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 advocate 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 ninety second 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 National Spokesperson for The American Diabetes Association’s Quick Diabetic Recipes cookbook and just signed a contract to write a second edition of her award-winning Mediterranean Diabetes Cookbook. Her seventh book, The Italian Diabetes Cookbook was released on January 12, 2016 and was the #1 New Release on Amazon.com. In April 2015 she released The Ultimate Mediterranean Diet Cookbook which earned multiple 5 star reviews on Examiner.com and Amazon as well as many other positive endorsements. Her third book, The Mediterranean Diabetes Cookbook, (American Diabetes Association) was released in March 2010, received a starred PW review, won the 2011 Nautilus Book Award and was named “Best. Diabetes. Cookbook. Ever. “ by DiabetesMine.com. Amy’s second book Nile Style; Egyptian Cuisine and Culture (Hippocrene Books) won the World Gourmand Award for "Best Arab Cuisine Book" in the United States and was just released in a second edition. Her first book, Arabian Delights; Recipes & Princely Entertaining Ideas from the Arabian Peninsula was chosen as one of the “16 Volumes Worth Staining” by the Washington Post (Capital Books, 2007).
Amy also contributed to The Food Cultures of the World Encyclopedia and co-wrote The Al Tiramisu Restaurant Cookbook: An Elevated Approach to Authentic Italian Cuisine with award-winning chef/restaurateur Luigi Diotaiuti. Amy, an American of Calabrian descent, was recently awarded the Wise Women 2015 award from The National Organization of Italian American Women. She is a Culinary Advisor for The Mediterranean Food Alliance. 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, and international newspapers and hundreds of blogs.
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 most recent 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. Amy has also worked in collaboration with the U.S. Department of State’s Diplomatic Culinary Partnership Program and chairs the Global Culinary Initiative program for Les Dames d’Escoffier. She is also the author of a noted culinary/cultural blog called Amyriolo.blogspot.com which is known for promoting little known facts about global cuisine and the people who create them.
Many of Amy’s books, recipes, and podcasts are used by universities and corporations to promote cultural pluralism. Amy enjoys judging Cultural Tourism DC’s annual Embassy Chef Challenge, and has worked with museum curators and events coordinators to create culturally appropriate receptions and culinary components to exhibits. 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, fundraisers, libraries, and farmer’s markets 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.
Amy is a guest speaker/subject matter expert for:
The Library of Congress
Georgetown University
Johns Hopkins University
The US Endocrine Society (Culinary Stage at Annual Conference)
The National Italian American Foundation
National Geographic
The National Organization of Italian American Women
The International Association of Culinary Professionals
The Cornell University Entrepreneurial Network
The International Visitors Center of LA
The Italy America Chamber of Commerce
The Italian Cultural Institute
The Utah Council for Citizen Diplomacy
Les Dames d’Escoffier
The Smithsonian Institution
The International Visitors Center of Los Angeles
The Fulbright Commission
The National Museum of African Art
The Textile Museum
The Walters Art Museum
The Kennedy Center
Montgomery College
Sharjah International Book Fair
Sharjah Children’s Reading Festival
Abu Dhabi International Book Fair
The Embassy of the Arab Republic of Egypt
The Embassy of Yemen
The Culinary Historians of Washington
The Library of Alexandria (Egypt)
as well as many other embassies, museums, and organizations.
As a successful culinary consultant, Amy enjoys developing menus, concepts, action plans, recipes, training seminars and guides for corporations, restaurants, and hotels. She has consulted international business owners on bakeries, cafes, restaurants, and culinary stores where she taught vocational baking classes for thousands of pastry chefs. Amy has taught hundreds of recreational cooking classes in the Washington, DC area. Internationally, Amy had led professional and recreational cooking classes and culinary tours in Italy, Greece, Turkey, Egypt, Morocco, and the UAE, and leads culinary tours. She currently teaches cooking and baking classes at Culinaria Cooking School in Vienna, VA. Some of her recent series include: The Mediterranean Diet Made Easy, Culinary Medicine Made Easy, How to Write a Cookbook, and The Mastering Italian Certification Series.
Amy also uses her culinary expertise to represent private clients by hosting videos, satellite media tours, social media outreach, recipe development and television segments. She has also collaborated with medical organizations, associations, hospitals, and clinics to create has workshops, podcasts, cooking demonstrations, panel discussions and resource guides to teach doctors, medical professionals, and consumers how to eat with pleasure and health in mind. Using a model that she created for the U.S. Endocrine Society’s annual conference, Amy has been able to teach medical practitioners how to best inform their patients of the latest dietary guidelines, while offering delicious recipes and practical tips that can be easily implemented at home.
In addition to her professional work, Amy spends a great deal of her time supporting philanthropic efforts. She is a member of The International Association of Culinary Professionals, 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 travels extensively through the Mediterranean region.
