Nina Furstenau teaches food and wine writing at the University of Missouri, writes a food column for Missouri Life magazine, and received the International Regional Magazine Association’s Award for Food Writing in 2009. She has recently completed a food memoir, Biting Through The Skin: Tales from an Indian Kitchen. She was a month-long resident at the Vermont Studio Center in Johnson, Vermont, in 2008. She received an M.A. in English/Fiction in 2006, a B.J. Degree in journalism in 1984, both from the University of Missouri. She was raised in a small town in Kansas in the 1960s-70s, cooks Indian food constantly, and visits India as often as possible with her family.