A Statesboro cooking enthusiast brought her Bulloch County flair to the season premiere of the ABC reality show "The Taste" Thursday evening.

Viewers had a glimpse of her, but in the end, none of the four judges chose Rebekah Faulk to be on a team.

Faulk, who writes a bimonthly food column for the Statesboro Herald and a popular food blog, both called "Some Kinda Good," auditioned for the show after being selected by officials who reviewed a YouTube video of a recent "Statesboro Cooks" segment.

Faulk helps produce "Statesboro Cooks," a Georgia Southern University student-run show on which she is a guest host.

She was one of four contestants shown during a brief segment in the second hour of the two-hour episode.

As she prepared shrimp and grits, which she calls her signature dish, she eagerly said, "Wait for Nigella (Lawson) to taste this. I can just see Nigella now saying, ‘That flavor, it's quite nice.'" Faulk playfully mimicked the British food star's accent.

The show edited the segment closely, showing only two of the judges' reactions to Faulk's dish. Both had encouraging words for her as they said no.

"Please persist, continue and learn," chef Anthony Bourdain told Faulk.

"And come back next year," Lawson said.

The other two judges on the panel are expert chef and author Ludo Lefevbre, and author, chef and restaurateur Marcus Samuelsson.

In an interview with the Statesboro Herald last week, Faulk said she "was very excited for the judges" to taste her shrimp and grits.

"It was the experience of a lifetime," she said. "I got to fly to Hollywood, Calif., and got to meet some amazing people and compete with some really talented people."

The show was filmed at Universal Studios Hollywood.