Former celebrity chef Pete Evans to publish cookbook with RFK Jr

Former celebrity chef turned conspiracy theorist Pete Evans has teamed up with anti-vaxxer and Donald Trump’s pick for US health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr, to produce a new cookbook for children.

In the book, titled Healthy Food for Healthy Kids, Evans has created 120 paleo- and keto-friendly meals for children that will be published by Kennedy’s Children’s Health Defence, one of the largest US anti-vaccine groups.

Pete Evans and Robert F. Kennedy Jr in Los Angeles in 2020.Credit: Instagram

“So pleased and thankful that Robert Kennedy Jr set this up for me with his Children’s Health Defence team,” Evans posted on Telegram, the Daily Mail reported, before the post was removed.

“Stay tuned for more.”

The book, which is available for pre-order, will be released in January 2025. In 2015, another children’s paleo cookbook co-authored by Evans was dumped by publisher Pan Macmillan after dietitians and doctors widely criticised it. The book, Bubba Yum Yum: The Paleo Way, recommended feeding infants a DIY baby formula made from bone broth.

Evans’ latest cookbook came after he met Kennedy in January 2020 just before the outbreak of COVID-19 when he was invited to Kennedy’s home in Los Angeles to film an interview with him. The two became known during the pandemic for regularly posting debunked conspiracy theories about COVID-19.

Pete Evans in a post he shared on social media on the day Donald Trump was re-elected as US president.Credit: Instagram

That was the same year that Evans was dumped from his $800,000 a year gig as co-host of Sevens’ My Kitchen Rules, and that he was fined $25,000 by the Therapeutic Goods Administration for selling a device called a “BioCharger”. The device, which critics mocked as a “glorified lava lamp”, claimed it could help with the “Wuhan coronavirus”. The TGA said this claim had no apparent foundation.

Kennedy, who ran for president as a Democrat, and then as an independent before endorsing Trump was selected last week as the president-elect’s choice as health and human services secretary. His nomination has alarmed people concerned about his record of spreading unfounded vaccine fears. He has long advanced the debunked idea that vaccines cause autism.

“I always have thought it would be so great if he and Trump teamed up, and now it has happened,” Evans posted on his Instagram days after Kennedy endorsed the then-Republican nominee.

“I have little doubt that the 2028 president will be Robert Kennedy Jnr.”

Kennedy, the son of Democratic icon Robert Kennedy, has run the Children’s Health Defence since 2018. The organisation says its mission is “ending childhood health epidemics by eliminating toxic exposure”.

The group’s social media accounts were removed from Facebook and Instagram in 2022 for spreading medical misinformation. In an email to its followers, the group said the accounts were taken down for 30 days and accused the apps of censorship.

In 2021, the Centre for Countering Digital Hate named the Children Health Defence as one of the “Disinformation Dozen”, the top 12 superspreaders of misinformation about COVID-19 on the internet.

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