Published 13:23 4 May 2026 GMT+1

Met Gala menu explained and the four foods you'll never see on there

Anna Wintour says she's 'not particularly fond' of the banned dishes

Kiesha Dosanjh

It’s almost time for fashion's biggest night of the year! Tonight, we’ll see hundreds of celebrities congregating on the red carpet at the New York City's Metropolitan Museum of Art - but what goes on after the red carpet remains a mystery.

We do know that the celebrities sit down at the Met Gala for a slap up meal, although what’s on the menu tonight is not yet known.

However, celebrity chefs from previous years have dished the goss on what goes on in the kitchen, and just how much planning goes into the slap up meal.

And one thing’s for certain, there’s four things that definitely won’t be seen on the A-Lister’s plates…

Met Gala menu explained

The Met hires celebrity chefs for the event, which last year, included Kwame Onwuachi, who cheffed up papaya piri-piri salad, Creole roasted chicken and BBQ collard greens, as per Vogue.

The Gala started bringing in celebrity chefs in 2021, and they’ve been a hit ever since.

In 2022, Top Chef winner Melissa King was one of the chefs who took to the kitchen, and she dished all to The Cut the next day.

There's four specific foods you won't see inside the Met (Photo by Arturo Holmes/MG25/Getty Images for The Met Museum/Vogue)

When asked how exactly they plan the menu, King revealed that Wintour is ‘involved every step of the way’.

“There were certainly a lot of emails,” she said. “There’s a pass-off of the menu and several tastings, as well as quick checks about what’s working and what’s not, then we tweak it from there. It took a few months, and that’s just me speaking on my one dish.”

King also revealed that the team of celebrity chefs work alongside a catering team, but there’s four dishes you’ll never see them serve…

Which foods are banned from the Met Gala?

Believe it or not, as well as a strict guest list, Vogue chief Anna Wintour also has a strict food list - with four foods reportedly banned from the event.

Although us civilians have no idea what’s going on inside the party, former Vogue employees have previously spoken out, and given us a taste of what’s inside (or not!)

For years, there were rumors swirling around that Wintour had banned garlic, onion and parsley from the menu - which she recently confirmed to be true.

“Those are three things I’m not particularly fond of,” Wintour told Today last year. “And so yes, that’s true.”

Of course, garlic and onion are notorious for causing bad breath, whereas parsley can easily get stuck in teeth. Not good for the photo ops!

The fourth food banned, although not confirmed by Wintour, is bruschetta, a Vogue employee recently told the New York Post in 2016.

But why is the tasty Italian snack banned? Well, reportedly it’s due to the risk of it spilling and ruining the fancy gowns.

Fair!

Onions are a strict no-no (Getty Stock Image)

Met Gala 2026 theme explained

We’ve seen some truly bonkers Met Gala looks in the past, but the celebs who attend are actually given a dress code, as well as an invitation to tailor their outfits to the event’s theme.

The Met Gala doubles as a launch event for the Costume Institute's spring exhibition, and the theme is generally aligned with that, along with a slightly more open-to-interpretation dress code.

This year’s theme is ‘Costume Art’, to tie in with a Costume Institute exhibition, which pairs paintings and sculptures with historical and contemporary clothes.

It looks to deal with ‘the centrality of the dressed body in the museum’s vast collection’.

The dress code is a bit more vague: Fashion is Art.

To me, that is even more anxiety-inducing than ‘smart-casual’. British Vogue says the dress code ‘encourages attendees to consider the many ways that designers use the body as their blank canvas’.

Previous themes and dress code have included: