Good Food - Good Food

Good Food is a lifestyle channel broadcasting in the United Kingdom and Ireland as part of the UKTV network of channels. The channel originally launched on 5 November 2001 and relaunched in its current format on 22 June 2009. Good Food is available on satellite through Sky, on cable services, primarily through Virgin Media, and through IPTV with TalkTalk TV, BT TV. It is available through TVPlayer (When subscribed to TVPlayer Plus).

History

The channel originally launched on 5 November 2001 as UK Food, as a channel dedicated to cookery programmes that had previously been broadcast on the increasingly crowded UK Style channel. The channel uses a large amount of programming from the BBC's programme archive. The channel is similar to a former international channel run by BBC Worldwide called BBC Food, as both use similar programming and both have a similar format. The channel changed its name on 8 March 2004 to UKTV Food.

As part of the rebranding of all UKTV's channels to a unique name and identity, UKTV Food rebranded as Good Food on 22 June 2009, the last of UKTV's brands to do so. The name is based on that of the Good Food cookery magazine, published by Immediate Media Company. The channel and the magazine continue to be operated separately.

Timeshift

The network also operates a time shifted version of the channel Good Food +1, which shows the same schedule an hour later for catch up purposes. The time shifted channel does not use any special branding, with the occasional exception of a change in Digital on-screen graphic (DOG). The time shift channel is available on Sky and Virgin Media.

Good Food HD

On 13 July 2009, Virgin Media revealed that they were "currently in active talks" with UKTV about launching a high-definition version of Good Food on their cable television platform. Good Food HD launched on 31 August 2010 on Sky, broadcasting a HD simulcast of the channel's schedule. As part of Virgin Media's deal to sell its share of UKTV, all five of UKTV's HD channels were added to Virgin's cable television service by 2012. Good Food HD was added to Virgin Media on 7 October 2011.

Identity

When UK Food channel launched in 2001, the channel adopted a branding package based around circular shaped foods with a spiral pattern located in the centre when looked at from above. The channel's logo at the time featured the name, stylised as ^UK Food, and a two lined spiral extending outwards from the right of the name. The majority of UKTV channels had some pattern located there to distinguish the channel, and this spiral also featured in the idents themselves as well as channel promotions.

Following the rebranding as UKTV Food, the channels identity was altered. The swirling motif was retained within the idents themselves: indeed many of the previous idents survived the rebrand to be reused again. The primary difference was the addition of the two lined UKTV logo, aligned to the left of the screen. The channels colour was orange, and was used in different shades as the background colour to all promotion end boards and static slides both on the channel and for promotion across the network.

Following the rebrand to Good Food, the idents changed to sequences involving the coming together of ingredients to events such as a picnic barbecue, a dinner party and a family Sunday roast. The idents finish with an endboard featuring the circular Good Food logo in the centre of a screen with food imagery in the background, such as fish outlines, knife and fork or wine glasses.

Programming

The channel primarily airs programming from the BBC's programming archive and programming aired on other domestic and international channels bought in by the channel. These programmes include:

• 4 Ingredients
• Ace of Cakes
• Alive and Cooking
• Barefoot Contessa
• Chefs in the City
• Choccywoccydoodah
• Dinner Impossible
• Everyday Gourmet with Justine Schofield
• Good Chef Bad Chef
• Iron Chef Australia
• James Martin's Brittany
• James Martin's Mediterranean
• Luke Nguyen's Vietnam
• Man v. Food
• Market Kitchen
• Mary Berry at Home
• MasterChef
• MasterChef Australia
• MasterChef Ireland
• Mitch and Matt's Big Fish
• Monster Munchies
• My Restaurant Rules
• New Brititsh Kitchen
• Nigella Bites
• Oliver's Twist
• Paul Hollywood's Bread
• Rachel Allen: Bake!
• Rhodes Across India
• Rhodes Across Italy
• Rhodes Across the Caribbean
• Saturday Kitchen
• The Best in Australia
• Top Chef
• Top Chef: Just Desserts
• World's Weirdest Restaurants

Website

The Good Food website, originally devised and launched by Ian Fenn and Ally Branley, provides a number of services including information on programmes shown on the channel, recipes, message boards, and a wine club. Recipes come from the various shows on Good Food and some include videos taken from the demonstrations. In September 2006 Good Food's website overtook the BBC Food site in popularity for the first time, achieving a 10% market share, against the 9.63% the BBC Food site dropped to, having held the top spot since it began.