World Food Championships

The World Food Championships (WFC) is an international cooking competition hosting its ninth annual event in Dallas, Texas at Fair Park from 05–09 November 2021. The competition puts chefs and home cooks on a level playing field, all competing for a piece of the $350,000 prize purse. After three rounds of challenges across ten categories, ten Category Champions are crowned and will later reconvene to battle it out at The Final Table for the World Food Champion title and $100,000 grand prize.

World Food Championships
Status	Active
Genre	Cooking competition
Date(s)	November
Frequency	Annually
Venue	The Wharf
Location(s)	Orange Beach, Alabama
Country	United States
Established	2012

Produced by MMA Creative, an advertising agency located in Cookeville, Tennessee, the inaugural event was hosted in Las Vegas, Nevada in 2012. Since then, the championships has moved host cities periodically, working with city tourism departments to bring the larger than life culinary event to different cities such as Kissimmee, Florida, Orange Beach, Alabama and finally Dallas, Texas.

After several years as the marketing agency for Kansas City Barbecue Society, Mike McCloud, President and CEO of WFC, began his journey to create an all-encompassing food competition that ranks the best chefs and home cooks in the world.

Yearly, more than 500 previously qualified teams travel from the United States and abroad to stake their claim at WFC. Earning their way to the competition by winning a Golden Ticket at a WFC sanctioned event, competitors are all trying to take home a piece of the $350,000 prize purse.

WFC has been filmed numerous times, starting with FYI as the World Food Championships TV series. Since then, it has been seen on the Discovery Network's Destination America, ABC's NIGHTLINE, CBS Sunday Morning, Voice of America, Food Network and CNBC’s “The Final Table: New Orleans”.

With 2020 being cancelled on grounds of COVID-19 pandemic, the 9th was deferred to 2021.