Aarón Sánchez (born February 12, 1976) is a Mexican celebrity chef, restaurateur, television personality, cookbook author and philanthropist. He is the executive chef and part-owner of the Mexican restaurant Johnny Sánchez in New Orleans.
He co-starred on Food Network's hit series Chopped and Chopped Jr. and hosted Cooking Channel's Emmy-nominated Taco Trip. He has appeared on Iron Chef America, and is one of the few chefs whose battles have ended in a draw, tying with Masaharu Morimoto in "Battle Black Bass" in Season 2. He was also a contestant on The Next Iron Chef. He is the author of two cookbooks, and had a memoir released October 1, 2019. An active philanthropist, Sánchez launched the Aarón Sánchez Scholarship Fund, an initiative empowering aspiring chefs from the Latin community to follow their dreams and attend culinary school. As of 2017, he is one of the judges/hosts of FOX's hit reality-TV culinary competition series MasterChef since Season 8 onwards after previously guest-starring in a select number of episodes in Season 7 as a guest judge, co-hosting alongside Gordon Ramsay, Joe Bastianich and Christina Tosi. He has also joined the judging panel of MasterChef Junior since its 7th season, which debuted in March 2019, after guest-starring in Season 5, which debuted early 2017.
