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General Presentation

Gourmand World Cookbook Awards

  • The Gourmand World Cookbook Awards were founded in 1995 by Edouard Cointreau. Every year, they honour the best food and wine books, printed or digital, as well as food television. 
  • In 2018, we have entries from 216 countries and regions participate in these prestigious awards, the only international competition of the sector. It is free, and open to all languages.
  • Every year, Gourmand gives the awards in a very special location for gastronomy. The Ceremony is always an opportunity to meet every important person in the world of food and books: hundreds of publishers, authors, chefs and journalists take part in these events. 
  • The Gourmand Awards have been compared to the “Oscars” for film. They are inspired by the Olympic Games and their spirit. 
  • We reward now all food and drinks content, in print or digital, paid or free, private or public, trade publishers or self published, big or small, with an equal chance for everyone. 
  • The Gourmand Awards are a unique opportunity to build the image of the food culture in a country, show the world its spirit.

The history of the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards is parallel to the history of cookbook publishing in the past 20 years. The years correspond to the year of the publishing of the books involved in a competition, while the awards event takes place between December and the following May.

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2018

Frankfurt, Germany

From October 10 to 14, the Gourmet Gallery will again be the center of the fair both for business and pleasure. During the first three trade days, incredible business in foreign rights and new projects take place. Then during the weekend, the crowdsfrom the public seem to want to buy as much food and wine as possible. The number of interviews with lifestyle journalists increase every year, because there is so much trade and public interest.

2018

Beijing, China

From August 22 to 26, 2018, BIBF will be bigger than ever. We add tourism stands in our area for food and wine. Turkey and Czech Republic total over 200 m2. We have the first stands of Atout France, Panama, Denmark, Arctic, and many others. China is number one in the world for the number of tourists international travel, and food is a leading criteria. The Beijing market is a leader, both for young professionals and affluent seniors, who are the bulk of the over 300.000 visitors of visitors to the fair. The trade in foreign rights and copyrights is also huge for professionals. Ask for our 8 pages BIBF brochure in English.

2018

Yantai, China

For the fourth time, the Gourmand Awards come back to Yantai, for an all day awards ceremony on Saturday May 26, 2018. We will have 5 days of food and culture events, with banquets every night. It has to be experienced, to understand how it can become the best week in the life of the participants, and change lives. The networking is intense, and the start of many new friendships. There is much fun, business, and pleasure. It is unique. For the first time, International Organizations . FAO, UNWTO, UNDP, Arctic, participate in the event. The China number one star chef Xu Long comes, to meet with his friend Guillaume Gomez, chef for President Macron of France.

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2017

Frankfurt, Germany

We organize again the International Gourmet Gallery at the Frankfurt Book Fair October 11-15. It is the biggest book trade fair in the world as well as a major event for culture. We have many stands, food products and wine tastings and sales, a show kitchen , conferences. France is the Guest Country, with a focus on gastronomy. It is the world center for the foreign rights trade. We help Gourmand Awards winners to make contacts . We have not missed one fair since 1989, and founded the awards there in 1995. We have multiplied by 3 the space of the Gourmet Gallery since 2015. Hanban Confucius Institute has the largest stand with 100 m2 , showing the importance of Food Culture.

2017

Beijing, China

We have a five year contract to organize the new Food and Wine Gallery of the Beijing Internatiomal Book Fair BIBF It was August 23-27, 2017 . It is the biggest book trade fair in Asia, with 300.000 visitors. We have publishers stands, a show kitchen, a wine masterclass theater, food products and wine stands with tastings and sales, conferences, and a cookbook foreign rights business center. Nearly all China publishers are present, as well as many publishers from Japan, South Korea, and all South East Asia. We help Gourmand Awards winners to make contacts.

2017

Yantai, China

The awards event comes back to Yantai, China, May 27-28. We have two new hotels, the five stars Hilton, with 404 rooms, within walking distance from our event, on the Golden Beach, next to the curved Tianma pier on the sea. The other new hotel is four stars, The Tianma Central Plaza Hotel, ten minutes away, in the center of the shopping center of our district. We have special low group rates at these hotels We will have a Peru day, with a Pachamanca barbecue dinner. banquet. The Loire Valley City of Angers will celebrate its wines and food during another entire day, to honor its sister city of Yantai.

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2016

Yantai, China

The awards come back to Yantai, in the same location, May 27-30. The date is earlier than the previous year to have lower temperatures, with less humidity.There will be 2 separate ceremonies May 28 for Wine and Drinks, May 29 for Food and Cookbooks.

2015

Yantai, China

Yantai is the birthplace of the Shandong cuisine, one of the 4 main cuisines of China. Yantai is the capital of wine in China. It is also the leading sea resort. For the first time the awards ceremonies were outdoors. A gigantic stage was set up in the beautiful gardens of Tianma Yantai Wine Bay, by the Golden Beach. The weather was tropical and great for visitors from the North, such as our Lapland and Swedish guests. The wine and drink awards were June 8, the food and cookbook awards June 9. The event was fabulous and unforgettable, with 1/3 of the guests staying 3 days or less, 1/3 staying for 4-5 days, and 1/3 for 6 or more days.There were banquets every night for 8 days.

2014

Beijing, China

On May 20 and 21, 2014 the two awards events at the Beijing Daxing theater awards attracted a total of 1200 guests, a truly international audience, with many Chinese, and foreigners coming from Europe 36%, Asia- Pacific 31%, Latin America 19 %, USA - Canada 11%, and Africa 3%. Food is now a very important component for the image of countries, and 36 embassies were present, with six ambassadors getting on the stage. There were spectacular dancing and music, from all continents, from China, Colombia and Samoa. The awards celebrations continued late into the night!

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2013

Paris, France

On February 23, 2013 we filled to capacity the 1050 seats of the Awards dinner at Carrousel du Louvre in Paris, at the center of world culture.. The president of honour was Alistair Burtenshaw, previous director of the London Book Fair. Star guests were Jancis Robinson for wine, Claudia Roden, Anne Willan, Nicholas Lander, Tony Le Duc, three stars chef Guy Savoy, food television leaders Geoffrey Drummond, Chef Wan, Jeroen Meus, Chakall, Annabel Langbein, Mocomishi Hayami, Stalic Khankishiev, and Wu ZhiHong. There were some very emotional moments, with Birthe Lyngaard from Denmark,our youngest winner ever Josh Thirion from South Africa, Sarah Lilford from Zimbabwe and Ska Mirriam Moteane from Lesotho. Food and Wine culture is now truly respected worldwide.

2012

Paris, France

On March 6, 2012, we fill up again Les Folies Bergere to complete capacity. The front rows have many ambassadors. The star is Francisco Fantini from Chile with his team of Gourmet Patagonia, the Best Book of the Year. He spoke for everyone when he explained the importance of the event, “ A book is an everlasting message “. This is the most emotional and fun awards event up to then, showing that the guests do not know in advance if they are going to win. They are so happy, often so overwhelmed they cannot speak, laugh and cry.tears off joy. Television stars Rocky Singh and Mayur Sharma from India thrilled the audience with their sense of humor and energy. China became the winner of more awards than ever.. Antigua and Panama came to the stage for the first time. For drinks, craft beer is honoured with Coreff from Brittany in France. The winebook awards show that wine tourism and climate change are the two main issues worldwide for the sector.

2011

Paris, France

On March 3, 2011, we had a record number of guests, 1250 at Theatre Folies Bergère, the glamorous shrine of Maurice Chevalier and Josephine Baker. 28% of the guests came from outside Europe, and 50% from Europe except France. New Zealand celebrated the best Book of the Year, Me’a Kai. We had an ovation for Tunisian Zouhair Ben Jemaa and Mediterranean cookery. The wines were from André Lurton, Champagne Gosset and Cognac Frapin. Both the Awards event and Paris Cookbook Fair doubled the number of professionals guests.

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2010

Paris, France

On February 11, 2010, we had two consecutive Awards celebrations at Le104, the new Artistic Centre of The City of Paris. The first was for the cookbooks, the second for the wine books. The stars were Claudia Roden and Harumi Kurihara. The Awards launched the first Paris Cookbook Fair. The combination of the Awards event and the Cookbook Fair really worked.The following days had record cold, with much snow in Paris. It was beautiful and festive.

2009

Paris, France

On July 1, 2009, La Comédie-Française was the host of the Gourmand Family for the Best in the World event. The theater of Molière was full with 800 guests from 45 countries. After the Awards, the magnificient buffet was due to Le Cordon Bleu® with Champagne Gosset, Cognac Frapin and the wines of Château Maison-Blanche. A special gift package for the event was given to all guests by Valrhona Chocolate. Photo: © Cosimo Mirco Magliocca / Coll. Comédie-Française

2008

London, United-Kingdom

On April 13, 2008 at the “Gourmand Awards” in the Olympia Theatre in London, there were over 400 guests from 47 countries. The Awards Ceremony included the awards and the presentation of the 19 Celebrity Chefs from 16 countries who gave cooking demonstrations at the London Book Fair. At the party after the Awards there was much celebrating, music by the 18 pieces Jazz Big Band of James O’Carroll, and dancing. There was also much business in foreign rights. Photo: Edouard Cointreau.

2007

Beijing, China

Beijing, China, Dragon Springs Hotel. The focus in Beijing is professional, with conferences by printers, Chinese publishers, superb diners, and much entertaining. There is much Dragon Seals Chinese wine, and even Tibetan wine. The Chinese Food Network filmed all the event, with a special show broadcast all over China. There were many stars, including Chef Ramzi filming for Future Television. Chef Wan, Vefa Alexiadou, Julie Biuso, Annabel Langbein, Art Smith with family and friends, Marlena Spieler, Vangelis Driskas, Mrs. Jigyasa Giri and Dr. Pratibha Jain from India, Edmon Ho from Singapore. Our friend Chef Du was present everywhere, as well as our friends from Hainan. The awards show was the most glamorous ever, with fashion show, Kung fu, Chinese singing, filmed live for television.

2006

Kuala Lumpur – Malaysia.

After 10 years in Europe, Gourmand went to Asia. The focus in Malaysia was food media and tourism: food is one of the keys to tourism today. Malaysia is “truly Asia”, with Malay, Chinese, Indian, Arab, Thai and Western cuisine. The Prime Minister hosted a dinner feast for 500 guests at his private residence. The awards event was very glamorous. Tom Victor Gausdal of Norway won Best Book of the Year, and Young Mo Kim, President of the Bakers Association of Korea won “Best Pastry Book”. Twenty six ambassadors came to dinner, plus chef Wan, the food ambassador of Malaysia. Photo: Young Mo Kim from Korea.

2005

Grythyttan, Sweden

Grythyttan, Province of Orebro, Sweden. Sweden is the country that buys the highest number of cookbooks per person. Gourmand guests visited the best cookbook Museum and Library in Europe, in Grythyttan, and the food sites of this region, 200 kilometres west of Stockholm. The star was Harumi Kurihara of Japan, who won Best Cookbook of the Year. The Award ceremony was celebrated with a Symphony Orchestra in the Orebro theater. The Award Dinner was “The new Swedish Smörgåsbord” by star chefs Mathias Dahlgren, and Stefan Karlsson. Leif Pagrotsky, Minister of Culture and Education of Sweden, presided the event. There were eight televisions filming, including shows for BBC, Fuji, Gambero Rosso, etc. Photo: Harumi Kurihara and Husband.

2004

Barcelona, Spain

Gourmand comes to the new capital of innovative cuisine. Star chefs come from everywhere: Heston Blumenthal gets his Third Michelin Star the same week as he is rewarded for the Best Book of the Year. Some of the other chefs are Fatema Hal, Lea Linster, Roland Mazère, Le Divellec, Paco Torreblanca. The wine stars are Michael Broadbent, Miguel Torres, the Marqués de Vargas. The guest of honour is Dun Gifford, of Oldways. There are twelve Ambassadors, plus chef Wan, the food ambassador of Malaysia.

2003

Loire Valley, Angers

Chateau de Brissac, Loire Valley . The Marquis de Brissac hosted the event, with many star chefs and friends, including Edouard Carlier of Beauvilliers in Paris. Chef Wan was back, following a new trend of past event stars coming back to a yearly event of friendship, fun and business. The book of the year was “Essential Cuisine” by Michel Bras. The wine star was Rene Renou, President of INAO and member of the Gourmand French jury. This was a very elegant and glamorous event that set the awards apart from all other events of the sector. The Australian Ambassador to France was there, with Maurice de Rohan, Agent General for South Australia, the perfect gentleman and friend, who did not miss any Gourmand events.

2001

Sorges

The event takes place for the first time in Sorges – Capital of the Truffles of Perigord. We organize a dinner with 22 kilogs of black truffles du Perigord, a World Record. The Awards are renamed “The Gourmand World Cookbook Awards”, and the Gala Dinner becomes a music and lights show like the “oscars”. Several televisions film. The stars are Elisabeth Luard, Anne Willan, Emi Kazuko, Dr. Miguel Sánchez Romera, Gilles and Laurence Laurendon, Julie Biuso and many others. The wine stars are Richard Juhlin, and Bruno Boidron of Feret. Until 2001, the event is for books published the same year. The next event from 2003 are for books published the year before. For instance in 2003 for books from 2002.

2000

Perigueux

On November 11, 2000 the German Dieter Müller receives the top international award, and Alain Dutournier the French one. This is quite a peaceful symbol. Anne Dolamore of Grub Street is there as best publisher of the year. The Special Award of the Millenium is given for his wine book “Les Vins du Siècle” to Philippe Faure Brac. Chef Wan of Malaysia is the star, with his show of a royal wedding banquet at the Malay Court.The guest of honour is Richard Grausman, of the US C-CAP organization, Carreers for the Culinary Arts Professionals

1999

Versailles

It is the year of Claudia Roden, Ruth Ozeki, Michael Ginor, and the French Laundry. We have the first American Foie Gras tasting in France, at the INRA French National Agricultural Research Institute, with Andre Daguin. And the day of the Gala Dinner in this Royal setting, there is a national strike of waiters and firemen in all Republican France = international star chefs led by Andrés Madrigal of Spain volunteer to serve as waiters to help.

1998

Perigueux

The event takes place for the first time in parallel with the Perigueux Salon International du Livre Gourmand. It is presided by Alain Ducasse, with guest of honour Chuck Williams. Albert Àdria is the star with his pastry book and his chocolate limited edition gift to the guests. We also reward Anneke Ammerlaan, Vefa Alexiadou, Margaret Dickenson and others. The Awards are not only an international event, but also a meeting place and a food discovery. We start the concept of linking international and local, through a “Tasting Perigord” tour.

1997

Paris

Thanks to the sponsoring of Cognac Frapin, the awards take place at the “Astor” restaurant in Paris, advised by Joel Robuchon. It is our first Awards Gala, with Baronesses Nadine and Ariane de Rothschild, star publisher Pierre Marchand, Anne Willan, Philip Clark, Allison Cathie, Wini Brugger from Hong Kong, NHK Books from Japan, Monique Janet Hooker from the US and many others. The Awards become a world event

1996

Frankfurt

The Australian Murdoch Books is our cookbook publisher of the year, starting a revolution in the design and the concept of books worldwide. Our book of the year is the “Vineyards of Saint Colombe”, by french best selling author Christian Signol. It is a “terroir” book, by big french publisher Albin Michel. Our international book is “Tukka”, by Jean Paul Bruneteau (Harper Collins Australia). The awards are proclaimed at the Frankfurt Book Fair.

1995

Frankfurt

Cookbooks are difficult to find at the Frankfurt Book Fair. To give them respect and honours, Edouard Cointreau decides with a small group of friends and international publishers to create the World Cookbook Awards. It is sponsored by ICR-The International Cookbook Revue, launched with a printing of 15000 at the 1995 Frankfurt Book Fair. It follows the “Le Cordon Bleu Book of Cookbooks”, international bibliographies of cookbooks in 4 languages.


The Rules for the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards

All books published between November 15 in one year and November 15 of the following year qualify for the awards dated thesecond year. The books in the Fund Raising category may be older.

The competition is free and open to all. There are no entry fees.

We accept books in all formats, digital is welcome, many entries are now both digital an on paper, with digital representing over 23%

Entries from publishers with less than 10 books per year represent 55% , and big publishers have 45 %

Television shows and videos have the same deadlines as books. The preferred format is high definition.

The Process

The books have first to qualify in our national competition, with results announced in December.

The winner is the product, and the whole team is welcome at the Awards

They represent their country in the “Best in the World” competition, which are proclaimed the following year.

The Objectives

To reward and honour those who “cook with words”.

To help publishers with international rights to translate and distribute food and wine books.

To help food and wine tourism

To create an opportunity to access the major markets in English, German, Spanish or French, Arabic, Chinese, etc.

To increase knowledge of , and respect for, food and wine culture, which promotes peace.

The Jury

National jury for Winners

The competition is by countries which gives an equal chance for books from all countries to reach the international level. There is one jury for each country. When countries have different languages, there is one jury per language. For these awards, countries are based on the United Nations members list, plus the regions that have their own internet code, such as .ax for the island of Aland, .nc for New Caledonia, .hk for Hong Kong, etc.

Some juries have over 15 members, mostly in Europe, while some others are very small. We do not count books at the national level. Books are considered for several categories before settling in a category or being eliminated.

Edouard M. Cointreau as founder is part of all juries.

International Jury for the Best in the World

Permanent Members

  • Edouard M. Cointreau, President and Founder 
  • Edouard Cointreau, Gourmet Gallery, Frankfurt Book Fair  
  • Zhang YaPing, China

Rotating Members
There are 2 other members. The international jury has usually five members. There have been over the years nine other members of the international jury. In total there have been 14 different members.

Remaining on that jury many years is important as experience is the key. Having seen thousands of cookbooks from dozens of countries is a must.

The intense lobbying of a few potential winners have made it very uncomfortable to publish names. The excessive gratitude of the happy Best in the World or the bitterness of bad losers is equally embarrassing. Jurors have lost friends who blamed them for not winning.

Our awards would not be the same today without the dedicated help of our sorely missed friends and jurors:

  • Dun Gifford, President of Oldways, USA - 
  • Óscar Yáñez, librarian, Spain
  • Rene Renou, President INAO

Independent National Cookbook Awards

We welcome the many independent national cookbook awards. We all share the objective of helping and promoting food and wine books. We take into account their results whenever possible. Our categories and criteria are often different. Our focus is the international potential of books, seldom considered in national awards.

Germany

  • German Academy of Gastronomy Awards Ireland - Eurospar Cookbook of the Year

Netherlands

  • Cookbook of the Year, Kookboek van het jaar, Fusina Verloop, founder

Spain

  • Academy of Gastronomy awards, Rafael Anson, president

Sweden

  • Arets Svenska Maltidslitteratur. Swedish National Awards, Carl Jan Granqvist, founder, Christina Moller, chair.

UK

  • Circle of Food Writers Awards

USA

  • IACP Cookbook Awards - James Beard Awards

Reviews

Amazon readers reviews are very useful

Cookbook bookstores newsletters and websites are very important.

Australia: Cookery Book, New South Wales

Canada: La Librairie Gourmande, Montreal

France: La Librairie Gourmande, Paris

France: Athenaeum, Wine Books, Beaune

Italy: Bibliotheca Culinaria, Lodi

Spain: Libreria Aliana, Madrid

USA: Kitchen Arts and Letters, New York

The Categories

The categories for each entry are chosen by the jury, to maximize the chances of winning, with 211 countries participating in 2016. There are many other local or national awards for food and wine books, with many different categories.

In order to fully represent the diversity of food and drink publishing around the world, Gourmand World Cookbook Awards have 70 categories for food books, 25 for drinks, and 10 for food and wine television.

Food books are regrouped in 6 groups of Awards, for publishers, authors, lifestyle, subjects, geography and Charity cookbooks. The awards focus on food culture. Many categories welcome books with no recipes.

Television

  • Gourmand gives 10 Awards specifically linked to food television. This is unique in the world. 
  •  Edouard Cointreau is President for 5 years of the World Association of Food & Wine Television Producers. He has produced over 200 food and wine television shows, in Europe, the Middle East and China. 
  • The television stars are included in the Chefs Show Kitchen and the Awards. They can have their own stands for food television, and their own conferences.

The Impact of the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards

  • Winners books get more visibility in the marketplace and higher sales, often with new print runs.  
  • Translations and international rights deals are negotiated. 
  • Winners use self-adhesive stickers to announce their award to the public. They issue press releases in their local markets, which helps make the Gourmand Awards known worldwide. The winners give permanent presence to the awards on their internet sites, in publishers catalogs and in the following books and authors biographies.  
  • The impact is worldwide, through television and other media.

A majority of the Awards winners are also journalists, about 60%. They give access to world media.

Television – Dozens of winners get on television, broadcasting segments of the Awards show.

Printed media – Over 3000 press articles each year.

Digital – The winners announcements are everywhere on internet, on blogs, websites, social media, and stay there for years.

“Awards are amazing things. When you win, you really believe in them, when you don’t, you pick holes in them. Having been a professional judge of many different things, including food, wine, cooking, recipes, books, radio and television, I know how difficult a job it is.
What doesn’t change is the effect awards have on sales. They really do help. It’s particularly important for the small market we have here in NZ. Our books are competing with zillions of others coming in from overseas. It is fantastic to have international recognition for NZ books”.
Julie Biuso, Author. New Zealand

Sharing Food and Wine

Food and wine is today shared worldwide thanks to food television and cookbooks.

  • Culture – It is a global culture built with a puzzle of an infinite number of local cultures 
  • Business – It is a global market for business 
  • Tourism – Food and wine are now the number one appeal for tourists 
  • Society – It is a community, with worldwide network
  • Nations – It is a key aspect of the image of countries 
  • Health – It is a most important component of human health 
  • Glamour – Cookbooks give glamour to their authors, food television makes stars with chefs, owning a winery is the dream of millionnaires who have everything. 
  • Harmony and peace – Sharing food and wine through cookbooks and food television brings mutual understanding, harmony and peace. It has the same inspiration as the Olympic spirit.

The Gourmand Awards and Tourism

Food is number one of the positive criteria for tourists, increasing from 25% fifteen years ago to 38% in 2013. The two other top criteria are negative, eliminating destination for security, and cost.

  • The Awards are an opportunity to show the best to opinion leaders and media. It builds image. 
  • Market research has evidenced that one dollar spent on the Awards event is multiplied more than thirty times in media impact. (Australia and Malaysia events research). 
  • The trend is for more local tourism by intenational tourists, after the first step of the national / capital tourism. 
  • Food gives a true vision of people and their country. It is very convincing, easy to understand and share.

We give six tourism awards for food and wine content:

  • Best National Food Tourism Website  
  • Best Local Food Tourism Website 
  • Best Online Food/Wine Tourism Brochure
  • Best Wine Tourism Website 
  • Best Food Tourism Book
  • Best Wine Tourism Book

Present at the Awards Ceremony

  • Ambassadors – Thirty six embassies attended the Gourmand Awards in May 2014.
  • Foreign authors – Over 60% of the authors also work with the media, in print, radio, internet or television. This is very important for the promotion of the Awards. 
  • Cookbook writers – Women 48%, men 52% 
  • Wine book writers – Women 25%, men 75% 
  • Foreign publishers – Professional 77% , in 2013
  • Self-published (8%) – This category is increasing quickly because of e-books and digital technology- In the USA, there are 3 times more self-published cookbooks than trade publishers cookbooks. 
  • Public institutions (12%) – More and more ministries, public institutions, museums, foundations and chambers of commerce participate. 
  • Hotels and restaurants (3%) 
  • National – Every year the national guests are approximately one third to one half of the guests, depending on space

Leaders Write Cookbooks

Leaders have understood the strong impact of cookbooks, and that writing a cookbook has value and gives glamour. It is very useful socially.

  • USA – Michelle Obama, Oprah Winfrey 
  • France – Jacques Chirac 
  • Germany – Chancellor Kohl 
  • UK – Paul McCartney 
  • Actors – Eva Longoria, Gwyneth Paltrow, Gérard Depardieu 
  • Sport – Novak Djokovic

University Press and Cookbooks

  • Universities publish many food and wine books, showing their importance for culture. 
  • These University books are in 4 groups of themes, sometimes combined :
    • Health & Food
    • Culinary history and sociology
    • Local area interest, close to the university
    • Wine, showing the biggest growth 
  • These books sell well and are translated internationally, because of the content’s value 
  • The growth is quick in the Gourmand Awards, multiplied by 3 since 2007. We now have University Press books from over 80 universities in over 30 countries 
  • They win major awards, for instance :
    • Best cookbook publisher in the world, 2004 – Universidad San Martin de Porres, Peru
    • Best wine book publisher in the world 2010 – University of California Press, USA

Copyrights and Cookbooks

  • Professionals come to the Gourmand Awards for Honors, and also business. The copyright trade is fundamental for the success of the Gourmand Awards. 
  • Cookbooks are a global market. A cookbook that sells well in one country will sell well in others. 
  •  The major sellers are the US, the UK, France, Japan, Italy, Spain. 
  • The major buyers are Northern Europe, Eastern Europe, Asia, Latin America. 
  • The copyright international sales often make the difference between profits and losses for a book. It can become very profitable. 
  • It is a multiplication of small deals in many countries, rather than one big deal. That is why it is so important to have many countries in the Awards. Small streams make big rivers. 
  • We have long term partnerships with the Frankfurt Book Fair and the Beijing International Book Fair to manage their International Food and Wine Galleries, with numerous stands, products tastings, business centers for the foreign rights trade, and show kitchens.

The participating Countries and Regions

2005 67

2007 107

2009 136

2010 154

2011 162

2012 171

2013 187

2014 205

2015 209

2016 211

2017 215/p>

2018 216, with competitions in 105 categories

The 2012 Olympics had 204 participating countries, for 303 competitions/categories.

The United Nations have 193 members.

The Gourmand Awards in Macao - Registration & Facts

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The Gourmand Awards are the major Food Culture event in the world.

They started in 1995 for cookbooks and wine books, at Frankfurt Book Fair. They now include all Food Culture content. The Gourmand Awards are open to all, big or small, print or digital, for sale or for free, with or without ISBN, trade or self published, private or public, in any language. It is free to participate, anyone can send entries. There is no comparable international cultural event in the world, except the Olympics. We are inspired by the Olympic spirit.

1- The countries

This year we had entries from 215 countries and regions. There are 193 countries in the United Nations. For the Finalists, we have considerably reduced from the entries the number of countries, and entries. There are now Finalists for Food from a total of 134 countries (116 UN members) and regions. There are 40 countries and regions for Drinks.

2- Categories

There are 100 categories for Food, 30 for Drinks. This is necessary to reflect the wide diversity of world food culture. It gives a chance to many countries to win in a category. In the Olympic games, they have 303 competitions/categories for 202 countries. On our list our finalists, we have 130 categories for 134 countries and regions. In total, there are 1372 entries now finalist, 1144 for food, and 228 for drinks. This represents less than 3% of the total of similar books and other formats published and available every year. It is a major achievement to be on this list of Finalists. There are 67% of the categories with 12 or less finalists, 26% with 13 to 19 finalists, and 7% with 20 to 30 finalists.

3- Trends

Food Culture is now taken very seriously by most governments and individuals. Food is at the heart of the issues of our future, collectively and individually.Trends in Food and Drinks culture are now global, everywhere in the world, which this list of finalists makes very clear. We see six major trends, combining or competing at a different pace in different countries, with change accelerating:

  • Tourism is becoming the force driving food culture. Food is the first positive criteria and motivation generally, for 35%, up from 25% fifteen years ago. We have 160 entries for tourism (12%). See our categories B15, B17, B21, W1-8, W1-12.
  • Social media and television continue to expand the food culture market, helping print. See our categories A07, A08, A09, A13, B18, B19.
  • Health and Nutrition have joined with Ethics and Environmental concerns, spreading the same issues worldwide. For instance Vegan has become mainstream in very few years, everywhere. See our categories D01, D02, D08, D09, E06, E13.
  • Local has become the key word. There is a major effort everywhere to save local food culture, and transmit it. It is helped by tourism and the locavore trends. Slow Food has won. See our categories C01, D05, D07.
  • Quick and easy comfort food is still very important, especially in Asia. See our category E01. In 1995, when we started, this was the leading category.
  • Children and Family food books are rapidly expanding. See categories D03, D11.
  • There are minor new trends starting now Sports and Food, see D13.
  • Seniors and food, see D12 Breakfast, see E15.
  • Embassies and Gastro Diplomacy, see F08.

4- Digital

We have 19 categories (15%) exclusively for digital, with 195 digital entries now finalists (15%). You can find in the list of Finalists approximately 50 free Food and Wine PDF to download, selected for their quality, nearly all produced by public institutions. Unfortunately, they tend to disappear quickly, so do not be surprised if you cannot find them. We cannot help. See categories A06 for FAO, UN-IOM, UNDEP-Canada, UNESCO, UNWTO or B17, W1-12. For cookbook professional online newsletters, see B03.

5- The next step

The Best in the World will be announced in Yantai, China at the Gourmand Awards annual event May 25-28, 2018. The top 3 in each category will have the right to Best in the World. We do not announce results before the event. It is not necessary to attend to win. Apart from the honors at the event, the major opportunity is meeting the other participants, for business and pleasure. As previous participants have written, it may be the best four days of your life if you participate. Guests from over 60 countries had already indicated they wanted to come as of January 12, 2018. There are among them 81 guests who have already been at our events in Yantai. They come back even if they have no entry in the competition, it is so important for networking, business, and food culture.