• Leaders The power of Macarena Rey, the 'mamma' of MasterChef: "People should not compete if they do not know how to lose"

After months of filming, with the largest casting ever experienced in an edition of MasterChef, with the judges "exhausted", next Monday, March 27, the 11th edition of MasterChef arrives at RTVE's prime time. And it will not be an edition like those of so far.

At the request of RTVE, Shine Iberia, the producer of culinary talent, has embarked on a mammoth adventure: twice as many contestants, twice as many days, twice as many tests and twice as many broadcasts. Yes, MasterChef 11 premieres this Monday, but only the first installment, since the second, and so it will be all this edition, will be broadcast the next day, on Tuesdays.

The idea is to shorten the broadcast of MasterChef that has always lasted until dawn. To do this, RTVE asked the producer to duplicate everything. In the new edition 30 aspirants participate, divided into two groups, who will have to face more tests than their predecessors.

On Mondays, except for this first one that will last longer due to the pre-selection and auqe the gigantic casting of 1,0000 candidates will be shown at the gates of the Royal Palace, it will last somewhat longer than the rest of the programs.

But after this first, the division of two episodes per week will be as follows: on Mondays all the tests will be on set, now with one set more than in other MasterChef. There will be a first test and a second that will be eliminatory. That is, each week two contestants will be eliminated, one in each program.

On Tuesdays there will be an introduction on set and the outdoor test that this year will travel Spain from Cádiz to Andorra "going through everything in between," says Samantha Vallejo-Nágera. From the cathedral of Toledo, to Cuenca, gastronomic capital 2023, to the ski slopes of Andorra, to a nursing home, an exterior that MasterChef had been wanting to do since the pandemic and that they promise will be more than emotional.

The only thing that does not change is that at the head of all this macrocanstig, "the biggest we have done for years," says Macarena Rey, CEO of Shine Iberia, follow Pepe Rodríguez, Samantha Vallejo-Nágera and Jordi Cruz. The three agree that "life two", that is, MasterChef, "has ended up eating life one".

They have never experienced such a hard shoot – filming that has not yet ended so the winner of the MasterChef trophy still has an owner – and never before have they spent so many hours dedicated to culinary talent. "At first we got a little scared," Samantha says of the day Shine told them Masterchef 11 was going to be double. "We see Jordi or Macarena more than our families. It's like a series that you have to get hooked on from the beginning, he says.

And Pepe Rodríguez adds that "you leave your skin, that's how they demanded it from us and that's how we charge it." Because for the three chefs and for the entire MasterChef team, their eleventh edition has been more than a challenge, but a challenge that anyone would dream of.

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