Author Andrea Nguyen Centers Plants from Land and Sea

Andrea Nguyen is a celebrated cookbook author, teacher, and expert in Asian foods and flavors. And while she’s received many impressive accolades over the years, including a James Beard Award for The Pho Cookbook back in 2018, and has contributed to many respected food publications, and published eight cookbooks, pursuing a career in food was always a dream but wasn’t always the plan.  

Born in Saigon, Vietnam, Nguyen and her family immigrated to the U.S. as refugees in the 1970s. She was always fascinated by cookbooks and cooking shows, and she eagerly helped her mom in the kitchen from an early age. Nguyen notes, “I fantasized about working in a food-related field but first-generation immigrants ‘don’t do that.’”

Instead, she worked various jobs before exploring a side hustle in freelance food writing. Soon thereafter, she built her site, Vietworldkitchen.com, and published her first cookbook, Into the Vietnamese Kitchen, which sparked a decades-long career in writing recipes and educating home cooks. 

Her most recent book, Ever-Green Vietnamese, explores a creative, plant-forward approach to Vietnamese cuisine starring plants from land and sea. Spurred by a health scare back in 2019, Nguyen realized she needed to change her diet. Her journey of reimagining Vietnamese dishes as vegetarian, vegan, or low-meat renditions that let vegetables shine is documented through the book. The result is, as Andrea puts it, “exciting recipes that are extra healthful, satisfying, and flavorful.”  

We are elated for the chance to partner with Andrea Nguyen for Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, to highlight some of her delicious, inventive recipes published in her brand-new cookbook and later in the month, share more of her story in an in-depth Q&A co about her process of creating the new book. Join us in highlighting Andrea’s fresh, vegetable-forward take on Vietnamese cuisine.