A TV cooking show is a television program that presents the preparation of food, in a kitchen on the studio set. The host of the show, often a celebrity chef, prepares one or more dishes over the course of the program, taking the viewing audience through the food's preparation and showing all intermediate stages of cooking. These shows are often intended to be at least partly educational, as the host teaches the viewing audience how to prepare different meals; however, some cooking shows (such as Iron Chef or Junior Masterchef) are intended simply for entertainment.
While rarely achieving top ratings, cooking shows have been a popular staple of daytime TV programming since the earliest days of television. They are generally very inexpensive to produce, making them an economically easy way for a TV station to fill a half-hour (or sometimes 60 minute) TV episode.
A number of cooking shows have run for many seasons, especially when they are sponsored by local TV stations or by public broadcasting. Many of the more popular cooking shows have had flamboyant hosts whose unique personalities have made them into celebrities.
Famous cooking shows include:
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The cable TV channel Food Network has showcased many cooking shows.
Famous quotes containing the words cooking and/or show:
“There is no spectacle on earth more appealing than that of a beautiful woman in the act of cooking dinner for someone she loves.”
—Thomas Wolfe (1900–1938)
“Back now to autumn, leaving the ended husk
Of summer that brought them here for Show Saturday
The men with hunters, dog-breeding wool-defined women,
Children all saddle-swank, mugfaced middleaged wives
Glaring at jellies, husbands on leave from the garden
Watchful as weasels, car-tuning curt-haired sons
Back now, all of them, to their local lives....”
—Philip Larkin (1922–1986)