Temperatures rise in Cooking with the Stars

In Dancing on Ice, celebs from all corners of the TV world, wobble around an ice rink, clinging gamely (or grimly) onto their professional partners who did all the twirly, complicated moves, while we all wait with bated breath to see if they’ll do a Gemma Collins: fall flat on their bums and go viral on social media.

Well, if that isn’t enough of a thrill for you, this switch to the kitchen is the perfect way to add a bit of pep to your midweek viewing.

Emma Willis and Tom Allen are our hosts as eight celebrities who (kinda sorta) know their way around a hob, are mentored, guided and transformed into whisking whizzes by a professional chef.

Emma Willis says about coming back for a second bite: “Tom and I had so much fun last series and I’m looking forward to getting back into the kitchen. The pressure the celebs are under is real and once the competition starts heating up everybody wants to win, but I’m hoping there isn’t as much blood as last series!”

Tom Allen adds: “Last series was so exciting! Emma Willis and I have been polishing our frying pans in preparation – we have so much fun working together. The celebrities are being trained by some of the best chefs in the business and with the clock ticking it’s always tense to see if they’ll improve their cooking enough each week to measure up to the judges’ high standards.”

As for those mentors who will be offering guidance, support, wisdom and possibly a foot in the backside of the celebrity chefs-in-training? They are none other than Rosemary Shrager, Ronnie Murray, Tony Singh MBE, Jean-Christophe Novelli, Jack Stein, Clodagh McKenna, Judy Joo and Mike Reid.

Just in case you missed it, last week’s opener saw the first quartet get to grips with the theme of British dishes.

Joe Wilkinson and Anton Du Beke prepared fish and chips, and fancy pork chops respectively, before Josie Gibson put her duck, stovies and HP Jus against Woody Cook’s ribeye steak with potato and celeriac gratin with a peppercorn sauce.

This week, Dame Kelly Holmes, Anne Hegerty from The Chase, TV expert Dr Ranj and Love Island’s Maura Higgins will all be attempting to cook Spanish dishes. Each of the famous faces will be eager to prove they have some actual culinary skills, but will their finished dish be good enough to avoid being in the cook off?

With things heating up in the kitchen as temperatures reach boiling point, our novices start to feel the pressure, and it’s not long before there’s a panic over tapas and one of the famous faces encounters an unfortunate meat-burn, while someone else has a wobble over a paella. As if all that wasn’t enough to stress you out, one star doesn’t even manage to plate up their whole dish. With one celebrity eliminated from the competition, it will remain to be seen which star will find themselves in increasingly hot water and who will be marching on to the next round…