Ruth Reichl joined Gourmet as Editor in Chief in April 1999. She came to the magazine from The New York Times, where she had been the restaurant critic since 1993. As chef and co-owner of The Swallow Restaurant from 1974 to 1977, she played a part in the culinary revolution that took place in Berkeley, California. In the years that followed, she served as restaurant critic for New West and California magazines. In 1984, she became restaurant critic of the Los Angeles Times, where she was also named food editor.

Reichl began writing about food in 1972, when she published Mmmmm: A Feastiary. Since then, she has authored the critically acclaimed, best-selling memoirs Tender at the Bone, Comfort Me With Apples, and Garlic and Sapphires, which have been translated into fourteen languages. She is the editor of The Modern Library Food Series, which currently includes ten books. She has also written the introductions for Nancy Silverton´s Breads from the La Brea Bakery: Recipes for the Connoisseur (1996) and Measure of Her Powers: An M.F.K. Fisher Reader (2000). She is featured on the cover of Dining Out: Secrets from America´s Leading Critics, Chefs and Restaurants, by Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page (1998).

–Reichl began writing about food in 1972, when she published Mmmmm: A Feastiary. Since then, she has authored the critically acclaimed, best-selling memoirs Tender at the Bone, Comfort Me With Apples, and Garlic and Sapphires.

Download Press Photos Download Printable Bio

She is the editor of Endless Feasts: Sixty Years of Writing from Gourmet, Remembrance of Things Paris: Sixty Years of Writing from Gourmet, and The Gourmet Cookbook, released September 2004. Her lecture, "Why Food Matters," delivered in October 2005, will be published in The Tanner Lectures On Human Values, Volume 28, in 2006. History in a Glass: Sixty Years of Wine Writing from Gourmet (Modern Library), which she also edited, will be published in March of 2006. Ms. Reichl hosted "Eating Out Loud," three specials on Food Network, covering New York (2002), San Francisco (2003), and Miami (2003). She is a regular host with Leonard Lopate for a live monthly food show on WNYC radio in New York.

Reichl has been honored with four James Beard Awards (two for restaurant criticism, in 1996 and 1998; one for journalism, in 1994; and Who´s Who of Food and Beverage in America, 1984) and with numerous awards from the Association of American Food Journalists. She is also the recipient of the YWCA´s Elizabeth Cutter Morrow Award. She holds a B.A. and an M.A. in the History of Art from the University of Michigan, and lives in New York City with her husband, Michael Singer, a television news producer, and their son.

Print Recipe