Possibly cheating, because anime, but Shokugeki no Soma (Food Wars). Initially a series following the protagonist as he entered a school where every dispute was settled with a cook off between two students (and sometimes a teacher). This seems over the top, but the food was always solid (they had a consultant just for it) and felt like something you could make with the right skill and ingredients.

In the final arc, they toss this all out to introduce a villain who can steal a chef’s signature dish/technique (something that is supposed to be unique to that chef) he gets a hold of their knife after winning a food battle. And he can wield those knives in any combination to form new dishes no one else can do. Just because. Also the dishes get less interesting in general, because it’s about powers related to cooking and not the food.

[–] dejected_warp_core@lemmy.world 4 points 1 week ago

Yeah, it kinda fell prey to Shonen-itis. Power-scaling in this genre requires a steady and firm hand to keep the show on a slow burn, without having to jump to "Super-Sayian 4 God Kaio-Ken x10" shenanigans.

I will say that the show still has some golden moments. The "stinky food battle" had some of the best reactions and visuals.