Product placement comes ever more visible with M&S co-funding the new series of Cooking With The Stars,. This is no ordinary cooking competition, this is an M&S cooking competition.
Man of the moment, Tom Allen is joined by Emma Willis as the joint hosts of the brand new series in which we see eight celebrities, each paired with a professional chef who will mentor, teach and take them from passionate amateur to restaurant level chefs.
Airing this Summer on ITV and the ITV Hub, among the eight celebrities who will be putting on their aprons and heading to the kitchen are two actor/comedians Griff Rhys-Jones and Johnny Vegas , who appeared together in the Murder on the Blackpool Express. They will be competing with, Strictly’s head judge Shirley Ballas, DJ and songwriter Naughty Boy, performer and presenter Denise Van Outen, actress Catherine Tyldesley, McFly’s Harry Judd. and TV presenter AJ Odudu.
Across a series of cooking battles, the celebrities will be trained by their mentor chefs to produce delicious dishes that will be judged by the remaining professionals. The bottom two will then have to fight for their place in the competition, creating a dish without any help from their mentor. The result of this eliminator will be decided by a blind tasting judgement from the professional chefs. Unaware of whose food they are tasting, the greatest supporter could swiftly and unwittingly become the worst critic and vote for their protege to leave the competition.
The professional chefs who are taking on the challenge are British chef and TV presenter Rosemary Shrager, food writer and restaurant owner Nisha Katona, culinary expert and regular chef on This Morning Joseph Denison Carey, Michelin starred chef and author Mark Sargeant, chef director Jack Stein, Korean food expert and TV chef Judy Joo, renowned chef and business owner Tristan Welch and Italian chef and restaurateur Francesco Mazzei.