Andreas Viestad

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Andreas Viestad (b. April 5, 1973, Oslo, Norway), also known as "The Gastronomer", is a Norwegian food writer and television chef who works mainly in the US. He has homes in Oslo, Norway and Cape Town, South Africa.

Viestad authored Kitchen of Light: New Scandinavian Cooking and has been dubbed "Norway’s Culinary Ambassador". Viestad’s weekly column for the Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet since 1999 and his cooking show on the USA's PBS channel, in which he speaks in accented but reasonable English, have brought him international fame in gourmand circles. He writes a monthly column for the Washington Post entitled "The Gastronomer" about the science of everyday cooking.

Viestad is most known for his culinary stunts on the television series New Scandinavian Cooking, where he takes his mobile kitchen to improbable places in his native Norway. His book Kitchen of Light and the three seasons of New Scandinavian Cooking he has hosted have had considerable international success, which has been aired in the U.S., China, Germany, Italy, Finland and on BBC Food in over fifty countries. Viestad took a break from the series for season 3 to leave fellow Scandinavian Tina Nordström to show of Swedish cooking, but returned for season 4. Dane and TV Chef Claus Meyer is currently representing his part of Scandinavia, on PBS.

Viestad is also a storyteller and emerging raconteur. His works have been published in the US magazine Gourmet and the London Sunday Times. His newest book Where Flavor Was Born (2007) is a departure from Scandinavian cooking. It is a book on the spices of the Indian Ocean. Viestad has traveled extensively around the Indian Ocean.

He has a farm outside of Cape Town, South Africa and is the consultant chef at Emerson Spice Hotel in Zanzibar's Stone Town.