Antony Worrall Thompson
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Antony Worrall Thompson (born 1 May 1951 in Stratford upon Avon, England) is a British celebrity chef and television presenter.
[edit] Career
Worrall Thompson opened his first restaurant - "Menage a Trois" - in Knightsbridge in 1981. Since then he has launched several successful restaurants, including "Wiz and Woz" in West London and "Metro" in Jersey — all of which reflect his individual approach to food.
He was a cook on BBC2’s Food and Drink, Ready Steady Cook, since 1994 as well as presenting other cookery programmes. In 2003, he appeared in the second series of I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here!.
From 2003 (when he replaced original host Gregg Wallace) until June 2006 he was the host of BBC2's Saturday Kitchen, which had transferred to BBC1 to replace Saturday morning kids' TV. However, after a large financial offer from ITV, Worrall Thompson and the production company responsible for the show, Prospect Pictures transferred the format - including Australian wine expert Matt Skinner - to ITV. The new show is called Saturday Cooks!. The BBC outsourced the now vacant Saturday Kitchen format to a new company and the show started with James Martin presenting just three weeks after Worrall Thompson started his ITV version.
AWT recently represented the Midlands and East of England in the BBC's Great British Menu but was knocked out by Galton Blackiston.[1], after infamously burning the meat course of his entry prior to the judging phase.
[edit] Criticism
As a result of his various TV appearances, Worrall Thompson made the most of his commercial activities and has franchised his name to various companies and cooking products, including Brevell. As a result, he has been branded by some as more a celebrity than a chef.
Worrall Thompson's recipe for Snickers Pie was nominated by independent food watchdog The Food Commission as one of the most unhealthy dessert recipes ever. Consisting of five Snickers bars, puff pastry, mascarpone, soft cheese, sugar and eggs, a single slice has been estimated to contain 1,250 calories. Although this was widely reported in the British media, the BBC still hosts the recipe on its website, albeit with a warning.
In 2005, as he launched his new series, Gordon Ramsay, commenting on the phenomenon of "Celebrity Chefs" said, I don't really think I'm a celebrity chef. There's a TV bracket and a serious chef bracket. He went on to dub Ainsley Harriot, Brian Turner and Worrall Thompson as the Teletubbies [2]. In Ramsay's most recent TV series entitled The F-Word, a major part of the series focused on growing your own Christmas dinner, which included raising his own turkeys, mockingly naming them: Antony, Ainsley, Jamie, Delia, Gary and Nigella - in reference to famous "celebrity" chefs in the UK. In one episode a pair of tiny animal testicles which Ramsay had cooked for a celebrity guest were (erroneously) identified as having belonged to Worrall Thompson.
