BBC confirm Gregg Wallace’s replacement on MasterChef

The new co-host has previously appeared on the show.

Dent, who has featured as a guest on the show on several occasions, will join John Torode for the upcoming season of Celebrity MasterChef.

The news comes weeks after Wallace stepped down from the series after facing allegations of inappropriate behaviour across a number of television shows over a 17-year period, all of which he emphatically denies.

The 60-year-old had been a co-presenter and judge on the popular BBC cooking show since 2005.

Earlier this month, Wallace responded to the series of allegations with a video posted to Instagram in which he singled out a “handful of middle-class women of a certain age”.

“I’ve been doing MasterChef for 20 years – amateur, professional and Celebrity MasterChef – and I think in that time I have worked with over 4,000 contestants of all different ages, all different backgrounds, all walks of life,” Wallace told his more than 200,000 followers.

“And apparently now, I’m reading in the paper, there’s been 13 complaints in that time.

“Now, in the newspaper I can see the complaints coming from a handful of middle-class women of a certain age just from Celebrity MasterChef. This isn’t right.”

He added: “In over 20 years of television, can you imagine how many women, female contestants on MasterChef, have made sexual remarks or sexual innuendo – can you imagine?”

The allegations of misconduct ranged from making a rape joke while on the set of MasterChef to walking nude into the studio with just a sock covering his privates.

Author and podcaster Dent appeared last year as a contestant on MasterChef: Battle Of The Critics.

She said: ‘I’ve been watching MasterChef since I was a girl sitting with my dad on the sofa. My whole family watches it. It’s all about uncovering and championing talent – and to have ended up in this position, is more than a dream to me.

"I’m so excited that I can’t eat, which is severely detrimental to a restaurant critic. I feel very lucky to be stepping in for the next Celebrity MasterChef.

"I can’t wait to meet the fresh celebrity faces for 2025."