Deborah Kennedy PhD is the CEO of The Food Coach Academy^TM, Build Healthy Kids®, and Culinary Rehab®; Director of Culinary Medicine at Rouxbe; Adjunct Professor at the University of New England, and consultant in Food is Medicine. She has published five books in the Culinary Medicine Textbook series with a dozen chefs and over 40 nutrition experts from Canada, Europe and the United States collectively reviewing over 2500 references. An outcome of this work was the development of culinary competencies for nutrition recommendations and various diseases. Dr Kennedy brings her work in nutrition and culinary competencies and a modular learning delivery system, which can be prescriptive, to create programs for various populations.

She received her PhD in Nutritional Biochemistry from Tufts University, Friedman School of Nutrition, Science and Policy. Dr. Kennedy has studied food from an early age - learning to cook at age 4, working as a chef in Canada, obtaining her doctorate in nutrition, authoring three books on children and nutrition and five in Culinary Medicine. She served as the first Chair for Best Practices in the Teaching Kitchen Collaborative (a Harvard and CIA initiative) and serves as a subject matter expert in Food is Medicine for large companies. She has built culinary medicine courses for higher education institutions – The New England Culinary Institute-, and centers in health and wellness -DHMC Weight and Wellness Center and NY Presbyterian Integrative Therapies Center for Children with Cancer. You will usually find her whipping up some gourmet delight in her kitchen between books.