Brandy O'Neill

Bruce Aidells is America’s “go-to guy” for all issues involving meat and meat cookery.

Bruce Aidells is America’s “go-to guy” for all issues involving meat and meat cookery. He is called upon for information and insights for most national newspapers, including the New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune and many more. Aidells, who founded Aidells Sausage Company in 1983, also has a reputation as an innovator in the gourmet sausage industry. While he left the sausage company in 2002 to continue to pursue his food-writing and television career, he is still considered a renowned expert on charcuterie and salumi. His dry-cured bacon and applewood artisan ham is sold under the brand Vande Rose.

Since 1982, Aidells has written 11 cookbooks. Four have received cookbook award nominations. His first book, with Denis Kelly, Hot Links and Country Flavors, received the IACP Julia Child award for best single subject cookbook in 1991. The Complete Meat Cookbook was nominated for a James Beard Award in 1999 and Bruce Aidells’s Complete Pork Book received another Beard nomination in 2005. His other titles include Flying Sausages and Bruce Aidells’ Complete Sausage Cookbook. In addition, Aidells contributed to The Joy of Cooking, 1997 Edition, writing the meat, poultry and stuffing chapters. Aidells’s recipes have appeared in over 50 cookbooks as a guest contributor and he wrote the key meat tips for The All New Good Housekeeping Cookbook.

Aidells has often appeared as a guest on TV and for 4 years has had a regular cooking segment on View From the Bay on KGO, the San Francisco affiliate of ABC. Now he has his own TV cooking show Good Cookin’ with Bruce Aidells on the national Disney cable channel, The Live Well Network. Aidells has appeared on NBC Today, Martha Stewart Living Al Roker on the Road, The FoodTV Network and many other cooking shows.

Aidells is a frequent guest not only on local Bay Area radio but many national shows including Fresh Air with Teri Gross, The Splendid Table with Lynne Rosseta Kasper and Everyday Cooking with Martha Stewart. Aidells was a contributing editor at Bon Appetit Magazine and is also a contributing editor at Eating Well Magazine. He is a regular contributor to Fine Cooking, Real Food, Costco Connection and has written for Food and Wine, Gourmet, Cooking Pleasures, and Cooking Light Magazines.

Bruce Aidells is married to Nancy Oakes, Executive Chef and Co-Owner of San Francisco’s top rated restaurants, Boulevard Restaurant and Prospect. Aidells and Oakes live in the San Francisco Bay Area and the Sonoma Wine Country.