Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Yes, Chef! Christmas’ On Lifetime, Where Tia Mowry Cooks Up Some Holiday Cheer, And Also Cake Boss Is There

If you’re thinking this is just the latest entry in the Yes, Chef! series that has previously encompassed Yes, Chef!, Yes, Chef! 2: No, Chef, and Yes, Chef! Arbor Day, you would be incorrect. Despite the inexplicable syntax of the title this is an entirely original Lifetime movie featuring Tía Mowry as a culinary instructor who dreams of something more. Will she get her Christmas wish, or is her pudding cooked? Read on to find out.

YES, CHEF! CHRISTMAS: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: Snow in Chicago as Christmas music plays. We settle on the Chicago Institute of Culinary Arts, where an unseen woman (god???) says, “Great semester everyone, we’ll see you in the New Year.”

The Gist: It’s not god, it’s Tía Mowry, aka Alicia Gellar, our main character. She’s a culinary instructor who dreams of getting back to being a chef after a traumatic experience in her past. She’s also adopted and her mother recently died and she’s single and her dad bought a duplex with her and she’s waiting on the results of a DNA test that will reveal her true parentage and also she loves Christmas.

Is there a lot going on in this movie? Oh, just wait, as a mysterious man tastes the food she makes at the old folks home she volunteers at, and she ends up as part of the Kringle Cook-Off, a yearly competition held by a rich family to determine who is going to cater their Christmas party or something? And then she’s paired with Logan (Luke Humphrey) a cranky chef who is her mentor but perhaps she’s going to strike up a flirtation with? And in between all this, she’s best friends with a guy named Bobby, who you might recognize as Buddy Valestro, aka Cake Boss. In a huge stretch that should probably win him an Emmy, Bobby teaches Alicia how to make a cake at one point, and then tells her she’s a boss.

Anyway, you can see where this is going. Enemies to lovers with Logan. Birth parents revealed. Coming to terms with dead mom. She even manages to get past her trauma from her previous restaurant job. And in between all of this, lots and lots of food porn, which is very much appreciated.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Not a movie, but the title is clearly trying to siphon some heat off The Bear, though other than the main character being a chef in Chicago there’s no connection. Also not a movie: Top Chef, given the cooking competition. Though structurally it’s closer to Iron Chef, which is also not a movie. Anyway, it’s not like a movie, I guess, so much as an entire season of TV in 90 minutes.

Performance Worth Watching: Seems ridiculous to say Tía Mowry, but there’s a reason she’s been a star for the past three decades. She’s loose, funny, and knows how to command the screen.

Memorable Dialogue: “For this to work, you have to start treating me like an equal. This isn’t Hell’s Kitchen.” We do love a self-aware movie, don’t we folks?

A Holiday Tradition: The city’s annual Kringle Cook-Off, of course. It’s annual! On Christmas! And the family name is Kringle, even though they’re not canonically related to Santa Claus. There’s also a magic golden coin that grants wishes early in the movie?? Which does not come back later???

Does the Title Make Any Sense?: Alicia literally says, “Yes, Chef!” in the final few minutes of the movie, and it’s all about cooking a Christmas dinner, so sure.

Our Take: There is, and I cannot overstate this enough, a lot going on in this movie. Too much, even. This is a personal preference, but I would have loved to see more focus on a slow-burn enemies-to-lovers plot than what the movie seems more concerned with… The whole DNA test/real parents plot. In fact, after the requisite, initial “we don’t know each other and we hate each other oops now we’re thrust together by forces beyond our control” sequence, the movie pretty much settles Logen and Alicia as best friends/love interests and its kind of a bummer. Having a movie where a Gordon Ramsay type slowly falls in love with his assigned protegé? I’d say “yes, chef!” to that.

But that’s not what this movie wants to do, and that’s okay. Raven Dauda is particularly good as Viola Kringle, and brings a real gravity to all her scenes. Jon Keonsgen as Ken Gellar, aka Alicia’s adoptive father, is also a classic Good Guy sitcom dad, and he’s got a nice charming growl going on in his vocal range.

Most importantly, though, the food porn is pretty good. Not stellar, but when the movie goes into food sequences it’s solid. Maybe Yes, Chef! St. Patrick’s Day will elevate that aspect of things.

Our Call: STREAM IT! There’s too much going on, but Tía Mowry is engaging and funny, and there’s enough backstory here for at least five prequels.