Lois Dorothy Daish is a New Zealand restaurateur, food writer, cookbook author and contributor to Radio New Zealand and Newstalk ZB. She is also a judge of food and restaurant awards and is a food commentator.[1]
Daish was born in Gisborne, and grew up in the Wellington suburb of Roseneath. While young, her family moved to New York for two years as her father had a job at the United Nations.[2] This early exposure to American food influenced her interest and taste in food in later years.
In the 1960s, Daish cooked at the Downstage Theatre, and later worked at a bohemian cafe, The Settlement.
In the 1970s, Daish wrote articles for a friend's newspaper in the western suburbs of Wellington; most were on town planning issues, but Daish convinced her friend to include a food column and she wrote food articles for the newspaper as well.
In the 1980s, Daish owned several Wellington restaurants: Number 9 on Bowen St for four years, followed by the Mount Cook Café from 1984 to 1989, and then the Brooklyn Café & Grill. In 1984 she began writing a food column for the New Zealand Listener magazine. For the first ten years she wrote alternate weeks with Annabel Langbein, and from 1994 she wrote the column every week.[3] She retired from the Listener in 2009.[4] In 1987, she was a founding member of the New Zealand Guild of Food Writers.[5]
In the 1997 New Year Honours, Daish was appointed a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to the food industry.[8] In 2010, she was elected a life member of the New Zealand Guild of Food Writers.