Jay Rayner

Jay Rayner (born 14 September 1966) is an English journalist and food critic. After editing the Leeds Student newspaper while at university, he wrote for The Observer, The Independent on Sunday, and The Mail on Sunday before returning to The Observer in 1996. Rayner became a restaurant critic in 1999 and developed a reputation for acerbity. Several of his reviews have been widely shared online, including a takedown of the Paris restaurant Le Cinq. Rayner has also been published in Esquire, Granta and Cosmopolitan, the last as a sex columnist. In 2025, he transferred from The Observer to the Financial Times. Rayner has published books, including a book about the 1947 BSAA Avro Lancastrian Star Dust accident, three compendiums of his columns, several works of fiction, and several works about food, including a cookbook. Rayner has presented the BBC program The Kitchen Cabinet and the podcast Out to Lunch and has judged numerous cooking shows for broadcasters including MasterChef, where he was nicknamed "Acid Rayner". In 2012, he founded a jazz band, the Jay Rayner Quartet, which changed its name to the Jay Rayner Sextet in 2022.