Mark Bittman is a well-known American cookbook author and food writer. He lives in New York. He is not a trained chef, but came to cooking through journalism.

Bittman writes the New York Times weekly column "The Minimalist" and is the author of numerous award-winning cookbooks including How to Cook Everything, Fish: The Complete Guide to Buying and Cooking, and the Minimalist Cookbook series. In 2005, he launched a PBS series to accompany How to Cook Everything. An ambitious food writer, he has also published The Best Recipes in the World: More than 1000 International Dishes to Cook at Home and his most recent work How to Cook Everything Vegetarian.

The online edition of the New York Times regularly contains video segments to accompany Bittman's "Minimalist" column. The segments emphasize Bittman's informal approach toward cooking and are deliberately under-produced, often featuring minor mishaps or delays that many producers would have chosen to edit out. Each segment ends with Bittman beginning to eat whatever he has just cooked.

Bittman is a regular guest on The Today Show, has appeared on other radio and television programs, and been profiled in national newspapers.