A cooking show, cookery show,[ or cooking program (also spelled cooking programme in British English) is a television genre that presents food preparation, often in a restaurant kitchen or on a studio set, or at the host's personal home. Typically the show's host, often a celebrity chef, prepares one or more dishes over the course of an episode, taking the viewing audience through the food's inspiration, preparation, and stages of cooking.
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Cooking shows have been a popular staple of daytime TV programming since the earliest days of television.
Production
Due to time and production constraints, most, if not all, cooking shows employ filming shortcuts such as video editing, and Food photography, and prepared ingredients to speed up the cooking process and ensure a smooth and seamless production.
Genres
Some cooking shows, such as Emeril Live, are oriented towards instructional material, and others, such as Trisha's Southern Kitchen, additionally focus on showcasing the personal lives of the hosts. Some, such as the Rachael Ray Show, blend the genre with a talk show format. There are also reality competitions within the genre such as Iron Chef, MasterChef, and Top Chef, in which contestants are given specific requirements and a time limit to prepare meals, which are then evaluated by a panel of judges, which can include celebrity chefs and other notable personalities. Travel cooking shows such as and Salt Fat Acid Heat explore the culinary experiences of host chefs in various destinations. Chopped and Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives are examples of reality cooking shows, and Chefs A' Field and Chef's Table represent some of the documentary cooking shows.
History
Until the 1940s, most cooking shows were performed on the radio.
United Kingdom
One of the first television cooking shows, Cook's Night Out, aired on the BBC on 21 January 1937.[ Cookery, which was hosted by Philip Harben and aired from 1946 to 1951, is considered by Guinness World Records to be the first cooking show on television.]
United States
In 1940, Sunday Evening Supper was produced by Edward Padula for the NBC station WNBC.
Australia
The Chef Presents, one of the first cooking shows in Australia, ran from 1957 to 1959 and was hosted by Willi Koeppen.[
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Brazil
The first cooking show on Brazilian television, Veja como se cozinha (English: "Watch How It's Cooked"), first aired from 1951 to 1958 with Marialice Prestes as its host, and then again from 1961 to 1963 featuring host Ofélia Anunciato.
France
In 1953, Jean d'Arcy, a French television director, was inspired by a cooking show in West Germany and brought the idea to France, resulting in the debut of the show Les Recettes de M. X (English: "The Recipes of Mr. X").
Germany
On 20 February 1953, Clemens Wilmenrod bittet zu Tisch (English: "Clemens Wilmenrod Invites You to the Table"), the first cooking show in then-West Germany, was broadcast, with television chef Clemens Wilmenrod presenting recipes for foods such as Rumtopf and Toast Hawaii.
Japan
In 1953, lead=yes, one of the first cooking shows in Japan, was broadcast, with Hatsuko Kuroda presenting chicken salad.
New Zealand
Graham Kerr was one of the first celebrity chefs to appear on New Zealand television, when the medium was introduced to the country in 1960.
Popular culture
Sue Ann Nivens, a character played by Betty White in The Mary Tyler Moore Show, is the host of WJM's The Happy Homemaker, a fictional cooking show. In the Family Guy episode "Pilling Them Softly", Glenn Quagmire starts his own cooking show called "Quagmire's Kitchen".
See also
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List of cooking shows
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Food reality television
Further reading
