Maggie, originally from Sydney, worked and travelled overseas in an amazing

variety of jobs from a Lift Driver in a New Zealand department store to the

Assistant to the Senior Geophysicist for British Petroleum in Libya. Returning

home in 1968 and well before becoming immersed in the world of food, she

was employed in fields as diverse as light aircraft, Citizenship Law Clerk for the

American Embassy and House Management at the Women’s College of Sydney

University.

Her marriage to Colin in 1970 led them to the Barossa Valley in 1973, where

they began pheasant breeding and grape growing. The establishment of the

Pheasant Farm was the start of a career that now spans farming, food

production, exporting, food writing and television presenting.

There have been lots of awards over the years from those first heady days

when in 1991 the Pheasant Farm Restaurant won the Remy Martin

Cognac/Australian Gourmet Traveller Restaurant of the Year. More business

related accolades included the Telstra Business Woman of the Year in 1997

and the Jaguar/Australian Gourmet Traveller Award of Excellence in 1999 and

then in 2001 Maggie was overwhelmed to be presented with the Food Media

Club’s Industry Peer Award.

Maggie has written 8 books in total. The first being Maggie’s Farm, followed by

Maggie’s Orchard and Cooking with Verjuice. She then collaborated with

Stephanie Alexander and chronicled their Italian cooking school experiences in

Stephanie and Maggie’s Tuscan Cookbook which has been translated into 5

languages. Her fifth book Maggie’s Table won the Best Regional Cook Book in

English in 2001, and then against all other languages, replicated its success in the

Gourmand World Cook Book Awards in Perigord, France. In 2003 Maggie’s

Table was also awarded the Australian Food Media Award for Best Hardcover

Recipe Book.

The sixth addition to her literary collection is Maggie’s Harvest, a veritable

tome of Maggie’s cooking expertise, superbly bound in hand embroidered

Chinese silk. Since its release it has been awarded second place against books

from 27 countries for the best cookbook cover in the World at the 2007

Gourmand World Cookbook Awards and was highly commended by judges in

the category for Best Recipe Book over $36 at the Australian Food Media

Awards in 2008. Maggie’s Kitchen released in 2008 is a collection of favourite

recipes as well as the everyday basics Maggie believes form the foundations of a

good food life. Her most recent addition to the library is Maggie’s Verjuice

Cookbook published in 2012, which features over 100 recipes using Maggie’s

favourite ingredient...Verjuice.

It was a natural extension, with her passion for food and food writing, that

Maggie should find herself in front of the camera in her own television series.

Screening on the ABC, The Cook and The Chef shows Maggie introducing

Executive Chef Simon Bryant to her home region and the people who supply

her with the produce she has used to create her culinary reputation. Her

success on the show was cemented at the 2008 Australian Food Media Awards

where Maggie won the inaugural Lifestyle Food Channel’s People’s Choice

Award and The Cook and The Chef won the Sizzler Bernard King Award for

Best Television Food Segment. Wrapping up production on The Cook and the

Chef has by no means meant Maggie has escaped the spotlight. As part of the

2010 Australia Day Awards, Maggie was honoured with winning Senior

Australian of the Year, in recognition of her focus on cooking with seasonal

produce, that has in turn, helped to educate so many Australians to make

informed food choices. The award was presented to Maggie by Prime Minister,

Kevin Rudd, at a special ceremony in Canberra on January 25th 2010. The

following year Maggie became the 2011 South Australian of the Year and in

addition to these achievements, Maggie was thrilled to be appointed a Member

of the Order of Australia (AM) for her service to tourism and hospitality on

Australia Day earlier this year.

Maggie Beer