Tejal Rao (born 1982 or 1983)[2] is a restaurant critic, recipe developer and writer based in Los Angeles.[3] In 2018, she was named the first California restaurant critic for The New York Times.[3] In 2021, she was named editor of the New York Times subscription cooking newsletter The Veggie.[4]
In 2012, Rao joined The Village Voice as a food critic.[6] In 2013, Rao won the James Beard Foundation’s Craig Claiborne Distinguished Restaurant Review Award for her work for The Village Voice.[7]
In 2014, Rao joined Bloomberg as a food editor and restaurant critic.[8] In 2016, she won the James Beard Foundation’s Craig Claiborne Distinguished Restaurant Review Award once again, this time for her work at Bloomberg.[9] In the same year, Rao joined the New York Times as a food department staff writer and monthly columnist for its magazine.[10] In 2018, she was named theNew York Times' first California restaurant critic, to better serve the growing number of New York Times readers in the state.[3]
In 2021, Rao was named the New York Times writer for the vegetarian recipe newsletter The Veggie.[4] Rao is not a vegetarian in her personal life but enjoys cooking vegetarian food.[11]
Rao has also contributed to a range of other publications, such as The Atlantic, Edible, and Gourmet, among others.[5]
Personal life
In December 2020, she contracted COVID-19 and lost her sense of smell. She used smell therapy to regain it over the course of two months.[12][13] She lives in Los Angeles.[14]
2013 – James Beard Foundation Awards, Craig Claiborne Distinguished Restaurant Review Award for "Bangkok Pop, No F etishes,; The Sweet Taste of Success,; Enter the Comfort Zone at 606 R&D"[7]
2016 – James Beard Foundation Awards, Craig Claiborne Distinguished Restaurant Review Award for "A Health Food Restaurant So Cool It Will Have You Happily Eating Seeds"; "Revisiting Momofuku Ko, After the Revolution"; "Polo Bar Review: Ralph Lauren Corrals the Fashionable Herd"[9]
2019 – Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise in Culinary Arts[5]
