Sara Moulton: Biography

[Chris Amirault]

Sara Moulton: Biography

Sara Moulton is among the busiest and most recognizable women in the world of food, and her work is beloved by professionals, gourmands, and busy parents alike. Moulton moves efficiently among her many toques: host of Cooking Live and Sara’s Secrets on Food TV, regular guest on Good Morning America, executive chef at Gourmet magazine, and bestselling author of Sara Moulton Cooks at Home. Balancing those responsibilities with her deep commitment to her own family life in NYC lead her to write her new cookbook, Sara's Secrets for Weeknight Meals.

Moulton's intelligent approach to food, cooking, and eating is grounded in both a solid education and a variety of professional experiences. She holds degrees from the University of Michigan and the Culinary Institute of America, and has staged in many important restaurants in NY, culminating in serving as chef tournant at La Tulipe in New York in the early Eighties. Recognizing the challenges faced by women in the restaurant business, Moulton co-founded the New York Women’s Culinary Alliance, which for over twenty years has helped women working in the culinary field.

After two years teaching at Peter Kump's New York Cooking School (now the Institute of Culinary Education), Moulton took a job in the test kitchen at Gourmet and would eventually become executive chef at the magazine. Meanwhile, work behind the scenes on public television’s Julia Child & More Company led eventually to Moulton’s regular appearances at Good Morning America, first off- and then on-camera. Then, in 1996, Moulton started the Food TV call-in phenomenon, Cooking Live, quickly becoming one of the superstars upon which that network was built.

Having succeeded in food magazines and television, Moulton then turned to cookbooks. Suffused with the personality, intelligence, and style that makes Moulton so resoundingly popular, Sara's Secrets for Weeknight Meals, her most recent book, embraces the belief that all cooks, from novice to expert, can learn important insights and techniques to create simple, tasteful dishes drawn from the world's kitchens. Along the way, her book teaches us the food science behind healthy main courses, the history and culture of many cuisines, and the methods necessary to extend the reader's expertise beyond any single dish.

We live in an age in which chefs strive to be food writers, and food writers seek television stardom; if you watch your television closely enough, you can see the strain of ambition beading on well-pancaked foreheads. Strange, then, that the woman who has been one of the defining pioneers of contemporary food media makes the books and shows and recipes all seem effortless, communicating so much genuine warmth and caring about food in her work that we call her by her first name: Sara.