Sonoko Sakai

Sonoko Sakai’s cooking reflects her rich cultural upbringing. Born in New York and raised by Japanese parents, she lived in many places as a child, including San Francisco, Kamakura, Mexico City, and Tokyo. She is the author of four books, Mai and the Missing Melon (Shambhala, 2023), Japanese Home Cooking (Shambhala, 2019), Rice Craft (Chronicle, 2016) and The Poetical Pursuit of Food (Potter, 1986, now OP). She has worked as a recipe developer, producer, creative director, cooking teacher, and lecturer. She is also a grain activist. Sonoko currently lives in Los Angeles and Tehachapi, California, with her sculptor husband, Katsuhisa Sakai. Their son, Sakae, and daughter-in-law, Binah, live in Seattle, and their son, Tyler, daughter-in-law, Emmalina, and their children, Masa and Mai, live in London.