Mark Bittman

Mark Bittman, one of the leading voices in the food movement, has been called a visionary for his rallying cry to change the way America eats. His seminal book, Food Matters - a New York Times bestseller - broke new ground in exploring the links among food, health, and the environment while providing tangible guidance for Americans to rethink their diet.

Bittman has been writing and speaking about food for 30 years, mostly through print and the web pages of The New York Times (he created "The Minimalist" for the Dining section in 1997, and is a contributor to both Week in Review and The Magazine). He is the author of several blockbuster cookbooks, appears regularly on both commercial and public television, and is a highly sought-after speaker on food and its role in American culture and health.

Prior to tackling food in general, Bittman set out to teach Americans to cook by publishing How to Cook Everything, which won three international cookbook awards, the IACP/Julia Child Award, and the James Beard Award (twice), and which has become the bible of cooking for millions of Americans. His follow-up, How to Cook Everything Vegetarian, was one of the best-selling cookbooks of 2007 and a multiple award-winner. His most recent book, Mark Bittman's Kitchen Express, hit The New York Times bestseller list the week it was released.

Bittman is also the host of the TV series Bittman Takes on America's Chefs, which won the James Beard Award for the best cooking series of 2005 and continues to run regularly. He also hosts The Best Recipes in the World and hosted the special, Spain: On the Road Again, in which with he co-starred with Gwyneth Paltrow and Mario Batali. He appears twice a month on The Today Show.

During the late '90s, Bittman created a best-selling collaboration with the internationally celebrated chef, Jean-Georges Vongerichten. Their classic, Jean-Georges: Cooking at Home with a Four-Star Chef, is widely considered to be among the most accessible chef's cookbooks ever published. Bittman's first book, Fish—The Complete Guide to Buying and Cooking is the best-selling contemporary book on the subject. Among his other works are the blockbuster The Best Recipes in the World and the award-winning "Minimalist" cookbooks, now collected in Mark Bittman's Simple and Easy Recipes from The New York Times.