Celebrity Chef - Joanne Weir

Ms. Weir has an extensive culinary background with regards to the history, theory and technique of Mediterranean cuisine, as well as the regional foods of the United States, particularly California. These elements are brought to life in her creative, thoughtful, enthusiastic classes, writing and television series.

Exclusive Foodfreeway Recipes from Joanne Weir:

Semolina Gnocchi w/ Brown Butter and Crisp Sage

Visit Joanne's Web Site (link)

Joanne's Bio:

Joanne Weir is many things…a world traveler… a James Beard Award-winning cookbook author… a culinary teacher… a chef and television personality. Never one to sit still for long, Joanne is home at last, bringing her flair for life and love of all things edible back to her beloved hometown, San Francisco. In "Weir Cooking in the City", her 26-part PBS series and companion book, for which Joanne received a 2005 James Beard Award for Best Cookbook in the General Category, Joanne invites even the most hardened city dweller to break free from routine to celebrate and savor the "mini food meccas" that are often tucked away in a city's most surprising spots. On film and in words, she captures the inventiveness, diversity and charm hidden in the flavors of San Francisco and proves no matter where you live, from Boston to Seattle, there is a world of enticing foods and culture just waiting to be explored.

Awarded the very first IACP Julia Child Cooking Teacher Award of Excellence in 1997, Joanne shares a lifetime of experience that flavors everything she touches. Her first book, From Tapas to Meze (Crown, 1994,) was selected by Julia Child as one of her 12 personal favorites out of 1000 cookbooks published that year. From there she went on to publish a library of delights including a series of books for Williams Sonoma in 1997 called Seasonal Celebrations, You Say Tomato (Broadway Books 1998) and Weir Cooking, Recipes from the Wine Country (Time Life, 1999.) Her talents were finally brought to life in the PBS show "Weir Cooking in the Wine Country", shot on location in the Napa Valley. The companion book, Weir's More Cooking in the Wine Country (Simon & Schuster, 2001) went on to garner a James Beard Award nomination as well as an IACP Cookbook Award. A completely revised version of From Tapas to Meze (Ten Speed Press, 2004) was re-released with spectacular food photographs and won the 2004 Gourmand World Cookbook Award for Best Mediterranean Cookbook.

Joanne's passion for home cooking was stoked by a legacy of life in the kitchen. Joanne's great-grandmother operated a restaurant in Boston at the turn of the century called Pilgrim's Pantry. That enthusiasm for food was passed down to her mother, a professional chef and caterer, who worked for years with the legendary cookbook author, Charlotte Turgeon. Joanne continues that same tradition, though it wasn't until after getting a degree in Art Education from the University and Massachusetts and teaching Fine Arts in Boston that she found her way back to the table.

Joanne spent five years cooking with Alice Waters at Chez Panisse in Berkeley, California and studied with Madeleine Kamman in New England and France and was awarded a Master Chef Diploma. Her ultimate calling has been in her teaching, which has taken her throughout the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, France, Italy and as of late, Thailand. She spends seven to eight months of the year touring the globe sharing her extensive background with regard to food theory and technique, in particular Mediterranean cuisine and the regional foods of the U.S. All these elements come alive in her thoughtful classes as well as her delightful words and television series.