Swapping their pens for pinnies, critics including Jay Rayner, Tom Parker Bowles, Tracey MacLeod, Bill Knott, Charles Campion, Joe Warwick, and Lucas Hollweg faced the heat of the kitchen to produce a three-course dinner for guests at the event hosted by Coq d’Argent.

Dinner was followed by live and silent auctions, with attendees bidding for prizes. A place on The Great Mozarella Run – a seven-day gastronomic tour through Italy – was the highest grossing lot, raising £7,000.

A home-cooked dinner for six by master chocolatier Paul A.Young went for £3,000, while an 11-night South African adventure for two raised a further £2,220.

Taking a welcome break from the kitchen, many top chefs were in attendance to pass judgment on the critics’ culinary efforts, including Pascal Aussignac, Michael Wignall, Michael Weiss, Claire Clark, Cyrus Todiwala and Vivek Singh.

Bill Knott, critic and ACF ambassador, said: “Of all the Too Many Critics dinners we've staged, I think this was probably the most successful: no disasters in the kitchen, a very merry throng in the dining room, and lots of money raised for a great cause. Two Germans in the room even commented that the sauerkraut was "spot on": high praise indeed.”

Too Many Critics followed a weekend which saw some 45,000 people descend on Hyde Park to demand G8 leaders tackle the causes of hunger as part of the Enough Food For Everyone If campaign and major breakthroughs being made in the fight against malnutrition.

Action Against Hunger works in many of the world’s poorest countries including Myanmar, Niger, D.R.Congo and Somalia to save the lives of malnourished children and provide families with the support and nutrition they need to feed their children.