Jamie Oliver

Jamie Oliver is one of the world’s best-known television personalities and one of Britain’s most famous exports. His television series include The Naked Chef, Oliver’s Twist, Jamie’s Great Italian Escape and Jamie at Home. His programs have now been broadcast in more than 50 countries, including Australia, South Africa, Brazil, Japan and Iceland. Having been translated into 26 languages, the accompanying cookbooks are bestsellers across the world.

Jamie believes that people can improve their lives through food. As a result, he set up the Fifteen Foundation, a charity that gives disadvantaged youngsters training to gain a career in the catering industry. In 2005 he also set about revolutionizing the state of school food in Britain. Following his School Dinners program, Jamie collated a petition with over 271,677 signatures from concerned parents, which he took to 10 Downing Street, the official home of England’s Prime Minister. As a result the government pledged an extra £280 million ($1 billion) to improve the standard of school meals, to provide training for staff and to supply equipment for schools.

In 2008, Jamie set up his first Ministry of Food center in the UK, which was conceived as a practical resource to help tackle the obesity epidemic by educating his countrymen about food and teaching them simple recipes to help them move away from relying on junk food and take-out.  

In 2010, he launched his food revolution in the United States. Building on everything he had learned at home, Jamie travelled to Huntington, West Virginia, which had been called “the most unhealthy town in America,” to help some of the residents turn around their lives. His efforts can be seen in the prime time series Jamie’s Food Revolution on ABC.

In recognition of his endeavors to tackle the obesity epidemic on a global scale, Jamie has been awarded the TED award. In his acceptance speech, he called for global food brands, including supermarkets and manufacturers, to take responsibility for educating people about how to eat a balanced diet, funding and equipment to create a charitable foundation to teach practical cooking skills and recipes, and asked the public to sign a petition that he hopes to take to the White House to call for drastic improvements in school food.

Jamie grew up in his parents' country pub in Essex, England, where he started cooking at the age of eight and has since worked with some of the world's top chefs. After attending catering college and studying in France, Jamie worked at The Neal Street Restaurant in London as the pastry chef before joining the staff of London’s famed River Café, where he worked for three and a half years before filming his first television program, The Naked Chef about a young Brit who stripped food to its bare essentials.

Jamie has starred in five television series and today owns Fifteen and Jamie’s Italian, two restaurants with multiple locations in London and elsewhere around the world. He has also written a number of top-selling cookbooks. Jamie's Fifteen Foundation provides training and mentoring for disadvantaged young people and now has programs and restaurants in London, Cornwall, Amsterdam, and Melbourne.

Jamie lives in London and Essex with his wife, Jools and three daughters, Poppy, Daisy and Petal.

To find out more about Jamie’s Food Revolution visit: www.jamiesfoodrevolution.com. His website is http://www.jamieoliver.com/.