TV chef allegedly caught 'racking up' live on morning show

A rogue TV producer may have exposed the secret ingredient to a Slovakian chef's success after a quick cut to the kitchen during a morning program showed the cook manipulating a line of white powder with a credit card.

Also at the ready in the fellow's hand is a rolled up banknote, leading viewers to believe that the substance probably wasn't castor sugar.

The chef, Ľubomír Herko, who has made appearances on Markiza network's Telerano show for years, didn't seem to be overly fazed by the apparent gotcha moment, and offered a thin "what can you do" smile as the cameraman executed a cruel close up.

Suffice to say, neither management nor the public were particularly impressed, with more than 80 percent of respondents in one poll of the opinion that Herko should probably take his culinary skills somewhere far away from their living rooms.

"We consider this a totally inappropriate joke that does not have (any place on our network)," Markiza spokeswoman Tatiana Tóthová is quoted by topsky.sk as saying.

"There will be consequences."