Lynn Yamada Davis, ‘Cooking with Lynja’ TikTok Star, Dead at 67

The content creator was known for her over-the-top, comedically edited cooking videos, amassing nearly 30 million followers across her social media platforms

Lynn Yamada Davis, the beloved social media star behind Cooking with Lynja, has died. She was 67.

Davis died on Jan. 1 at Riverview Medical Center in New Jersey. Her daughter, Hannah Mariko Shofet, told The New York Times that the cause of death was esophageal cancer.

Davis was diagnosed with throat cancer in 2019 and diagnosed with esophageal cancer in 2021, per The New York Times.

The content creator was known for her over-the-top, comedically edited cooking videos on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube, which began during the Covid-19 pandemic. The mother of four and grandmother of two told PEOPLE last summer that she had “no idea” what TikTok was before her son, Tim, started posting videos of her there.

Davis’s videographer son asked her to participate in a casual month-long project to record a video every day at the start of the pandemic. But, as the lockdown continued, the mother-son duo continued to create cooking videos for YouTube and eventually TikTok with Tim behind the camera and Davis taking centerstage.

“He's the one who writes the script. He's the one who does the videography. He does all the editing. So, he really is the genius behind Cooking with Lynja. I just show up,” Davis said.

A few months after starting to share the clips, the former software engineer’s zany bacon, egg and cheese recipe video blew up online and her fame “just started growing after that.”

Now, more than three years later, the Cooking with Lynja TikTok page has 17.5 million followers, her YouTube account has nearly 10 million subscribers and her Instagram account has more than two million.

Prior to her social media stardom, Davis had a long career as an engineer. After going to Massachusetts Institute of Technology for her undergraduate degree, she worked for the federal government to make federal buildings accessible. She then earned her MBA and MPH at Columbia University before working at AT&T Labs. She was a systems engineer and project manager during her 29 years here.

“She had this whole chapter as a groundbreaking female engineer, and she was very proud of that,” Shofet told The New York Times.

Davis told PEOPLE that, while the comments from fans asking her to be their grandmother are sweet,  the travel opportunities have been one of her favorite parts of her internet fame.

Related: Meet the Viral Grandmas Finding Fame on TikTok with Their Cooking Videos

She traveled to Japan with frequent collaborator and fellow food TikToker Nick DiGiovanni last summer. In 2022, Davis flew to the United Arab Emirates Forbes’ Women’s Summit, where she was named one of Forbes' Top 50 over 50 Creators and won a Streamy Award in the editing and food categories.

More so than the globetrotting, Davis loved how she got to spend time with her family while doing Cooking with Lynja.

“It's definitely a big family affair for us, and it's very nice,” she said. “We have lots of family memories from this time. It’s just wonderful.”

Since her death, her social media accounts have remained active. Davis asked Tim to continue to post edited videos, according to The New York Times. The account will stop posting after the last Cooking with Lynja videos that feature Davis are uploaded, Tim told the outlet.

“It's a joy to wake up and know you're going to have a good day,” Davis said of her life as an influencer. “It is a lovely change in my life, definitely.”

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