[4] Ottolenghi is an Italian name, an Italianised form of Ettlingen,[5] a town in Baden-Württemberg from which Jews were expelled in the 15th and 16th centuries; many settled in Northern Italy.

He then studied at the Adi Lautman Interdisciplinary Programme for Outstanding Students of Tel Aviv University where in 1997, he completed a combined bachelor's and master's degree in comparative literature; his thesis was on the philosophy of the photographic image.

[7] In 1997, Ottolenghi and his then partner Noam Bar moved to Amsterdam, where he edited the Hebrew section of the Dutch-Jewish weekly NIW.

[12] In 2002, the duo (in collaboration with Noam Bar) founded the eponymous delicatessen Ottolenghi in the Notting Hill district of London.

The deli quickly gained a cult following due to its inventive dishes, characterised by the foregrounding of vegetables, unorthodox flavour combinations, and the abundance of Middle Eastern ingredients such as rose water, za'atar, and pomegranate molasses.

Influenced by the straightforward, culturally-grounded food writing of Nigella Lawson and Claudia Roden,[15] Ottolenghi's recipes rarely fit within traditional dietary or cultural categories.