Spanish lawyer, writer and gourmet.
His professional activity began as a Food Law adviser at the Institute of Agrochemistry and Food Technology, a body dependent on the Higher Council for Scientific Research (CSIC) and, at the same time, he began his teaching activity as a professor of Food Legislation at the aforementioned Institute, teaching Food Law courses in the master’s degree on Food Science and Engineering at the Polytechnic University of Valencia, also at the University of Salamanca, and at the University of La Serena (Chile). Finally, since 1988, on the occasion of the founding of AINIA, Agro-Food Technological Institute, he has worked as an adviser and professor in food legislation.
Proof of his extensive knowledge in food matters was his stay in Rome, headquarters of the international Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), where he directed comparative studies on food legislation for Latin America and served as a consultant in the development of the Codex Alimentarius between 1976 -1978; In this legal-professional facet, he published the Spanish Food Legislation , as well as numerous articles in specialized national and foreign magazines on the subject. During his stay in the Italian capital he wrote Roma pasada, a curious guide to corners of the old city. By then, she had already started his literary work as a result of his extensive reading and an enthusiastic admiration for classical antiquity; Thus, he published various articles in the local press, which in 1973 he compiled into his first two books: Ramblings on Classic Gastronomy: Fish and Ramblings on Classic Gastronomy : Hunting and Meats, with a pleasant, erudite narration sprinkled with wit, that bring to light the Hellenic and Roman roots of Mediterranean gastronomy.
From then on, there was no gastronomic magazine that did not have his accredited signature and for such journalistic work he was awarded the Rupert de Nola prize in 1982. Adding to this journalistic facet and delving into one more trait of his personality than as a great fan a la Fiesta Nacional he worked as a bullfighting critic for radio Valencia for more than ten years.
In 1983, continuing within this framework of classical antiquity, he was awarded the La Odyssey Prize, organized by the Barcelona restaurant of the same name for his book Septem Coquiorum Convivium (The Banquet of the Seven Cooks), which constitutes a parody of banquets. Socratic — symposium — in which cooks replace wise men and gather around the table in the villa of a courtesan, Gnatena .
But, in addition, Millo’s work is bilingual and is expressed in his vernacular language, publishing in 1984 La taula y la cuina , which won the National Gastronomy Award in 1985, the first time that the Ministry of Industry and Commerce granted said award to a work not written in Spanish. Along these lines, other titles such as El Trinquet , Carrers y racons de Valéncia , El joc de la pilota , or Els veins de dalt were added . But, definitely, the book that consecrates Lorenzo Millo as the greatest expert in Valencian gastronomy up to that moment and makes him an obligatory reference in what concerns the autochthonous taste of the Mediterranean brand and Valencian designation of origin is his magnum opus.Gastronomy of the Valencian Community (1992) which is dedicated to culinary research, collecting the uses and customs of the Valencian people at the table and where there is room for recipes from different specialties. From then on, titles follow one another along the same lines: Rice , Valencian Cuisine , Traditional Cooking Techniques , Valencian Gastronomy and, his posthumous published work, Regional Valencian Cuisine , as well as a monographic work on La Paella , which proves forcefully the strength and success of this dish of humble origin that has its place in the context of world gastronomy.
Finally, his scholarly contribution to gastronomic literature is Gastronomy, manual and guide for use by yuppies and perplexed or unwary executives , a book that aims to facilitate the search for the right path for beginners and serve as a warning to those who advance recklessly or overconfident by the route of gastronomy.
Lorenzo Millo was a great gourmet according to the definition that appears in the Dictionary of the Academy of Gourmets of Paris as an “expert in good food” and in practice until the end of his days. He died aboard the Queen Elizabeth II, off the island of Tasmania in the South Seas on 10 February 1998 at age 73.