Miyoko Schinner

Schinner was born in a town outside of Tokyo, Japan as Miyoko Nishimoto. She left Japan and moved to the United States when she was seven. Schinner and her family settled in Marin County, specifically in Mill Valley, California.

Schinner became a vegetarian at the age of 12. She describes this period as "the 60s and early 70s, the glory days of the hippie movement and spiritualism and hare krishna," or the turn to natural foods within the American counterculture. Her initial exposure to this movement occurred during a camping trip that included vegetarians who "were from a spiritual family and didn't believe in harming animals. I went home and my mother put pork chops in front of me after being vegetarian for two or three days. I looked at the pork chop and just could not eat it. I stopped right there." Schinner's mother did not support this shift towards vegetarian dishes, forcing Schinner to teach herself how to cook. However, Schinner credits this period as the time that she grew to love cooking. Although this interest in cooking led her to consider culinary school, she ultimately decided not to attend (as she would have to work with animal products), and is entirely self-taught.

Schinner began college at the Pratt Institute in order to study graphic design, but dropped out after a year. She eventually transferred to St. John's College in Annapolis, and graduated with a B.A. in philosophy in 1979.

Miyoko and Michael Schinner have three children, a son (a basketball player in Japan) and two daughters. They divorced in 2023.