After graduating from Columbia, he went to work with his stepbrother in a publishing company. Soon after, he worked for The Center for Direct Marketing in Westport, Connecticut and also started taking cooking courses. After securing $100,000 in angel investments from friends and family, he started Cook’s Magazine from a tiny office in Weston, Connecticut in 1980 when he was 29 years old. He sold the magazine to the Bonnier Group in 1989 and moved on to other publishing ventures.
''America's Test Kitchen''
Kimball was a co-founder and has been editor and publisher of America's Test Kitchen, which produces television and radio shows, and publishes magazines, including Cook's Illustrated, which Kimball launched in 1993. It also publishes Cook's Country magazine, which was launched in 2004,. The company's revenue comes from its readers, rather than advertisers, which differentiates them from the competitors. Its cookbook publisher division is Two Pigs Farm. Boston Common Press, a private partnership between Kimball, Eliot Wadsworth II, and George P. Denny III, owned Kimball's publishing activities. Kimball also hosted the syndicated Public Televisioncooking showsAmerica's Test Kitchen and Cook's Country from America's Test Kitchen. On November 16, 2015, a news release from Boston Common Press, parent company of Cooks Country/Cooks Illustrated/America's Test Kitchen, announced the departure of Christopher Kimball. The 2016 TV programs had already been filmed and Kimball appeared as host, but his direct participation in the company ended immediately. He remained a minority stockholder until 2019 when he sold his shares back to the company as part of a lawsuit settlement.
''Christopher Kimball's Milk Street''
In 2016, he created Christopher Kimball's Milk Street, located on Milk Street in Boston, Massachusetts. On October 31, 2016, Boston Common Press filed a lawsuit against Kimball in Suffolk Superior Court, claiming that Kimball "literally and conceptually ripped off" his former employer. In the lawsuit, Boston Common Press claims Kimball built his new venture while still on their payroll, using company resources in the form of recipes and databases to help shape Milk Street Kitchen into a direct competitor. The lawsuit was settled in August 2019. He was further sued by his ex-wife Adrienne, alleging his departure from Cook's Illustrated devalued the company and affected his payments to her.
He has been married three times. He had a son and three daughters with his second wife, Adrienne. They divorced in December 2012. On June 30, 2013, Kimball married Melissa Lee Baldino, executive producer of the America's Test Kitchen television show. She is now co-founder of Christopher Kimball's Milk Street. Their son, Oliver Kimball, was born on May 4, 2017. A daughter, Rike, was born in 2019.
