Sandor Ellix Katz (born May 20, 1962) is an American food writer and DIY food activist.

Work

A self-described "fermentation fetishist", Katz has taught hundreds of food workshops around the United States, and his book Wild Fermentation (2003) has been called a classic, "the bible for people embarking on DIY projects like sourdough or sauerkraut", and "especially notorious for getting people excited about fermenting food". He was named one of Chow magazine's top "provocateurs, trendsetters, and rabble-rousers" in 2009.

Personal life

Born to an Ashkenazi Jewish family with origins in Eastern Europe, Katz grew up in New York City on the Upper West Side. His grandparents immigrated from Belarus in 1920, then part of the Soviet Union. He is openly gay, an AIDS survivor, and began his fermentation experimentation while living in a rural, off-the-grid Radical Faerie community in Tennessee.

Popular culture

Katz was the subject of the 2009 punk rock song "Human(e) Meat (The Flensing of Sandor Katz)", a satirical vegan response to Katz's 2006 chapter on "Vegetarian Ethics and Humane Meat" in The Revolution Will Not Be Microwaved.