Joel McHale and Yolanda Gampp on Getting Salty in ‘Crime Scene Kitchen’ Season 2 With Savory Dish Twist

In Foxs Crime Scene Kitchen, its not (entirely) about who wins or loses the most-delicious-baked-good portion, its about how you play the baking-detective game.

For the second season, which premieres Monday at 9 p.m., host Joel McHale and judge Yolanda Gampp said the competition becomes even harder, as it includes both self-taught and classically trained bakers who come at deciphering the mystery baked goods in very different ways. This season also throws savory recipes into the mix in an attempt to trip up contestants who saw only sweet treats featured in Season 1.

The new bakers all saw the show, and I will say a lot of them swore they could do it, McHale, who also hosted the first season of Crime Scene Kitchen back in 2021, told Variety. Its just like anything you see while youre watching it at home, youre like, I can do that, I can figure that out. And then because we opened up the competition a little bit, so now it can be sweet and savory, we put in another variable that did stump a lot of them. Because some of them were classically trained, they knew their stuff very well. But some of the non-classically trained ones thought out of the box a little bit. I would say the advantages are almost equal, in a weird way.

On Mondays premiere, youll be introduced to the six teams of self-taught bakers, with the classically trained crew coming in next weeks episode. Further along in the season, the two groups will be combined. And without giving anything away until the Confectionator 3000 does, that is McHale assures that some wild choices will be made this season, along with some surprisingly accurate guesses.

I find it hilarious when they have no clue what it is and they make something completely off the wall, McHale said. And Im like, its gonna be tasty! And then its always scary when they get it dead on. It added a very nice rub to it with no pun intended, because I love a good barbecue rub and I think they get a little more in the crime scenes and its a bit more streamlined.

Cake decorating extraordinaire Gampp, who is a self-taught baker and social media star, is back judging Crime Scene Kitchen alongside celebrity chef Curtis Stone, who has a professional education in sweets. Gampp says she and Stone were mindful of their differences when assessing the strengths and weaknesses of each group.

Self-taught bakers tend to be really scrappy, Gampp said. Youve learned the ropes yourself, youll try anything, obviously. Thats why youre self taught because youre willing to learn from disappointment and your mistakes. So in that respect, I think thats a better advantage in a competition, because youre perhaps better under pressure. The advantage of being classically trained is you have all this back knowledge of a lot of different types of pastry and baking. No matter what those clues tell you, you probably have some knowledge and background or practice in all the avenues of bakery and patisserie. And you can see how it plays in their minds, too, because if I was on the show as a self-taught baker, I would think these classically trained backers are going to have an advantage. But baking has a lot of rules, its not like cooking where you can be as free so the classically trained might stop themselves from thinking through what the clues could actually be and go more classic each time.

Those are the mental components of judging Crime Scene Kitchen, but what about the physical aspects?

Heres what worked in Season 2: not eating breakfast, McHale said. I knew that on a big day, especially in the beginning, theres going to be six different dishes coming out a couple times. Id be like, just drink coffee, because youre gonna eat like a king or in a couple hours. I gained over 9 lbs., just like I did the year before. I really did. And I never got lunch. I just kind of would go, alright youre just gonna be eating, its the sacrifice youre making for television, which is really Gods work.

Gampp was just grateful that savory recipes helped break up the sugar intake with a little salt.

From a judges perspective, its great because it was less of a sugar crash, Gampp said. The days we had something savory were like, at least we wont be a sugar cube today. I think theres a lot of room for savory baking, I love savory. I wont give away what savory we do, but I love that theres different flavor profiles this time.