It’s a hot, sunny day but he is surrounded by Christmas trees and elves as he’s shooting the “Next Level Baker” holiday special for Fox. It’s very festive, which seems appropriate as he’s recently uncorked the 25th season of “Hell’s Kitchen,” and earlier this year unwrapped the 10th season of “Kitchen Nightmares,” while also serving up the 16th season of the U.S. version of “MasterChef.” But despite the continued popularity of his shows, reinforced by the Netflix series about him, some in the industry are starting to ask: Have TV audiences started to lose their appetite for food shows? Natalie Cruz, an analyst for Ampere Analysis, says, “Globally, the commissions of reality-food shows have shown a consistent downward trend since 2022, with the highest decrease of 16% lower global commissioning volumes between 2024 to 2025, from 663 to 555 titles.
This trend continues into 2026, with commissioning volumes falling by 13% between the second half of last year and the first half of this year from 282 to 245 titles.” Cookery shows need to add some spice to pique the hunger of audiences, according to TV sales executives. Take “The Heat,” part of the offering from international distribution and production giant ITV Studios, which folds the ingredients of a high-end cooking format in with those of a dating show. What you then see is the romances, the rivalries, the flirtations, the fallouts — they all make their way back into the kitchen in the daytime.” Ramsay has watched the show, and he’s not impressed.
After its first season, the show was axed. Ramsay attributes the popularity of his own shows to their “live aspect,” and underscores the need to “keep things incredibly fresh.” Referring to “Hell’s Kitchen,” he says, “There’s a format, but each and every season, we rip up the rule book and rewrite the challenges.” The secret to its success, Ramsay says, is that he runs it like a live restaurant. We train and train and train those individuals, put them through this incredible boot camp before we go live, and each and every night is a live performance, like you’d go to see in a theater,” he says.
Lucas Green, chief content officer, operations, at Banijay Entertainment, another global TV distribution and production titan, acknowledges there has been a shift in audience tastes as food content on social media proliferates. That said, Banijay’s “MasterChef” was the most adapted format in the world last year, with versions on air in 38 territories (the total is now 41 territories), and similar formats, like “Top Chef,” are also going strong, which Green ascribes to their narrative structure. Lots of winners have gone on to get Michelin stars.
It’s very aspirational.” The blending in of a story arc boosts the audience’s desire for more, encouraging binge-viewing, says Mike Beale, managing director, creative network, at ITV Studios, which has “Hell’s Kitchen” on air in 26 territories and “Come Dine With Me” in 50. Just seeing five people cook, and there’s one winner at the end of the competition, and then next week, you do the same competition again with five new people, isn’t going to do that anymore,” Beale says. YouTube is proving to be a fertile seedbed for new cooking show concepts, Levet adds.
Meanwhile, Levet notes that the streamers have developed their own taste for cookery shows like “Dinner Time Live With David Chang,” “Culinary Class Wars,” “Iron Chef: Quest for an Iron Legend” and “The Final Table” on Netflix, and “The World Cook” on Prime Video. And online and linear can feed off each other, Green argues. Whatever exotic recipes the latest generation of celebrity chefs throw together, for Ramsay, his approach is simple, “I suppose I just work at keeping it fresh, and I take criticism, but I don’t sit there and self-absorb and self-obsess about how good we are.
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