Member
Natalie MacLean
External Website
Biography
In 2003, Natalie was named the World’s Best Drink Writer at the World Food Media Awards in Australia. Held every two years, the competition received more than 1,000 entries. An international and independent panel of 47 food and wine experts selected her from a short-list of 14 nominees from the U.S., Canada, U.K., New Zealand and Australia. Natalie also won the 2003 James Beard Foundation Journalism Award for her writing about drinks and the Bert Greene Award for excellence in food journalism, presented by the International Association of Culinary Professionals.
This year, Natalie has won another Bert Greene Award and two more James Beard awards, including the MFK Fisher Distinguished Writing Award, in memory of one of America's greatest food writers. This award was given out at the end of the ceremony for work of literary merit. She won a first and two second place prizes from the American Association of Food Journalists for Best Food Feature Article in a Magazine and for Internet writing, as well as three honorable mentions at the National Magazine Awards in the categories of humor and leisure pursuits.
In the U.K., she is a nominee for the 2004 Communicator of the Year award, hosted by the International Wine & Spirit Competition in London, England. Previous winners include Jancis Robinson and Hugh Johnson. Her web site has been nominated for Britain’s top award, Le Prix du Lanson. Other nominees include the BBC, Decanter and The Wine Spectator. Elle magazine recently named her one of the “Top 30 Power Women.”
Her articles have appeared in newspapers and magazines such as the Chicago Tribune, Bon Appetit, Food & Wine, Reader’s Digest, BusinessWeek, San Francisco Chronicle, The National Post, enRoute (Air Canada), Hemispheres (United Airlines), Saturday Night, The Age (Australia), Sydney Morning Herald, Chatelaine, Wine Enthusiast, Wine International, Ritz-Carlton Magazine, Canadian House & Home, Worth, Canadian Business Magazine, Food & Drink, Ottawa City Magazine, Ottawa Citizen, MD Canada, MD News, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, St Louis Post-Dispatch, Saltscapes, Halifax Herald, Pure Canada, Tasters Guild International, Vines, Wine Selectors, Wine Access, Wine Tidings, Calgary Herald, Edmonton Journal, IE Money Magazine and President's Choice Magazine.
Other than wine, her interests include highland dancing, which she taught for ten years, after placing fifth in the world championships in Scotland. A Rhodes Scholarship finalist, she studied nineteenth-century English literature at Oxford University, England; earned an honors Bachelor of Public Relations (MSVU, Halifax) and took an MBA with distinction (UWO, London). However, all of this training is irrelevant to her current preoccupation. Instead, she credits the long line of hard drinkers from whom she descends for her ability to drink like a fish—and for the motivation to write about it, in a transparent attempt to make it look respectable.
Natalie offers a free e-mail newsletter that will help you make choices from restaurant wine lists, match wine with food, get good value when you buy wine (including those from the monthly LCBO Vintages releases) and chuckle over the lighter side of wine. While she tackles each topic to learn something new, she never takes wine—or herself—too seriously.
There are no ads and your e-mail address will be kept confidential. Natalie does this because she enjoys the occasional feedback that she receives from those on her list. To sign-up for her newsletter, visit www.nataliemaclean.com. Please let others know about the newsletter too—the more, the merrier!
Affiliations
NATJA