Simple Pleasures

Annabel Langbein is a New Zealand celebrity cook. She is also a reugular TV presenter and radio guest. She has fronted her own TV series, Annabel Langbein The Free Range Cook, which launched on the TV One network in New Zealand and now airs in over eighty countries. She is known for promoting organic food, primarily using seasonal ingredients and is a member of the Sustainability Council of New Zealand.

She started to cook for a living when she went to Gisborne to work as a chef in a friend's restaurant. She travelled the world experimenting with different flavours but eventually made her way back to New Zealand. She never formally trained as a chef but has a Diploma of Horticulture from Lincoln University in New Zealand. She has also attended cooking courses at the Culinary Institute of America in upstate New York

Since 1984 she has worked as a food writer. She has written for several magazines including NZ Life & Leisure, a column for the NZ Listener and a feature writer for Cuisine. She has authored 18 cookbooks which are published in numerous languages and have been sold worldwide. Her 2010 book The Free Range Cook was available in more than 70 countries. In 1991 she established the Culinary Institute of New Zealand, a specialist food marketing consultancy, and was responsible for marketing and media campaigns for New Zealand food manufacturers, retailers, and exporters, as well as promoting New Zealand food offshore for Trade New Zealand.

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