''Food Poker'' is a

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tea-time television programme which fuses traditional culinary skills with

poker Poker is a family of comparing card games in which players wager over which hand is best according to that specific game's rules. It is played worldwide, however in some places the rules may vary. While the earliest known form of the game w ...

. It is presented by

Matt Allwright Matthew Allwright (born 14 April 1970) is an English television presenter, journalist, and musician. He has presented shows such as ''Watchdog'', ''Rogue Traders'', ''Food Inspectors, The Code'', ''Fake Britain'' and ''The One Show'' for BBC On ...

and voiced over by

Jeni Barnett Jeni Barnett (born 24 March 1949 in London) is an English actress and TV presenter who grew up in Borehamwood. Acting career As an actress Barnett appeared on several TV shows, including ''Revolting Women'' (BBC2, 1981) and ''Doctors'', and has a ...

, each episode features four chefs. It was first broadcast on

BBC Two BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream an ...

between 29 October and 7 December 2007.

Format

The show involves chefs being dealt two food cards and can use up to three ingredients from five more 'shared ingredient' cards. The chefs then decide in secret what dish they will prepare and then choose either to 'pitch' their idea or 'fold', if they don't believe they can cook anything with the available ingredients. Those who pitch their ideas must do so to the Food Poker Panel, which consists of seven food experts. The panel then vote, using

poker chips Casino tokens (also known as casino or gaming chips, checks, cheques or poker chips) are small discs used in terms of currency in casinos. Colored metal, injection-molded plastic or compression molded clay tokens of various denominations are us ...

, for the two dishes they wish to see prepared. There are three rounds, the savoury cook-off, the sweet cook-off and the final showcase cook-off. Once two chefs have been selected by the panel they have 20 minutes to cook their dishes, however they only have 15 minutes during the Sweet Cook-off. This time is very intense and competitive banter between chefs is commonplace. Once the chefs have cooked their dishes they are presented to the seven gourmets who then vote again for their preferred dish (no poker chips are used for this vote). Only the savoury and sweet cook-offs use this format. The showcase cook-off, which automatically features the two winners from the previous two cook-offs, has a different format.

The Showcase Cook-off

In this round the finalists are presented with a single card, which all can see: this ingredient must be the central feature of their dishes. They then have a choice from an array of other ingredient cards from a large selection; once a card has been selected it is not available to the other chef. Therefore, chefs can both take the ingredients they need and/or steal ingredients which they think will be most valuable to their opponents. They then have 20 minutes to prepare their dishes. The two cooked dishes are then presented to the two losing chefs who then vote for their favourite and ultimately the winner, in the event of a tie the winner is decided by presenter,

Regular contributing chefs

Martin Blunos Martin Lauris Blunos (born 11 April 1960) is a British TV chef. Blunos earned two Michelin Guide stars at his restaurant Lettonie (restaurant), Lettonie, first in Bristol and then in Bath, Somerset, Bath. Early life and career His parents came ...

Gennaro Contaldo Gennaro Contaldo OSI (; born 20 January 1949) is an Italian chef known for his association with his British protégé, Jamie Oliver, and his partnership with fellow Italian chef Antonio Carluccio and their BBC Two television series '' Two Greedy ...

* Peter Gordon *Maria Elia *Lawrence Keogh *Allegra McEvedy * Jun Tanaka *

Atul Kochhar Atul Kochhar (born 31 August 1969) is an Indian-born, British-based chef and television personality. Kochhar was one of the first two Indian chefs to receive a Michelin star, awarded in London in 2001 whilst at Tamarind. He opened his own resta ...

*Stuart Gillies *Paul Rankin *Theo Randall

External links

*{{BBC programme
Food Poker on ukgameshows website
2007 British television series debuts 2007 British television series endings 2000s British cooking television series BBC Television shows Food reality television series British cooking television shows Television series by All3Media Television shows about poker Poker in Europe