Lorraine Clissold was born in England and grew up in rural Sussex. Her interest in food was nurtured from an early age by her parents and grandfather who had a lifelong interest in good food and health. She graduated in History from Cambridge University and later worked in London for a number of PR organizations promoting food products. In 1995, she moved to Beijing where she spent ten years exploring Chinese food culture and traditional medicine. She appeared frequently in the Chinese press, hosted a cooking programme on Chinese national television and founded the Chinese Cooking School, the first to be dedicated to teaching Westerners the wisdom of the traditional Chinese diet. She now lives in North Yorkshire surrounded by a small menagerie of animals and her family of four children. "Why the Chinese Don't Count Calories" is her first book.
