The F Word (UK TV series)

The F Word
Genre	Food magazine/Cooking show
Starring	Gordon Ramsay ; Giles Coren (Series 1–2); Janet Street Porter ; (Series 2–5)
Opening theme	"The F Word" by Babybird
Country of origin	United Kingdom
Original language(s)	English
No. of series	5
No. of episodes	51 (Series 1–5)
Production
Running time	44 minutes
Release
Original network	Channel 4
Original release	27 October 2005 –; 7 January 2010
Chronology
Related shows	The F Word (U.S. TV series)
External links
	Website

Last updated May 31, 2019

The F Word (also called Gordon Ramsay's F Word^[1]) is a British food magazine and cookery programme featuring chef Gordon Ramsay. The programme covers a wide range of topics, from recipes to food preparation and celebrity food fads. The programme was made by Optomen Television and aired weekly on Channel 4. The theme tune for the series was "The F-Word" from the Babybird album Bugged .

A cooking show, cookery show or cooking programme 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.

Gordon James Ramsay Jr. is a British chef, restaurateur, writer, television personality, food critic, and former footballer. Born in Johnstone, Scotland, and raised in Stratford-upon-Avon, England, Ramsay's restaurants have been awarded 16 Michelin stars in total and currently hold a total of 7. His signature restaurant, Restaurant Gordon Ramsay in Chelsea, London, has held three Michelin stars since 2001. First appearing on television in the UK in the late 1990s, by 2004 Ramsay had become one of the best-known and most influential chefs in British popular culture.

Optomen is an independent television production company, with Optomen Television Ltd. for the United Kingdom and Optomen Productions Inc. for the United States.

Programme segments

Each episode is based around Ramsay preparing a three-course meal at the F Word restaurant for 50 guests. Diners in the restaurant include celebrities, who participate in conversations, challenges, and cook-offs with Ramsay. Other segments focus on food-related topics, such as alternative foods, healthy eating and even Ramsay himself demonstrating recipes of the courses to the home viewers.^[2] Finally, there was a series-long feature on home-reared livestock or poultry that was ultimately served to F Word diners on the series finale.

Livestock is commonly defined as domesticated animals raised in an agricultural setting to produce labor and commodities such as meat, eggs, milk, fur, leather, and wool. The term is sometimes used to refer solely to those that are bred for consumption, while other times it refers only to farmed ruminants, such as cattle and goats. Horses are considered livestock in the United States. The USDA uses livestock similarly to some uses of the term “red meat”, in which it specifically refers to all the mammal animals kept in this setting to be used as commodities. The USDA mentions pork, veal, beef, and lamb are all classified as livestock and all livestock is considered to be red meats. Poultry and fish are not included in the category.

Poultry are domesticated birds kept by humans for their eggs, their meat or their feathers. These birds are most typically members of the superorder Galloanserae (fowl), especially the order Galliformes.

Series 1

The first series is based around the "Get Women Back in the Kitchen" campaign where Ramsay visited several English households to help women who wanted to improve their culinary skills.^[3] The Times' s restaurant critic Giles Coren and food writer Rachel Cooke acted as field correspondents who presented reports on unique food fads and healthy eating respectively. Two or three commis (picked from a thousand applicants) squared off in each episode to earn a position at one of Ramsay's restaurants. Ramsay raised turkeys in his garden, so that his children gained a better understanding of where their food came from. Chef and television presenter Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall regularly offered tips on raising free range turkeys. The turkeys were named after other celebrity chefs, for example, Ainsley, Antony and Nigella. The pudding (dessert) challenge regularly pitted Ramsay with a celebrity guest, with the winner having the honour of serving his or her pudding to the guests at the F-Word restaurant.

<i>The Times</i> British daily compact newspaper owned by News UK

The Times is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register, adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers, since 1981 a subsidiary of News UK, itself wholly owned by News Corp. The Times and The Sunday Times do not share editorial staff, were founded independently, and have only had common ownership since 1967.

Giles Robin Patrick Coren is a British food writer and television presenter. He has been a restaurant critic for The Times newspaper since 1993, and was named Food and Drink Writer of the Year at the British Press Awards in 2005. He has co-starred with comedian Sue Perkins in The Supersizers... series and with chef Monica Galetti in the Amazing Hotels - Life Beyond The Lobby series.

Rachel Cooke is a British journalist and writer.

Series 2

The series theme emphasises the importance of Sunday lunch, with Ramsay teaching families how to prepare this meal on a regular basis. From the second series onward, the restaurant had 50 paying diners served by an amateur brigade. If guests found any of their food unsatisfactory, they could choose not to pay for that item.^[4] Janet Street-Porter became the series' regular field correspondent; Giles Coren only appeared in a one-off segment on the Pimp That Snack phenomenon. The celebrity pudding challenge was changed to a general cooking challenge, while Ramsay raised pigs in his garden, which he named Trinny and Susannah.^[5] Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall returned to offer advice on raising the pigs. Unlike Series 1, the second series of the show was usually transmitted after the 9pm watershed, meaning that Ramsay's infamous bad language was no longer bleeped out.

Janet Street-Porter, is an English media personality, journalist and broadcaster. She was editor for two years of The Independent on Sunday, but relinquished the job to become editor-at-large in 2002.

Pimp That Snack is a website which received media attention during April 2006. The website features guides on creating giant versions of everyday snacks. Articles are submitted by members of the public and a voting system allows people to rate each pimp from 1 to 100.

Sarah-Jane Duncanson "Trinny" Woodall is an English TV celebrity, Founder of TRINNY LONDON, fashion and make-over expert, television presenter and author. In 1994, after ten years working in marketing, Woodall met Susannah Constantine whom she joined to write a weekly fashion column for The Daily Telegraph. This led to the launch of their own internet fashion-advice business and the release of their first fashion-advice book.

Series 3

This series ran a campaign stating that "Fast food doesn't have to mean junk food", with Ramsay showing people how to prepare a simple supper in under 30 minutes, without having to order takeaways or rely on prepackaged meals or other convenience food.^[6] The best weekly amateur brigade was rewarded with the prestige of cooking at Ramsay's restaurant at Claridge's in the series finale.^[7] Ramsay home-reared a pair of Charollais-Welsh lambs, named Charlotte and Gavin.^[8] There was also a series-long search for a new "Fanny Cradock".^[9]

Convenience food, or tertiary processed food, is food that is commercially prepared to optimise ease of consumption. Such food is usually ready to eat without further preparation. It may also be easily portable, have a long shelf life, or offer a combination of such convenient traits. Although restaurant meals meet this definition, the term is seldom applied to them. Convenience foods include ready-to-eat dry products, frozen foods such as TV dinners, shelf-stable foods, prepared mixes such as cake mix, and snack foods.

Charlotte Maria Church is a Welsh singer-songwriter, actress, television presenter and political activist.

Gavin Lloyd Henson is a Welsh rugby union player who currently plays for Dragons in the Pro14. He attracted much media attention as part of a Wales national team which achieved Grand Slams in the Six Nations Championship in 2005 and 2008. He has also played for the British and Irish Lions, touring in 2005 to New Zealand but has never appeared at a World Cup.

Series 4

This series' weekly amateur brigade featured a celebrity and their relatives.^[3] Janet Street-Porter took on the responsibility of rearing veal calves nicknamed Elton and David in a North Yorkshire farm.^[10] Food columnist Tom Parker Bowles appeared on two episodes. In his first appearance, he visited Sardinia to sample casu marzu, a local cheese containing maggots.^[11] On his second stint, he attempted to cook a whole pig.^[12]

Sir Elton Hercules John is an English singer, songwriter, pianist, and composer. He has worked with lyricist Bernie Taupin as his songwriting partner since 1967; they have collaborated on more than 30 albums. John has sold more than 300 million records, making him one of the best-selling music artists in the world. He has more than fifty Top 40 hits, as well as seven consecutive number-one albums in the United States, 58 Billboard Top 40 singles, 27 Top 10 singles, four which reached number two and nine which reached number one. His tribute single "Candle in the Wind 1997", rewritten in dedication to Diana, Princess of Wales, sold over 33 million copies worldwide and is the best-selling single in the history of the UK and US singles charts. He has also composed music, produced records, and has occasionally acted in films. John owned Watford F.C. from 1976 to 1987, and 1997 to 2002, and is an honorary Life President of the club.

David James Furnish is a Canadian filmmaker and former advertising executive. He is married to English musician Sir Elton John.

Thomas Henry Charles Parker Bowles is a British food writer and food critic. Parker Bowles is the author of seven cookbooks and in 2010 won the Guild of Food Writers 2010 award for his writings on British food. He is known for his appearances as a judge in numerous television food series and for his reviews of restaurant meals around the UK and overseas for GQ,Esquire, and The Mail on Sunday.

Series 5

A fifth series premiered on 3 November 2009 on Channel 4.^[13] The series focused on a search for "Britain's best local restaurant".^[14] 10,000 nominations were narrowed down to 18 restaurant finalists representing nine different cuisines.^[15] The second round involved the finalists serving their signature dishes to a panel of diners at their own establishments, followed by a semi-final cook-off at Ramsay's flagship restaurant at Royal Hospital Road in Chelsea.

U.S. version

On 30 September 2016, Fox announced that The F Word would go to the United States sometime in 2017.^[16] On 3 February 2017, it was announced that it would air for the summer.^[17] Each installment of the series will be presented live and will feature surprise guests and VIPs as well as foodie families from across the U.S. battling in cook-offs.^[16]

The series premiered on 31 May 2017 on Fox.^[18]