Jean Anderson is the author of more than 20 cookbooks, including the best-selling Doubleday Cookbook, Jean Anderson Cooks (named by Time magazine as one of the outstanding cookbooks of 1982), and The Food of Portugal (Tastemake/IACP Best Foreign Cookbook, 1987). Other books include Process This! (James Beard Best Tools & Techniques Cookbook, 2003), A Love Affair with Southern Cooking (James Beard Best Regional American Cookbook, 2008 as well as SIBA [Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance] "Cookbook of the Year"), The American Century Cookbook, Falling Off the Bone, Jean Anderson's Preserving Guide, and From a Southern Oven. In all, Jean has won six "cookbook Oscars" (Tastemaker, IACP, James Beard) as well as multiple nominations.

Early in her career, Jean was the woman’s editor of The Raleigh Times in Raleigh, North Carolina, and over the years worked as a food editor, then Copy Director, then Managing Editor at Ladies’ Home Journal; senior editor at Venture: The Traveler’s World; and as a Contributing Editor at Family Circle and Diversion magazines. She also served as chief cookbook consultant for Reader’s Digest  Books and helped create five best-sellers. Digest Books and helped create five best-sellers.

Jean has been twice honored by the Portuguese government for articles on that country, has won the George Hedman Memorial Travel Writing Award, and just this spring, IACP declared her Saveur Magazine article on Portugal's Alentejo Province the year's best Food and Travel feature. In 1992, Jean was named Editor of the Year by the James Beard Foundation. In 1994, she was inducted into the James Beard Who’s Who in Food & Beverage in America and in 1999 into the James Beard Cookbook Hall of Fame.

A busy freelancer in the fields of food and travel, Jean has written regularly for Bon Appétit, Cottage Living, Family Circle, Food & Wine, Gourmet, Travel & Leisure, and More. She has written weekly food columns for The Los Angeles Times Syndicate and biweekly food columns for New York Newsday, and contributes occasional food and travel articles to The New York Times. She is a founding member of both Les Dames d’Escoffier and the New York Women’s Culinary Alliance as well as an active member of the New York Culinary Historians, New York Travel Writers Association, IACP (International Association of Cooking Professionals), and Southern Foodways Alliance.

After many years in New York City, Jean now lives in Chapel Hill, NC. She is presently at work on two new cookbooks for Houghton Mifflin Harcourt: Mad for Muffins, to be published this October, and Crisps & Cobblers, Custards & Creams (pub date October 2015). Her recently updated and improved website is: www.jeanandersoncooks.com/.