Victor Lewis-Smith in the Evening Standard on C4’s Gordon Ramsey’s Kitchen Nightmares…

“AS every chef knows, if you use low-quality ingredients and serve them half-baked, you’ll end up with an indigestible dog’s dinner that leaves a funny taste in the mouth. That’s what C4 has done with this programme, which seems to have given Ramsay a licence to terrorise the unwary, and it’s disgraceful that Ofcom (perhaps after some lobbying from C4 over a few good lunches) is now planning to relax the rules governing public-service broadcasting, so that contrived food series like this can be counted as “quality” or “educational” public service programming.

In truth it’s neither - it’s just another desperate scream for attention from a channel that used to be the natural home of intelligent innovation and the arts but, of late, seems afraid to broadcast any culture at all. Certainly, the only culture I saw last night was the furry fungus growing up the walls of the fridge in Bonaparte’s dangerous kitchen.”