Ethnic-haute is the improbable joining of two seemingly separate food worlds, across class and restaurant cultures. It is also the basis for many of today's urban culinary success stories. Food studies scholar Krishnendu Ray describes the cosmopolitan phenomenon of Asian chefs who are changing the palates, tastes, and aesthetics of contemporary dining.

Before joining the NYU faculty in 2005, food studies scholar Krishnendu Ray taught at the Culinary Institute of America, where he was also an associate dean for curriculum development. He received his Ph.D. in Sociology from SUNY Binghamton and his master's in Political Science from Delhi University, India.

Ray is the author of The Migrant's Table: Meals and Memories in Bengali-American Households (Temple University, 2004), as well as several book chapters, including "Exotic Restaurants and Expatriate Home Cooking" in David Inglis and Debra Gimlin, eds., The Globalization of Food (Oxford: Berg, 2009), and "Ethnic Succession and the New American Restaurant Cuisine," in David Beriss and David Sutton, eds., The Restaurants Book: Ethnographies of Where We Eat (Oxford: Berg Publishers, 2007).

Among his journal articles are "Nation and Cuisine: The Evidence from American Newspapers ca. 1830-2003," Food & Foodways, 16:4 (August 2008); "Domesticating Cuisine: Food and Aesthetics on American Television," Gastronomica 7:1 (Winter 2007). His most recent co-edited book is Curried Cultures: Globalization, Food and South Asia (University of California Press, 2012).

He is currently working on his next book-length project tentatively titled "Taste, Toil and Ethnicity: Immigrant Restaurateur and the American City." He serves on the editorial board of the journal Food, Culture & Society.