Viewers love MasterChef for its intense competition, fast-packed cooking challenges, and Gordon
Ramsay hurling insults at contestants.
But what happens on screen is only a small fraction of what goes on during filming.
Even a long-running show can still hold surprises for viewers.
Here's what you don't get to see.
The countdown on MasterChef is very real and very enforced.
When the clock stops ticking, there's absolutely no more cooking.
But the cameras keep rolling long after the clock runs out.
Getting just the right shot to show the action can take a few different attempts.
When the clock stops, the cooks step back from their dishes.
Then they're asked to recreate the intensity of the final minutes of the competition to
make sure the cameras catch the excitement from every angle.
While the contestants aren't allowed to actually make any changes to their dishes, they recreate
the final scramble by moving around their dishes and moving things around the countertops.
Alice Zaslavsky from MasterChef Australia season four wrote on her blog:
"[W]e would finish cooking and then have to step away from the bench, put all of our utensils
down, stop touching the dish and then the next two to three minutes, just pretend to fuss around our plates.
I remembered I'd forgotten to season my peas and the salt was so close to my hand but I
knew there were five cameras on me so I couldn't do anything!"
It seems like all the action on MasterChef moves at a fast pace.
Contestants furiously cook their dishes and rush to get the food on plates.
The judges then declare who gets immunity and who has to cook even harder to stay afloat.
In TV time, it all happens in the space of less than an hour.
In real life, it takes a lot longer for those final dishes to make it to the final judging.
Once again, Alice Zaslavsky of MasterChef Australia season four blogged:
"The judges would walk around and taste the food as soon as the challenge was over, while
everything was still hot."
Zaslavsky went on to reveal that:
"Once you finish cooking, they take your plate away and shoot it with an overhead camera
so it looks fresh.
Then all of the dishes go straight into the fridge, while the cast and crew would break for lunch."
Once everyone returns from their break, the dishes are pulled from the fridge and used
to film the final judging scenes.
Maybe that's what gives judge Gordon Ramsay the push to be extra mean to food he doesn't like.
"But if that's the best you can do, then you are in the wrong kitchen."
Imagine walking into your kitchen and creating an incredible meal entirely from scratch with
no recipes or reference to help guide and inspire you.
Now, imagine doing that with the clock ticking and Gordon Ramsay waiting to judge the final product.
For MasterChef contestants, that's exactly what happens.
With no recipes allowed in the kitchen, contestants must lean on tried and true techniques, guidance
from the chefs when they offer it, and a heavy dose of luck.
Season five MasterChef contestant Elise Mayfield told The AV Club:
"It's scary.
There are moments when you're like, 'Oh my god, it worked!'
I don't know any other way to explain it other than that it is amazing what the human brain
can remember when you're under pressure."
So how do they do it?
It turns out that studying for MasterChef is a lot like studying for grad school.
Mayfield said:
"I basically put myself through a mini culinary boot camp where I made flash cards and memorized recipes.
I quizzed myself all the time."
Have you ever noticed how each contestant seems to have an endless selection of one
particular kind of clothing in their closet?
Like all camouflage shirts for the guy who hunts, or all lace dresses and cowboy boots
for the girl next door?
That's no accident.
MasterChef's costume department gives contestants a wardrobe that fits their personality type
and then tells them what to wear for each episode.
The MasterChef wardrobe and makeup crew are trying to build a particular character, and
it's done so well that you hardly even notice.
Season five contestant Elise Mayfield told The AV Club:
"You are in your outfit that you've been told to put on, you are going to wardrobe and hair and makeup."
If you watch closely, wardrobe changes throughout the course of an episode can happen.
Often, cooks wear comfortable shoes while cooking and then change into nicer shoes to
match their wardrobe when it's time for the big judging scenes.
MasterChef hopefuls may be working up a sweat in the kitchen, but television demands they've
got to look good while doing it.
If you've ever been on the set of reality TV or a scripted show, you'll know that what's
going on in front of the camera is just the tip of the iceberg.
Behind the camera, there's a small army of people making it all happen, from camera operators,
to makeup artists, to the people setting up craft services.
The MasterChef set houses a working kitchen built where up to 24 cooks can work at once,
including a viewing balcony, a small grocery, and a full dining room.
What you don't see is the rest of the stage and people working behind the camera.
So how do the judges keep track of everything that's going on in the chaos?
Well, they have help.
Chef and judge Christina Tosi told Lucky Peach:
"There is a team of standards-and-practices officials who watch the contestants' every move.
Everyone has the exact same advantages, and we want them to leverage those advantages fairly."
And Tosi said everyone gets the same amount of help from the judges, admitting:
"We want everyone to succeed."
Between the pots and pans getting thrown around the stovetops, stand mixers whirring, and
trays coming in and out of the oven of a very large kitchen, you might not even be able
to hear what the person next to you is saying on the MasterChef set.
But according to Delish, every single word the contestants say is recorded.
Each cook wears a small microphone that can pick up even the quietest conversations while
cameras are recording the action from every angle.
With so much audio and video to go through, the production crew has a massive amount of
material to manage for every episode.
The microphones are attached to the cooks' aprons and capture conversations between contestants,
people talking to themselves while they cook, and hopefully even a few dramatic sound bites
to make an episode especially exciting.
"’How did I tell you to cook them though?’
‘You told me to, you didn't tell me to cook them.’
‘I said to cook them almost burnt.’
‘No you did not.’
‘Yes, I did.’
‘You said don't burn them.’"
In a season 8 episode of MasterChef, three contestants were tasked with a pressure test
of making a chocolate soufflé to progress in the competition.
Chocolate soufflés are notoriously finicky and delicate, allowing very little room for error.
How, then, did all three contestants manage to prepare absolutely perfect soufflés and
avoid getting sent home?
Season five contestant Elizabeth Cauvel wrote on Medium:
"The answer is: they teach us.
Every weekend, we'd practice three to four dishes or techniques."
Cauvel explains that, while filming took place Monday through Friday, the contestants were
offered cooking classes on the weekend.
They weren't required to take these classes, but considering that the lessons would walk
cooks through techniques directly related to upcoming challenges, it probably wasn't
smart to turn them down.
Indeed, contestants who took the classes often did better on the show than ones who didn't.
So it's okay if someone doesn't know how to cook everything.
It's more about who remembers how to make and execute the recipe best.
It's difficult for many of us to go without social media for a whole day, but if you're
interested in being a reality TV star, you'll need to learn to go without.
MasterChef contestants aren't allowed to spill the beans about who made the cut or what they
cooked before the show airs.
The veil of secrecy begins the moment the contestants step on set.
The production staff takes each cook's phone before they come on set and holds onto them
for the duration of filming.
When they're not filming, contestants are allowed to contact their families but aren't
allowed to discuss any details of the filming or broadcast.
Being so secluded in such a stressful environment certainly takes its toll on plenty of the
cast members, especially once they re-enter society after their time on the set.
After leaving the production, season 5 contestant Elise Mayfield told The AV Club:
"The real world just came flooding back to me and it was really scary because I'd been
isolated for so many weeks, and getting my phone back and realizing I had a thousand
emails to read was shocking,"
Given the amount of food that everyone goes through making their signature dishes, you
may wonder where all of it ends up.
Gordon Ramsay and his fellow judges don't eat the entirety of every single dish that's presented to them.
And what about the food that the cooks didn't use?
Have no fear, it's not going to waste.
The food that doesn't make the cut for judging and filming gets eaten by the cast and crew.
Host Gregg Wallace told The Sun:
"The cooked food is devoured by the filming crew.
A lot of them carry their own cutlery!"
As for all of the groceries that aren't used, Wallace says:
"The raw food gets divided up by the youngsters in the crew — talented young people who've
just begun their careers and aren't necessarily earning very much."
Waste not, want not, thankfully!
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