne the Collingwood warehouse apartment chosen for filming was spacious.

“The kitchen is a little bit bigger so they can get more than one camera angle,” Khoo says.

“It is in a new style apartment as when you film you need a big space and we needed it to be practical, but we dressed it up and made it cosy.”

There was also an outside space for the Australian barbecue.

“It was important to make it Melbourne, for it to have its own identity as Melbourne,” she says.

From her Collingwood base Khoo was able to produce the type of show she likes to watch.

“The cookery shows I enjoy are the ones where you discover something and then you get to cook it, so it’s not just in the kitchen.”

She also spends time with some of the newcomers making waves in Melbourne’s eatery scene.

Modern innovators like Matt Wilkinson and Chris Terlikar she discovers have had fine dining training in the kitchens of Vue de monde.

“The Bluebonnet Barbecue is a smokehouse and Chris Terlikar the chef there travelled around Texas and loved the Texan barbecue and that is what he is doing in Fitzroy,” she says.

While a Texan barbecue may seem to be a backward step, away from fine dining, Khoo begs to differ.

“The meat is amazing and he also has these great side dishes and attention to detail. He takes a fine dining approach but produces more accessible, affordable food. Just because it is every day doesn’t mean it can’t be the best it can be.”

With a love of the Vietnamese dish, pho noodle soup, Khoo was able to indulge her tastebuds in one of Melbourne’s Vietnamese districts.

“The place we went to had the granny in the corner and the kids and everybody’s helping out,” she says.

“Everybody has a story of how they ended up in Melbourne and it is so rich and really inspirational.”

Khoo’s all-time favourite ingredient however would have to be cheese.

“I love cheese.

“I’m quite happy if I have been working all day just to have cheese and crackers and grapes and apple and don’t cook. That is my kind of easy food.”

Rachel Khoo’s Kitchen Notebook – Melbourne, premieres Thursday July 23 at 8pm on SBS.