Craig Claiborne

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Craig Claiborne (September 4, 1920 – January 22, 2000) was an American restaurant critic, food journalist, and cookbook author. He was The New York Times’ longtime food editor and dining critic, and he wrote many cookbooks and an autobiography.

Claiborne was born in Sunflower, Mississippi, and grew up with Southern cooking in his mother’s boardinghouse kitchen in Indianola. He began premedical studies at Mississippi State College, then switched to journalism at the University of Missouri, earning a B.A. He served in the U.S. Navy during World War II and the Korean War. Using his G.I. Bill, he studied at the École hôtelière de Lausanne in Switzerland to learn about hotels and cooking.

Back in New York, Claiborne worked for Gourmet magazine and as a food publicist before becoming The New York Times’ food editor in 1957, following Jane Nickerson. He helped turn the Times’ food section into a major cultural feature, expanding coverage of new restaurants and innovative chefs. He introduced readers to a wide range of ethnic cuisines, especially Asian and Mexican, at a time when American menus were mostly French. He created the newspaper’s four-star restaurant rating system, a standard that is still used today.

Claiborne’s reviews were exacting but open-minded. He helped bring attention to chefs like Paul Prudhomme and, with Julia Child, helped make French and other cuisines more accessible to Americans. He authored or edited more than twenty cookbooks, including works with French chef Pierre Franey, and they together developed low-sodium, low-cholesterol recipes.

One famous event was a 1975 charity dinner in Paris at Chez Denis, where Claiborne and Franey spent about $4,000 on a five-hour, multi-course meal. The experience drew widespread criticism, including remarks from the Vatican, but Claiborne later wrote about it with a balanced view.

Claiborne faced health problems in later years and died in New York City at age 79. He left his estate to The Culinary Institute of America.