Sri Owen

Her first cookbook, The Home Book Of Indonesian Cookery, was published by Faber in 1976, and brought together family recipes handed down by her grandmother and carefully recorded by her mother. Owen went on to write more than a dozen books on the food of Indonesia and other Asian countries. A significant mentor was Alan Davidson, author of The Oxford Companion to Food, to whom she eventually dedicated her 15th book, Sri Owen’s Indonesian Food. He influenced her thinking about "foodways"—the ever-evolving totality "of all the food habits in a community or culture". She argues that rendang, recognised by the Indonesian state as one of the five national dishes, is a Minangkabau dish.

After accompanying her husband back to London in 1963, Sri worked as a translator, broadcaster and producer for the BBC Far Eastern Service for almost 20 years. In 1984, Roger and Sri moved with their two sons to Wimbledon Village, where Sri sold Indonesian dishes and snacks from a shop on the High Street.

Her childhood was disrupted by Japanese occupation of the Dutch East Indies; during World War II, millions of Indonesians died of famine, forced labour, and the disruption of society. Her parents worked as teachers, and the family lived briefly in Jakarta, before settling in Magelang, Central Java in 1949. Sri continued her education in Yogyakarta and studied English Literature at Gadjah Mada University. After graduating, she taught at the university and became head of its library; it was there in 1961 that she met Roger Owen, a British Oxford University graduate, who lectured in history in Indonesia for three years. Sri and Roger married in 1962.

Sri Owen (born 31 March 1935) is an Indonesian cooking teacher and food writer, based in London for most of her life. She is the author of the first English-language recipe book dedicated to the food of Indonesia, and is recognised as a leading authority on Indonesian cuisine.

Owen was born in Padang Panjang, West Sumatra, in what was then the Dutch East Indies, on 31 March 1935. She was born to a Minangkabau family, in a town at the heart of that culture. She was the eldest of six children, all girls.