Culinary Class Wars

흑백요리사 — "black-and-white chefs." The Korean title translates literally to "black and white chef: culinary class war," a reference to the show's two tiers of contestants: 20 established "White Spoon" chefs with public reputations, and 80 anonymous "Black Spoon" cooks fighting to be taken seriously.

A hundred cooks, one season. Season 1 ran 12 episodes across four release batches in autumn 2024 and became one of Netflix's biggest non-English hits, driven almost entirely by how much real food it puts on screen — this catalogue covers a representative, food-dense spread of the season's signature and judged dishes rather than every dish every contestant ever plated.

Aliases before names. Round 1 contestants compete and are judged under colorful aliases — "Napoli Matfia," "God of Seasoning," "Triple Star" — with their real names and résumés withheld until later rounds. This catalogue uses the alias current to the episode in question and notes real names only where they were revealed on screen by the point of that dish.

The prize is real money, not just a title. The eventual winner takes home ₩300 million — a genuinely life-changing sum for most of the field, which is part of why the Round 4 restaurant mission's real sales numbers land as such high stakes.