Food Radio is brought to you by a team of radio, multi media, food and journalistic experts:

Meet Our Presenters:

Katie Derham
Katie Derham is best known as the co-presenter of the ITV Lunchtime News with Nicholas Owen and ITV’s London Tonight programme with Alastair Stewart. But she’s also something of a foodie mover and shaker. With husband John Vincent, Katie is an investor in the ethical, healthy fast food Leon restaurant group.

Katie started her career in radio as a business journalist at the BBC, before moving to ITV News as media and arts editor. She has presented a weekly show on Classic FM for 5 years, writes for Classic FM magazine, and presented the Classical Brit awards at the Royal Albert Hall for four years. She's also hosted a talk show on LBC.

Allegra McEvedy
Allegra McEvedy is a chef, broadcaster and writer. She is a founding partner of Leon, the healthy fast-food restaurant group that won Best New Restaurant in the 2005 Observer food awards.

Allegra’s catering career has included stints at some of London’s most glamorous and acclaimed restaurants including Green's, The Belvedere, The Groucho Club, The River Café and The Cow where she was head chef at the age of just 24. She gained a special visa to the US as 'an alien with extraordinary ability in the culinary arts' where she worked at Robert de Niro's New York restaurant Tribeca Grill and Rubicon in San Francisco. She also cooked personally for President Clinton at a Democratic party fundraiser.

Michael Bukht
Michael has the unrivalled record of having launched two of the UK’s major radio brands: Capital and Classic FM. He has also successfully launched some 20 further stations around the world. Apart from his credentials in programme management, he is known to a wider public as the culinary expert Michael Barry. Michael was a lead presenter of the long running ‘Food and Drink’ series on BBC 2. A founder (and for 12 years chairman) of Kentish Fare, the Kent local food producers’ co-operative (now Produced in Kent) he was an early supporter of organic growing. He is an honorary member of Garden Organic, the working name of the Henry Doubleday Research Association (HDRA). A registered charity, and Europe's largest organic membership organisation, it is dedicated to researching and promoting organic gardening, farming and food.

Nigel Williams
Nigel has been a broadcaster since his student days. He has presented programmes for many of the nation’s top radio stations including Virgin, Heart, Magic and the BBC.
His passion for food extends back to childhood and it was a chance opportunity at one radio station that interested Nigel in fine dining. He was asked to be a restaurant critic and present a cooking demonstration at a London food show. Since then Nigel has been honing his cooking skills, including creating a menu for Michael Winner to review at his home in front of TV cameras.

Our Contributors:

Jilly Goolden
Jilly Goolden presented television’s top rated food and drink series, Food & Drink, for nearly two decades, becoming nationally famous as the most widely-known wine expert in the country. She started as a journalist, and as well as writing about wine, she has written about travel, women’s issues, sex, the occult and a wide range of general features.

Dr Sarah Schenker
Sarah is one of the most high profile and influential nutritionists in the UK, quoted in every daily national newspaper on diet and health issues, appearing regularly on TV and radio, and writing for magazines, newspapers and journals.She is a qualified Accredited Sports Dietitian, a consultant to Norwich City Football Club and Delia Smith, a qualified State Registered Dietitian, Accredited Sports Dietitian and Registered Public Health Nutritionist. Sarah is a member of the British Dietetic Association; The Nutrition Society; The Guild of Health Writers and has served on both professional and government committees.

Faith Warn
Faith Warn has won gold medals for Chelsea Show gardens, broadcast for Capital, Radio 4 and Classic FM, given lectures and talks and is author of several books. Her recent life on a Greek island has given her a passion for growing and eating vegetables and fruit and living in harmony with the seasons and nature.

Our Producers:

Phil Critchlow, Production Director
Responsible for some of the highest profile content across the majority of genres and platforms in radio, Phil was a studio manager at the BBC and producer at the World Service before joining the Radio 5 launch team. He moved to Unique where he rose to director of programmes. In 12 years, he developed many millions of pounds of independent production with thousands of hours of output across BBC and commercial radio. His team developed output for all BBC terrestrial and digital networks, as well as leading major networked projects on commercial radio, including The Pepsi Chart, which grew by almost two million listeners under his direction. Last year Phil left Unique to launch TBI Media, producing audio based content for a range of clients including BBC network radio. As well as other industry work, he has been a regular Sony Radio Awards judge.

Deborah Cowan, Producer
Deborah started her career in radio with Unique Broadcasting then moved into television, working on This Is Your Life for the BBC, and Today With Des and Mel for ITV1. A senior producer on Good Food Live for UKTV Food, her subsequent freelance career includes projects for Channel 4, The ITV London Restaurant Awards and a cooking series for the US Food Network. Deborah rejoined the BBC as a producer for BBC Classical Music Television, and BBC4 television, producing programmes that included the BBC Proms.

Laura Parfitt, Producer
Laura owns production company White Pebble Media, specialising in documentaries and audio production. She was a judge in the 2007 Sony Awards.Previously, she was at the BBC for 12 years producing across all Networks – particularly Radio 4 documentaries and programmes such as Desert Island Discs, Loose Ends, live outside broadcasts and youth documentaries for Radio 1. After the BBC she became deputy managing director of production at Unique, building a team of speech radio programme makers. Laura has 4 Sony awards (3 gold) for Best Specialist Music Programme, News Programme of the Year, Best Feature and Best Speech Programme.

Our Portal Editors:

Jill Brand MPhil, FICSc
Jill is a home economist with over 20 years of experience in product design, consumer issues and teaching. She holds qualifications in home economics, teaching, consumer sciences, chemistry, and food hygiene. She has written several recipe books including Cakes and Biscuits: Best Kept Secrets of the Women’s Institute and regularly writes for magazines and contributes to radio programmes.

Zelie Hilton
Zelie ran Le Lion restaurant in Hammersmith, followed by Kett's delicatessen in South Kensington. She had a long association with Vivian's in Richmond, an award-winning food specialist, and has worked both in retail and wholesale, sourcing artisan foods from England, Ireland and France. She founded a catering company, Eat Me Drink Me, with Reza Mahammad of Star of India.

Andy Lynes
Specialising in food, drink and travel writing; Andy is a regular contributor to BBC’s olive magazine and the Independent on Sunday Compact Traveller supplement. He has also been a guest restaurant critic for The Guardian and Metro (London edition) and contributor to the Square Meal restaurant guide. Author of several Caterer and Hotelkeeper cover features he has also contributed to Waitrose Food Illustrated, Independent on Sunday Review magazine, Restaurant magazine, Food Arts, History Today and Scarlet magazine. He has served on the committee of the Guild of Food Writers and edited the Guild’s magazine Savour. Andy is currently writing Britain's Finest Restaurants for Tomorrow’s Guides Ltd.

The Expert Team:

Sir Rodney Walker, Chairman
Sir Rodney has served on the boards of Radio Aire, Piccadilly Radio and EMAP Radio. He has extensive experience as executive and non-executive chairman and director of a variety of major companies (including Spice Holdings Plc, Goals Soccer Centres Plc and SMC Group Plc.) and sports bodies and government agencies, including The UK Sports Council and The Rugby league.

Robin Ford, CEO
Robin is an experienced business manager with an extensive track record in marketing, sponsorship, sales promotion and event management consultancy. He has been involved in several successful start-ups, including marketing agencies and a telecoms infrastructure company.

Sami Shaaya, Founding Director
Sami has spent his life in the advertising and film industries, including scriptwriting for major films and TV series. He worked in the USA for film distribution companies, before returning to Europe to develop films for the home and international markets.

 
Clive Dickens - Absolute Radio, Programme and Operations Director
A founding member of Absolute Radio, Clive consults to stations in Europe, Asia and the USA. Once named fourth most influential person in the UK radio and music industry by the Sunday Times, Clive was Group Head of Programmes at Capital Radio (now GCAP Media plc). He oversaw the integration of all FM acquisitions including BRMB - Birmingham, Southern Radio, Red Dragon and XFM-London. Prior to Capital he was at Chiltern Radio plc, where he rose from being the youngest head of music in UK radio to network controller of seven market leading local stations.

 
Mike Taylor, Portal Operations Director
Mike has extensive hands-on IT experience in building and operating systems for a wide variety of clients, including banks, retailers and government departments. He created and sold his own successful software company.

Gary Johnson, Sales Director
Gary has in depth experience of media sales and marketing management. Following roles at IPC Press, LBC and Melody FM, he was group sales and marketing director for IMD (electronic and video distribution), which he helped obtain a market listing in 2003. He is also director of UP Solutions, a media services company.

Adrian Robinson, Finance Director
Adrian is a founding director of Absolute Radio. Central to the acquisition of 107.6 Juice FM in Liverpool in 2003, he was interim finance director at the station until Absolute Radio sold its stake in 2005. During his time turnover increased by 50 per cent. He is a Chartered Accountant who, prior to Absolute Radio, spent 15 years with KPMG as a partner specialising in the communications and entertainment sectors.

Nick Mustoe, Non-Executive Director
Nick has spent 24 years in the advertising industry in the UK. With Frank Lowe, he looked after major accounts such as Hanson industries, Imperial Tobacco and Melody FM. In 1993, he founded the London based agency: Mustoes, now a leading UK independent creative agency, with clients such as Danone, Coca Cola, Kia and Lloyds Pharmacy. Mustoes is now jointly owned with Hakuhodo, the 7th largest communications group worldwide.