Richard Olney was one of a kind - a scholarly cook who had a tremendous influence on modern cooking via his cottage on a hillside in Provence. Born and raised in Iowa, America he was drawn to France as a young man. Olney moved to a Parisian suburb in 1951 before settling in a run-down property in Provence where he wrote eight cookbooks and consulted on the Time-Life Good Cook series. Olney passed away at his Provencal home in 1999.