Cuisine & Culture
Gael Greene
The celebrated food critic Gael Greene earned her fame as New York magazine's New York magazine's "Insatiable Critic" for over 30 years and helped change the way Americans think about food. Two of her seven books were the best-selling novels, Blue Skies, No Candy and Doctor Love. Her most recent is a memoir, Insatiable: Tales from a Life of Delicious Excess, a spicy romp through the decades when America was falling in love with food, what she ate and what she did between meals. If you've read it, you'll understand at once why the story of her afternoon at the age of 20 with Elvis and a fried egg sandwich set the stage for her career as a passionate foodie.
Gael is also the co-founder with James Beard of the 25-year-old Citymeals-on-Wheels, which hand delivers over two-and-a-half million meals a year to the city's homebound elderly. She has received numerous awards for her continued efforts with Citymeals, including "Humanitarian of the Year" from the James Beard Foundation. She is also winner of the International Association of Cooking Professionals magazine writing award and a Silver Spoon from Food Arts magazine.
In an attempt to remain the anonymous restaurant critic, Gael has always hidden her face beneath hat brims in photographs and on television. She lives in New York City with her long-time partner, the distinguished photographer Steven Richter.
Gael Greene's new website, the Insatiable Critic, can be found at www.insatiablecritic.com.
Simon Winchester, OBE
Simon Winchester is an award-winning author and Asia expert, and is perhaps most famous for his New York Times best-selling book The Professor & The Madman about the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary. He has written books about China, India, Korea, and the Asia/Pacific region as a whole. His most recent book is A Crack in the Edge of the World: America and the Great California Earthquake of 1906.
Simon was Asia-Pacific Editor of Condé Nast Traveler magazine for almost a decade, and is now the magazine's Editor-at-Large. He lived for many years in New Delhi and Hong Kong, and has written about every corner of Asia (and the rest of the world) for a variety of prestigious publications including Harper's, The Smithsonian, The National Geographic Magazine, The New York Times and The Atlantic Monthly.
Simon has undergraduate and graduate degrees in geology from Oxford University (St. Catherine's College). He was made Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) by HM The Queen in 2006 in a ceremony at Buckingham Palace.