Amy Riolo
As an award – winning, best-selling, author, chef, television personality, and educator, Amy Riolo is one of the world’s foremost authorities on culinary culture. She is known for sharing history, culture, and nutrition through global cuisine as well as simplifying recipes for the home cook. A graduate of Cornell University, Amy is considered a culinary thought leader who enjoys changing the way we think about food and the people who create it. Amy is a food historian, culinary anthropologist and Mediterranean Diet specialist who makes frequent appearances on numerous television and radio programs both in the United States and abroad, including Fox TV, ABC, CBS, NBC, The Hallmark Channel, Nile TV, The Travel Channel, Martha Stewart Living Radio, and Abu Dhabi Television. She also created and appeared weekly in cooking videos entitled “Culture of Cuisine” which air on nationally syndicated news shows on 28 different channels across the United States, totaling a reach of over 300 million people. One of her videos reached a record of four million hits.
Amy is the brand ambassador for the Pizza University and Culinary Arts Center and Ristorante d’Amore in Capri, Italy. In 2019 she launched her private label collection of premium Italian imported culinary ingredients called Amy Riolo Selections which includes an extra-virgin olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and pesto sauce from award-winning artisan companies.
Amy is a Chef/Instructor for the Casa Italiana Language School in Washington, DC as well as Italian Sensory Experience, a company which she leads Eno-gastronomic tours in Italy with as well as Indigo Gazelle Tours in Morocco and Greece. Her work has appeared in numerous print media including USA Today, Cooking Light magazine, The Washington Post, CNN.com, The Wall Street Journal, Parade Magazine, Gulf News, The Jerusalem Post Magazine, Popular Anthropology Magazine, Ambassador, The Examiner, The UAE National, as well as hundreds of other national and international newspapers and magazines.
Amy released the second edition of her award-winning, best-selling Mediterranean Diabetes Cookbook in May 2019. She has written multiple books with The American Diabetes Association and was the National Spokesperson for their 2018 release – the Quick Diabetic Recipes cookbook. In 2018 Amy also released
Creating a Cookbook: How to Write, Publish and Promote Your Culinary Philosophy on Amazon.
Her seventh book, The Italian Diabetes Cookbook was released on January 12, 2016 and was the #1 New Release on Amazon.com.
As a respected culinary diplomat, Amy has created menus, culinary ceremonies, and educational seminars for diplomats, international chefs, and world leaders, earning her the title “The Cook to the Kings” by a Cairo newspaper in 2008. She speaks English, Italian, French, Spanish, conversational Arabic, and is studying Greek. Amy’s gastronomic diplomacy events include the “Exploring Italy’s Influence on Cuisine and Culture’ in July 2015 which was sponsored by the International Visitors Center of Los Angeles and the Italy-America Chamber of Commerce West. In September 2015, she presented “Culinary Diplomacy: Building Bridges through Global Cuisine” for the Utah Council for Citizen Diplomacy. In one of her favorite media interviews, Amy was asked by CNN.com to create a fantasy wedding meal for Prince William.
Amy is frequently asked to lecture and give demonstrations on The Mediterranean Diet, culinary diplomacy, diabetes-friendly eating, and cuisine and culture at medical conferences, book fairs, universities, culinary symposiums, museums, embassies, and fundraisers on over three different continents, and five states in the USA. Last year her live audiences alone totaled 18,350 people. With the addition of podcasts, her popularity and viewership has grown immensely.
In addition to her professional work, Amy spends a great deal of her time supporting philanthropic efforts. She is a member of Cornell Club DC, Les Dames d’Escoffier (Global Culinary Initiative Chair), Slow Food DC, The James Beard Foundation, The National Organization of Italian American Women, and the Culinary Historians of Washington. Amy can often be found mentoring culinary students, teaching children’s cooking classes, and participating on panels for charity events. One of the highlights of her volunteering career was chairing the Baltimore Luxor Alexandria Sister City Committee which enabled her to obtain a grant to provide clean drinking water for a village outside of Luxor, Egypt. Amy is based in the Washington, DC area and spends a great deal of time working in the Mediterranean region – predominately Italy, Greece, and Morocco.
