Nadia Lim

Nadia Lim is a New Zealand chef, nutritionist, author and farmer of New Zealand and Chinese-Malaysian heritage. Born in Auckland in 1985, she spent six years of her childhood in Kuala Lumpur before returning to New Zealand, an experience she credits with shaping the Asian-European fusion that runs through her cooking. She studied nutrition and dietetics at the University of Otago and qualified as a dietitian before turning to food professionally.

In 2011 she won the second series of MasterChef New Zealand, which launched a career across television, books and business. She has published multiple cookbooks, including Nadia Lim's Good Food Cookbook (runner-up at the 2014 International Gourmand Cookbook of the Year awards) and Vegful (runner-up for best vegetarian cookbook in the world, 2019). Her television work includes New Zealand with Nadia Lim, Nadia's Comfort Kitchen and a stint as judge on the seventh series of MasterChef New Zealand in 2022.

In 2012 she co-founded My Food Bag with Cecilia Robinson, James Robinson (Cecilia's husband), Theresa Gattung and her own husband Carlos Bagrie. The company grew into New Zealand's largest meal-kit service, reaching $100 million in annual revenue within three years and listing on the NZX in March 2021 with a market capitalisation of roughly NZ$450 million. Its founders feature in what New Zealand's most successful founders did next.

Lim has since stepped back from My Food Bag to focus on Royalburn Station, a 485-hectare sheep and barley farm on the Crown Range between Arrowtown and Wanaka that she runs with Bagrie. There she has turned to regenerative paddock-to-plate farming: raising lamb, pasture-raised eggs, honey, spray-free wheat, malting barley and organic vegetables, with a focus on soil health and crop rotation. Royalburn's fine lamb won the Primary Sector category at the NZ Food Awards in 2024. The farm and its challenges are documented in the television series Nadia's Farm, followed by Nadia's Farm Kitchen in 2025 with an accompanying cookbook.

Lim was made an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the 2025 New Year Honours for services to the food industry and the community. Bagrie received the same honour for services to the food and rural industries.

Sources: Wikipedia · nadialim.com · NZ Herald · NZ Food Awards