Scottish-born Australian food writer and cookbook author Margaret Fulton died this morning at the age of 94 at a retirement home in NSW's Southern Highlands. Fulton has been attributed with expanding Australian home cookery from meat and three veg to more adventurous fare via her magazine columns and more than 25 cookbooks.
She first came to the nation’s attention with her food columns in Woman’s Day magazine, before going on to author staples such as The Margaret Fulton Cookbook and Margaret Fulton’s Encyclopaedia of Food and Cookery. She was an avid traveller who encouraged Australians to look beyond their own shores for culinary inspiration. Until Fulton began writing about Chinese food in the 1950s, few non-Chinese Australians had ventured into their local Chinatown. She also brought Italian food to mainstream Australia with the release of an Italian cookbook in the 1970s.
Fulton was awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia in 1983, and in 2006 was named an Australian National Living Treasure by the National Trust.
In a statement, her family said they are “mourning the loss of their loving, inspirational and treasured mother, grandmother and great-grandmother early this morning”.
