Real Food Daily - Organic, vegetarian restaurant

Ann Gentry has spent the past twenty-five years striving to raise the standard of vegetarian and vegan cooking. By combining the balanced approach to macrobiotic food preparation with the ambience and richness of her Southern upbringing, she founded and continues to run Real Food Daily — the only restaurants in the Los Angeles area that serve a 100 percent vegetarian (vegan) menu using foods grown exclusively with organic farming methods. Now boasting locations in Santa Monica and West Hollywood, the trailblazing proprietress and executive chef is the owner of LA’s most progressive and highly lauded gourmet vegan eatery.

Ann grew up in Memphis, Tennessee in a home filled with great food and a love of entertaining. She became interested in vegetarian cuisine in New York City during the late 1970s; and by the 1980s, she was exploring the cause and effect relationship between the health of her body and the foods that she ate. Fusing the essential elements of Eastern macrobiotics with her own American culinary style, her distinct “gourmet whole food cuisine” was born.

In 1986, after relocating to Los Angeles, she became the personal chef to actor/director Danny DeVito and created the idea of a home food delivery service that served truly healthful but exciting dishes. From 1988 to 1992 Real Food Daily thrived as a home delivery service and garnered many loyal customers.
In June of 1993, Ann opened Real Food Daily, the restaurant, in Santa Monica. Antithetical to the dreary perceived notion of a vegetarian restaurant, RFD’s décor of blond wood, clean lines, cozy counter space and eclectic art perfectly complements the innovative style of Ann’s gourmet whole food. The original location has been going strong for thirteen years. The West Hollywood location opened in 1998 and has been written about in numerous publications, praised not only for the food but also for the light and modern vibe and the recycled rich teak wood used on table tables, counter bar and throughout the dining room.

Thanks to the restaurant’s immediate and enduring popularity, Bon Appétit declared that Real Food Daily is to organic vegan cooking what Alice Waters’ Chez Panisse is to California cuisine. Articles and reviews of Real Food Daily have appeared in Cooking Light, Esquire, Self, Allure, Fit, Longevity, Yoga Journal, Los Angeles Magazine, US Weekly, Daily Variety, and The Los Angeles Times, among others, as well as major Internet sites.

Because her creations are absolute originals, Ann has appeared as a guest chef at Canyon Ranch, Pritikin Longevity Center, Robert Mondavi Wine Center, LA Times Festival of Books, and the Environmental Media Awards. She has taught cooking at the annual conference of the North American Vegetarian Society, toured Texas teaching at Central Market and inspired 350 graduate students at the World Arts & Cultures program at UCLA.

Ann is the author of The Real Food Daily Cookbook published in October ‘05 by Ten Speed Press. She is also the executive chef to Vegetarian Times magazine, where she contributes recipes and articles about healthy eating and lifestyle. She writes her own bi-monthly column about food and children for a magazine out of the UK called Junior: The World's Finest Parenting Magazine.

Ann has appeared on numerous television shows from the Discovery Channel to the Food Network to local southern California news shows. Ann can be seen on Veria TV on the DISH network in her own cooking show entitled Naturally Delicious with Ann Gentry. As the host of her own show, Ann will show viewers how to prepare her recipes, while educating them on healthy foods and healthier lifestyle choices. This serves Ann’s greater goal of helping people to learn how to live healthfully and enjoy life more.

Ann lives in Los Angeles with her husband, Robert Jacobs, a health professional and entrepreneur, and their two children.