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Andrew Zimmern
Four-Time James Beard Award-Winning TV Personality, Chef, Writer & Social Justice Advocate
Andrew Zimmern is an Emmy-winning and four-time James Beard Award-winning TV personality, chef, writer and social justice advocate. As the creator, executive producer and host of the "Bizarre Foods" franchise, "Andrew Zimmern’s Driven by Food," MSNBC’s "What’s Eating America," Magnolia Network’s Emmy-nominated "Family Dinner," and the Emmy-winning "The Zimmern List," he has devoted his life to exploring and promoting cultural acceptance, tolerance and understanding through food. You can also find him judging "Iron Chef: Quest for an Iron Legend" on Netflix, "The Silos Baking Competition" on HBO Max, and teaching live fire cooking on Outdoor Channel’s "Andrew Zimmern’s Wild Game Kitchen."
Zimmern’s first book, "The Bizarre Truth," offered a behind-the-scenes look at cultures in his favorite destinations. "Andrew Zimmern’s Bizarre World of Food: Brains, Bugs and Blood Sausage" gives younger fans a backstage look at his culinary adventures. A book for young adults, "Andrew Zimmern’s Field Guide to Exceptionally Weird, Wild, Wonderful Foods" is a pop culture-influenced look at fantastic and bizarre ingredients. His latest offering, a grade level reader series called "Alliance of World Explorers, Volume 1: AZ and the Lost City of Ophir" was released in February 2019 and won the Gold IPPY in Juvenile Fiction.
Zimmern hosted the three-part 2019 Conversations at Copia in partnership with the Culinary Institute of America to publicize, educate and amplify the hard conversations around social justice and food. He is an entrepreneur-in-residence at The Lewis Institute for Social Innovation at Babson College. In 2022, he was a contributor to the White House Strategic Policy for Hunger, Nutrition and Health and a contributor to the White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition and Health. Through the James Beard Foundation and the Culinary Institute of America he funds Andrew Zimmern’s Second Chances Scholarships, which offer students faced with extreme challenges an opportunity to follow a culinary path.
Zimmern sits on the board of directors of Services for the UnderServed, EXPLR Media, Soigne Hospitality and Beans is How. He is on the advisory board of the Charlize Theron Africa Outreach Project, serves on City Harvest’s Food Council, is the International Rescue Committee’s Voice for Nutrition and was named a Global Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations World Food Programme, as well as The Nature Conservancy. Zimmern is a founding member of the Coalition for Sustainable Aquaculture and the Independent Restaurant Coalition, fighting to save restaurants affected by Covid-19. Other charities Zimmern works with include Lovin’ Spoonfuls, ONE, Food Policy Action Committee, No Kid Hungry and Giving Kitchen. In his rare downtime, Zimmern relaxes in Minneapolis, spending time with family and his dogs Luca and Clemmie the Lagottos.
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The Adventure of Recovery
Stay far away from what William James called the evil of "contempt prior to investigation." Andrew Zimmern has used this motto as a bedrock of both his personal and professional life.
While most people know him as the host of his own wildly popular TV show, they might not know that he is also a survivor of drug addiction, alcoholism and homelessness. Now in his 20th year of sobriety, his inspiring and funny story is a prescription for hope that can be applied to anyone regardless of their life situation.
Zimmern grew up on the upper east side of NYC, was a daily drug user from the age of 15 and lay dying in a hospital bed at age 21 of acute alcohol poisoning. He continued to abuse drugs and booze for another 10 years before going homeless and off the grid in 1990. Drinking himself to death in a flop house hotel in January of 1992 he had a life-changing experience that saw him check into rehab, sober up and stay clean. Devoting himself to helping others, his life changed, his show Bizarre Foods is a direct result of his channeling that life choice, telling his stories through food and travel adventures.
Zimmern combines his personal and professional stories in an audio and video presentation detailing his fall and rise, his experiences in recovery and how those lessons have informed his life as a husband, adoptive father and activist for the social issues he holds dearest.
Zimmern believes that the best way to change the world is to share a meal with a stranger and his family, telling stories from the fringe as you seek to learn about the world and yourself in the global classroom of the traveler's universe.
His funny and inspiring message spans both the personal and the professional, and he gladly exemplifies the necessity for a public face to be put on the private hell of addiction.
FOOD : A Global Perspective on the State of our Food Life
Andrew Zimmern takes you with him for a whirlwind tour of his world travels, informing and entertaining as he connects the audience to both his "boots on the ground" experience and his philosophies of both food and life. His amazing stories cover everything from the great global food scene to how you really can change the planet one meal at a time, as he's experienced firsthand breaking bread (or other things!) with people from Syria and China to Cuba and the Kalahari desert. Inspiring, enlightening and always entertaining, Zimmern shows that the world is truly getting smaller, and that the best place to learn about it and other cultures, is at the dinner table, not in a museum.
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