# Ree Drummond
**Ree Drummond** is an American blogger, cookbook author, and television personality known as **The Pioneer Woman**, the name of the website she founded in 2006 to chronicle life on her family's cattle ranch near [Pawhuska, Oklahoma](https://www.edgepedia.org/pawhuska-oklahoma). The blog grew into a [Food Network](https://www.edgepedia.org/food-network) cooking show, a series of New York Times bestselling cookbooks, a magazine, and restaurants and retail businesses in Pawhuska.[1](https://www.barnesandnoble.com/authors/ree-drummond) • [2](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-pioneer-woman-ree-drummond-on-food-fame-and-family/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab4i)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Blog | The Pioneer Woman (ThePioneerWoman.com), started in 2006; by 2011 it drew about 23.3 million page views and 4.4 million unique visitors per month[1](https://www.barnesandnoble.com/authors/ree-drummond) • [3](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/05/09/o-pioneer-woman) |
| First cookbook | *The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Recipes from an Accidental Country Girl* (2009), which debuted at No. 1 on the New York Times best-seller list in November 2009[3](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/05/09/o-pioneer-woman) |
| Television | *The Pioneer Woman* on Food Network since 2011, filmed at The Lodge on the Drummond ranch; the show was still airing new seasons in 2025[4](https://www.tvinsider.com/1221290/where-is-pioneer-woman-filmed-ree-dummond-kitchen-the-lodge/) • [5](https://www.tvmaze.com/shows/6110/the-pioneer-woman) |
| Cookbooks | Nine bestselling cookbooks through *The Pioneer Woman Cooks: The Essential Recipes* (October 28, 2025), with a tenth planned[6](https://www.tvinsider.com/1216055/ree-drummond-retiring-from-releasing-cookbooks-the-pioneer-woman/) |
| Family | Married Ladd Drummond in 1996; five children, Alex (born 1997), Paige (1999), Bryce (2002), Todd (2004), and Jamar, who joined the family through foster care in 2018[7](https://nz.news.yahoo.com/30-years-ago-ree-drummond-171511918.html) • [8](https://www.aol.ca/articles/know-ree-drummond-5-kids-173705000.html) |
| Ranch | The Drummond family has ranched cattle for four generations near Pawhuska, on roughly 100,000 acres[2](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-pioneer-woman-ree-drummond-on-food-fame-and-family/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab4i) |
| Pawhuska businesses | The Pioneer Woman Mercantile restaurant, the Boarding House hotel (opened 2018), and a pizzeria, which helped turn the town of about 3,500 people into a tourist destination[2](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-pioneer-woman-ree-drummond-on-food-fame-and-family/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab4i) • [9](https://leaders.com/rankings/person/ree-drummond/) |
## Early life and move to the ranch
Drummond was born in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, the third of four children of a stay-at-home mother and an orthopedic surgeon father, and grew up on the seventh fairway of a golf course.[10](https://green-country.webnode.page/ree-drummond/) • [3](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/05/09/o-pioneer-woman) • [11](https://www.thepioneerwoman.com/about/a5039/about/) After high school she moved to Los Angeles to study broadcast journalism at the [University of Southern California](https://www.edgepedia.org/university-of-southern-california), saying she wanted to be [Jane Pauley](https://www.edgepedia.org/jane-pauley), then switched to gerontology. After graduation she worked for a company marketing to the "baby boom-plus population," wrangling celebrity guests for senior-centric trade shows.[3](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/05/09/o-pioneer-woman)
She returned to Bartlesville and was studying for the LSAT when she met a "Marlboro Man-esque, rugged character" at a local bar, the cattle rancher Ladd Drummond, whom she calls [Marlboro Man](https://www.edgepedia.org/marlboro-man) on her blog. She married him and moved to his family's ranch in [Osage County, Oklahoma](https://www.edgepedia.org/osage-county-oklahoma).[3](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/05/09/o-pioneer-woman) The couple married in 1996 and marked their 30th anniversary in September 2026.[7](https://nz.news.yahoo.com/30-years-ago-ree-drummond-171511918.html)
## The blog
Drummond started the blog in May 2006, on the first morning she had spent alone in her house for several hours since becoming a mother, intending it as a way to keep in touch with her mother in Tennessee. Early posts included droll poems, audio recordings of herself burping, and anecdotes about country living.[3](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/05/09/o-pioneer-woman) A steak recipe she posted in 2007 drew requests for more, and cooking tutorials such as "How to Cook a Steak" became popular with readers, encouraging her to post more food photography.[2](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-pioneer-woman-ree-drummond-on-food-fame-and-family/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab4i) • [12](https://legacylearningcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/12thGrade-English-V2-Workbook.pdf)
By 2011 the site received approximately 23.3 million page views and 4.4 million unique visitors per month, with sections for Confessions, Cooking, Photography, Home & Garden, and [Homeschooling](https://www.edgepedia.org/homeschooling), plus a recipe-sharing forum called Tasty Kitchen. Drummond estimated her readership as "ninety-five per cent female," many logging on from suburban or urban locales for whom her rural housewifery read as exotic.[3](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/05/09/o-pioneer-woman) *Time* later credited her Pioneer Woman blog with kicking off the blog-to-cookbook phenomenon that preceded the wave of Instagram food celebrities.[13](https://time.com/5709378/instagram-food-influencers-cookbooks/)
## Books
Her first cookbook, *The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Recipes from an Accidental Country Girl* (2009), debuted at No. 1 on the New York Times best-seller list in November 2009.[3](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/05/09/o-pioneer-woman) Her memoir *The Pioneer Woman: Black Heels to Tractor Wheels—A Love Story* reached second place on the best-seller list when published in February 2011; [Sony Pictures](https://www.edgepedia.org/sony-pictures) optioned it, with [Reese Witherspoon](https://www.edgepedia.org/reese-witherspoon) signed to star and Robert Harling writing the screenplay.[3](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/05/09/o-pioneer-woman) Follow-up cookbooks include *The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Food from My Frontier* (2012)[14](https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/ree-drummond/pioneer-woman-cooks/) and *The Pioneer Woman Cooks—Dinner's Ready!* (2023).[15](https://s48687.pcdn.co/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/WS26-Ultimate-Cookbooks-Catalogue.pdf)
By 2019, five of her cookbooks had been New York Times No. 1 bestsellers.[2](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-pioneer-woman-ree-drummond-on-food-fame-and-family/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab4i) Her ninth cookbook, *The Pioneer Woman Cooks: The Essential Recipes*, published October 28, 2025, was, she told *People*, initially intended to be her last; she has since said a tenth cookbook is in the works and "will definitely be my last."[6](https://www.tvinsider.com/1216055/ree-drummond-retiring-from-releasing-cookbooks-the-pioneer-woman/) She has also written children's books and a second memoir, *Frontier Follies*.[1](https://www.barnesandnoble.com/authors/ree-drummond) • [16](https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/ree-drummond/frontier-follies/)
## Television
The Food Network series *The Pioneer Woman* premiered in 2011.[1](https://www.barnesandnoble.com/authors/ree-drummond) Since 2011 the show has been filmed at The Lodge, a structure on the Drummond ranch near Pawhuska, rather than in her home kitchen.[4](https://www.tvinsider.com/1221290/where-is-pioneer-woman-filmed-ree-dummond-kitchen-the-lodge/) The series was in its 40th season by late 2025, airing Saturday mornings.[5](https://www.tvmaze.com/shows/6110/the-pioneer-woman) Drummond has also hosted the competition series *Big Bad Budget Battle* and serves as a regular judge on Food Network competitions, including *Christmas Cookie Challenge*.[11](https://www.thepioneerwoman.com/about/a5039/about/) In 2025 she launched a QVC apparel and food line, *Ree by The Pioneer Woman*.[6](https://www.tvinsider.com/1216055/ree-drummond-retiring-from-releasing-cookbooks-the-pioneer-woman/)
Her cooking style is deliberately accessible. "I'm not a trained chef, and so I have a level of accessibility," she told [CBS News](https://www.edgepedia.org/cbs-news), describing comfort food such as macaroni and cheese, sticky buns, and her signature chicken-fried steak, made with easy-to-get ingredients.[2](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-pioneer-woman-ree-drummond-on-food-fame-and-family/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab4i)
## Pawhuska businesses
Ree and Ladd Drummond own what CBS described as "a prosperous chunk of downtown" Pawhuska, Oklahoma, a town of about 3,500 people that their ventures turned into a tourist destination. The Pioneer Woman Mercantile is a large restaurant and shop; the Boarding House, opened in 2018 in a renovated three-story historical building, offers hotel suites the couple designed; and they also run a pizzeria.[2](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-pioneer-woman-ree-drummond-on-food-fame-and-family/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab4i) • [9](https://leaders.com/rankings/person/ree-drummond/)
## Family
The Drummonds have five children: Alex (born 1997), Paige (1999), Bryce (2002), and Todd (2004), plus Jamar, who joined the family through foster care in 2018; Drummond wrote publicly about him in November 2020.[8](https://www.aol.ca/articles/know-ree-drummond-5-kids-173705000.html) The children were homeschooled on the ranch and appeared regularly on the blog and show.[3](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/05/09/o-pioneer-woman) As of the mid-2020s the couple are empty nesters; Alex lives in Dallas and made Drummond a grandmother in December 2024.[17](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3845270/news/)
## Reception
Amanda Fortini's 2011 *New Yorker* profile described the blog as a domestic idyll without conflict, politics, or snark, and noted that parodies and critique sites had sprung up alongside the fan base.[3](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/05/09/o-pioneer-woman) Common criticisms of her cooking are that the recipes are derivative and the techniques unremarkable, though her accessibility is central to her appeal; chef [Bobby Flay](https://www.edgepedia.org/bobby-flay), who cooked alongside her on his series *Throwdown*, said her cooking strikes a chord with people who want to feed their families better without molecular gastronomy.[18](https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-pioneer-woman-gets-lost-on-the-range) • [3](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/05/09/o-pioneer-woman) In 2017, Eater criticized a season 2 episode featuring "Asian hot wings," in which her family wrinkled their noses at the dish, as racist and called for its removal.[19](https://www.eater.com/2017/3/7/14846788/pioneer-woman-racist-asian-hot-wings) Academic commentators have read her show and blog as presenting traditional gender roles, self-reliance, and rural nostalgia within a framework of white culinary nationalism.[20](https://digitalcollections.ohsu.edu/record/9704/files/Becker.Darci.2022.pdf?ln=en)
## References
1. [Ree Drummond, author page, Barnes & Noble](https://www.barnesandnoble.com/authors/ree-drummond)
2. [The Pioneer Woman: Ree Drummond on food, fame and family, CBS News (March 10, 2019)](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-pioneer-woman-ree-drummond-on-food-fame-and-family/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab4i)
3. [O Pioneer Woman! by Amanda Fortini, The New Yorker (May 9, 2011)](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/05/09/o-pioneer-woman)
4. [Where Is 'Pioneer Woman' Filmed?, TV Insider](https://www.tvinsider.com/1221290/where-is-pioneer-woman-filmed-ree-dummond-kitchen-the-lodge/)
5. [The Pioneer Woman, TVmaze show page](https://www.tvmaze.com/shows/6110/the-pioneer-woman)
6. ['The Pioneer Woman's Ree Drummond Makes Surprise Retirement Announcement, TV Insider (September 17, 2025)](https://www.tvinsider.com/1216055/ree-drummond-retiring-from-releasing-cookbooks-the-pioneer-woman/)
7. [30 Years Ago, Ree Drummond Married Husband Ladd, Yahoo News (September 22, 2026)](https://nz.news.yahoo.com/30-years-ago-ree-drummond-171511918.html)
8. [What to Know About Ree Drummond's 5 Kids, Yahoo/AOL (September 24, 2026)](https://www.aol.ca/articles/know-ree-drummond-5-kids-173705000.html)
9. [Ree Drummond, Leaders.com](https://leaders.com/rankings/person/ree-drummond/)
10. [Ree Drummond, Green Country](https://green-country.webnode.page/ree-drummond/)
11. [About Pioneer Woman, ThePioneerWoman.com](https://www.thepioneerwoman.com/about/a5039/about/)
12. [The Pioneer Woman Succeeds, Legacy Learning Center workbook](https://legacylearningcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/12thGrade-English-V2-Workbook.pdf)
13. [Why All Your Favorite Instagram Chefs Are Whipping Up Cookbooks, Time (2019)](https://time.com/5709378/instagram-food-influencers-cookbooks/)
14. [Food from My Frontier, Kirkus Reviews](https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/ree-drummond/pioneer-woman-cooks/)
15. [Cider Mill Press Ultimate Cookbooks Catalogue (December 2025), William Morrow Cookbooks listings](https://s48687.pcdn.co/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/WS26-Ultimate-Cookbooks-Catalogue.pdf)
16. [Frontier Follies, Kirkus Reviews](https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/ree-drummond/frontier-follies/)
17. [Ree Drummond News, IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3845270/news/)
18. [The Pioneer Woman Gets Lost on the Range, The New Yorker (2011)](https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-pioneer-woman-gets-lost-on-the-range)
19. [Maybe Food Network Should Pull This Racist 'Pioneer Woman' Episode, Eater (2017)](https://www.eater.com/2017/3/7/14846788/pioneer-woman-racist-asian-hot-wings)
20. [Becker, Darci (2022), thesis, Oregon Health & Science University digital collections](https://digitalcollections.ohsu.edu/record/9704/files/Becker.Darci.2022.pdf?ln=en)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Food, customs, and everyday culture › Food, cooking and hospitality › Food media, writing, and celebrity food culture › Food writing, criticism, and cookbooks › American food writers*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 12, 2026; Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license