Nina Mukerjee Furstenau is a journalist, author, and editor of the FoodStory book series for the University of Iowa Press. She was a Fulbright Global research scholar in Kolkata, India, is on the board of directors for Media for Change, and has won the MFK Fisher Book Award, the Grand Prize Award for Culture/Culinary Writing from Les Dames d'Escoffier International, a Kansas Notable Book award, and more.

Her upcoming book, Green Chili & Other Impostors (Nov 2021), will be published as Chilies, Channa & Rasa in India . Other published works include the award-wining Biting Through the Skin: An Indian Kitchen in America's Heartland, Tasty! Mozambique, and Savor Missouri: River Hills Country Food and Wine. Nina's work appears as a contributor in the anthology Pie & Whiskey: Writers Under the Influence of Butter and Booze, as well as in newspapers, magazines, and journals.

Nina served in the U.S. Peace Corps (1984-86), work that informs almost everything she has done since.