Ugly Delicious: Season 1 (2018)

SEASON:

Season 1
Ugly Delicious

Critics Consensus

Ugly Delicious injects new life into the food documentary by dispensing with culinary pretensions and celebrating a vibrant spectrum of dishes that are sure to whet audience appetites.

100%

TOMATOMETER

Critic Ratings: 21

72%

Audience Score

User Ratings: 146

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Episodes

1. Pizza
Air date: Feb 23, 2018

While pizza purists in Brooklyn and Naples insist on classic ingredients, innovative chefs in Japan and beyond are redefining what makes a good pie.

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2. Tacos
Air date: Feb 23, 2018

Taco lovers introduce a skeptical David to an explosive array of flavors at LA food trucks, Arab-style taco joints and pop-up restaurant Noma Mexico.

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3. Home Cooking
Air date: Feb 23, 2018

As Dave and Peter Meehan help prep the Chang family's Thanksgiving feast, fellow chefs look back on their most powerful childhood memories of food.

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4. Shrimp & Crawfish
Air date: Feb 23, 2018

Frustrated by New Orleans chefs' stubborn refusal to try new things, Dave heads to immigrant-rich Houston for a taste of spicy Viet-Cajun cuisine.

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5. BBQ
Air date: Feb 23, 2018

While Peter explores the many flavors and styles of U.S. barbecue, Dave samples mind-blowing Peking duck, yakitori and Korean barbecue.

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6. Fried Chicken
Air date: Feb 23, 2018

Dave learns the tricks to making Nashville hot chicken, scopes out KFC's China menu and delves into the loaded history of soul food.

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7. Fried Rice
Air date: Feb 23, 2018

Forget fortune cookies and General Tso's chicken: Secret menu items, local delicacies and a lobster volcano reveal the true range of Chinese cuisine.

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8. Stuffed
Air date: Feb 23, 2018

Time for the ultimate showdown: Italian stuffed pasta vs. Asian dumplings. Will xiaolongbao or tortellini carry the day?

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Ugly Delicious: Season 1 Videos

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Tv Season Info

Over eight episodes, David travels the world with writers and chefs, activists and artists, who use food as a vehicle to break down cultural barriers, tackle misconceptions and uncover shared experiences. Ugly Delicious ventures out of polished kitchens into the wider world to explore Viet-Cajun cuisine in Houston, Neapolitan Pizza in Tokyo, home cooking in Copenhagen, and much more.

News & Interviews for Ugly Delicious: Season 1

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Critic Reviews for Ugly Delicious Season 1

All Critics (21) | Top Critics (13)

It's a cooking show that has explicit judgments, and that states them, and sometimes tries to work through them, which makes it less soothing than some other cooking shows, but also more interesting.

Dec 19, 2018 | Full Review…
Willa Paskin
Top Critic

Chang's best moments are thoughtful takes on the immigrant experience.

Jul 2, 2018 | Full Review…
Jessica Yadegaran
Top Critic

I don't watch much food television. What it serves up - competition, showiness - has never really made me hungry. Until now. David Chang's series "Ugly Delicious," on Netflix, makes me ravenous.

Mar 20, 2018 | Full Review…
Devra First
Top Critic

Those who prefer their pizza with the works should order up the first episode of "Ugly Delicious," the delightfully messy new series by renowned chef David Chang, who is grounded enough to appreciate the occasional slice of Domino's.

Feb 26, 2018 | Full Review…
Neal Justin
Top Critic

In the very least, it provides plenty of food for thought.

Feb 23, 2018 | Rating: A- | Full Review…
Hanh Nguyen
Top Critic

Don't watch [Ugly Delicious] while hungry.

Feb 23, 2018 | Full Review…
Allison Shoemaker
Top Critic

It's for want of a better term, woke cooking, and it makes for hypnotic watching, which is why I'd probably end up queuing for more of it.

Feb 15, 2019 | Full Review…
Anna Conrad

It tells a beautiful story of America and how we got here, one taco at a time.

Jan 28, 2019 | Full Review…
Ani Bundel

The message is reassuringly simple: the inelegant, ungainly and downright dangerously calorific is just as important as a three-Michelin-starred chef's latest dizzyingly complex concoction.

Dec 19, 2018 | Full Review…
Josh Baines

Food-culture show about more than just cuisine.

Mar 7, 2018 | Rating: 4/5 | Full Review…
Marty Brown

What gives chef David Chang's fun and frenetic series the edge is that it's one of the only food documentaries with the cajones to reflect on the food doc genre itself.

Feb 26, 2018 | Full Review…
Meghan O'Keefe

It's a playful approach to highly technical cooking that has influenced a generation of chefs, and inadvertently shaped the way millennials have come to think about eating. Not that Chang would ever want you to say that.

Feb 26, 2018 | Full Review…
Christine Friar
View All Critic Reviews (21)

Audience Reviews for Ugly Delicious: Season 1

  • Jun 08, 2020
    I'll give this show a motherfucking 4. As always, spoiler alert motherfucker. First of all, I'm not even done with the show, this is a premature rating. All I know is I'm finishing the show. I'm not a big fan of food shows. I'm on a diet and they make me hungry. Especially during the quarantine, I want to eat pizza. The last food show I enjoyed was man vs food. This motherfucker would go around and literally kill himself doing food challenges. You watched him as a normal health guy turn into a slightly more obese version of himself. I think he died in the end or something. Great fucking show though. Maybe I just like seeing people suffer. So we got this asian guy, who turns out to be like a semi-fat korean dude. When you think about it, I think the best cooks are going to be fat dudes. Born in America. Pretty serious guy, not a comedy show. He gets down to brass tacks. I guess he owns a restaurant or restaurants and is a big deal, it's what I gather from the show. What I like about the show: the editing is amazing. In this post mtv world, that reference is so dated. In this instagram world, where things flash here and there in a second to keep you entertained, this show satisfies you. It's not boring like in other cooking shows, where they follow a guy into a restaurant, and just watch him talk or eat. One second you're in china eating crawdads, the next second you are in Houston comparing the food. I find that really interesting. The guy seems really intelligent and knows a lot about cooking and gives his opinion. I watch these guys and wonder if they wash their hands before cooking, that's all I think about. It's actually very educational. They do these cartoons which educate you about food that are "fun" to watch and educational. After I watch them, I think, "Oh my god, I just fucking learned something." This show just makes me want to eat anything and everything in the world. Every meal should be a splendid celebration. You could eat a bowl of ramen for lunch or have the world's most delicious chicken tacos. Every meal eating just so you don't starve is real fucking waste. This show makes me want to start a business and make a living off a hobby or basically doing nothing. This lady started posting recipes on instagram and someone offered her a book deal. What the fuck? Why not me? There's so much money out there just waiting for me to get it I just have to figure out how to get it. 1. This show makes me hungry. 2. I learn interesting things which I can probably regurgitate to a first date to impress her to sleep with me in the future. 3. The guy is really fucking culinary smart. 4. edited extremely well, good flow and is not boring. 5. inspires me to eat amazing foods as opposed to shit everyday. 6. also inspires me to want to go out and make money somehow because it seems like every fucking human being on the planet is doing that instead of me. 7. a traveling show and cooking show in one Aziz Ansari is in this show, and all I can think about is, what is dating going to be like for him in the future. Get all that success and can't even get lawfully laid, that's the biggest catch 22. Domino's Fucking Pizza! This was the selling point of the show for me. I'm trash and eat at trash establishments. When that motherfucker put on a Domino's jacket and went to go check out a Domino's, I was sold. Because I don't know shit about no uppity restaurant in New York City. But I know what a fucking Domino's Pizza tastes like, and it tastes delicious. So, this show can be for the high class restaurantier (I just invented that word) or the average Joe Shmo eeking a life out on minimum wage. So fucking good. I fucking love Domino's. I think they really evolved during the years. I could eat there everyday until my body would start rejecting it.
    Vincent C
  • Mar 21, 2020
    I usually love these types of shows but just had to turn it off and could no longer watch current or future programs due to his racism and constant victimhood. He's wrong by the way regarding his opinion that there is no real Chinese food in America. He should spend time in the San Gabriel Valley, CA. People come from all over for REAL Chinese food in fact some of the restaurants have no English menus. He is so arrogant and bitter that even after visiting one of those San Gabrial Restaurants and asked if what he was eating was on the menu for everyone and was told yes, he still didn't change his tune in following episodes even though he loved what he ate.
    Steven F
  • Mar 16, 2020
    Peter Meehan says "there is a reductive quality to saying something is authentic" in the first episode. Throughout the season, David Chang (and his many wonderful guests) challenges a culture espoused by shows like "Chef's Table," where fine dining is meant to be the epitome of the culinary experience. Ugly can be delicious, delicious can be ugly, and the show embodies that philosophy to the max.
    Ji Y
  • Feb 27, 2020
    I genuinely want to like the show. I love cooking and love trying new food. But you can't make it through a single episode without talking about racism, or "because white people". People that make movies, or TV shows or any type of art make it through their eyes. Their perception. So I try to keep an open mind. But it's exhausting lately. You can't make it through anything on Netflix without hearing how white people are bad. Just like every other race... everyone is different. Some white people like genuine Chinese food and some don't. And sometimes it's not because they're racist, they just don't like it. Stop painting everyone with broad strokes. David Chang is funny, the food and culture behind it is interesting, but just like everything else nowadays it comes with a large side order of racism/politics.
    Dave G
  • Feb 17, 2020
    last memories, leftovers
    Raisul S
  • Jan 28, 2020
    I feel like the host focuses too much on making insults towards white American. I respect the host's knowledge, but he comes across ARROGANT & RACIST more and more each episode. I am hoping he was doing it just to appear interesting.
    Chris L
  • Jul 03, 2019
    Talks about elitism the entire series how it's wrong, but is an elitist when it comes to Asian foods.
    Jonathan C
  • May 11, 2019
    Would be excellent if it wasn't so politically charged. I loved episode one even with the Anti Trump joke. But episode two became a political open border, illegal immigrant sob story that once again shows that netflix is trying to manipulate viewers politics injecting open border globalist views into shows that do not need them. Food should be like religion or sex and have nothing to do with politics. This series would have been amazing if I didnt have to hear the partisan preaching.
  • Apr 24, 2019
    Could of been a better host , David Chang is very bias and not really open minded , he is very arrogant on the show , and he alone breaks the show for me
  • Feb 19, 2019
    The host Chang drops too many f-bombs for absolutely no reason. Seemingly encourages interviewees to swear as well, which to me takes away from the topic of the episode. The format made me think of Showtime's The Circus, except there's more swearing. We learn a bit at first, but I find the episodes tend to veer off into self-importance where a bunch of guys ramble on to the point of not liking any one of them. Too bad, I was hoping to like this one following my deception of Salt Fat Acid Heat, or rather its irritating host Samin Nosrat. Chang is just as annoying.
    Andre M
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