Partnerships:
HarperCollins
OXO
Bottlerocket Wine & Spirit
Whole Foods
Alain Benzaken
Co-founder and CTO
Alain met Amanda and Merrill on a rainy day at La Colombe coffee shop in the East Village, and they have made it a habit to meet in excellent coffee places ever since. Alain previously worked at TheLadders, where he ran the technology team for five years and survived the terror of a Super Bowl ad traffic hit. Before that he oversaw technology teams for various startups and was at priceline.com during the dot-com years. His expertise is in building highly scalable consumer websites and highly delicious dishes, especially with his two daughters Casey and Jordan. He is currently training for an Ironman, which allows him to eat pretty much anything he wants. There is no doubt that Alain's doppleganger is Anthony Bourdain, and he plans to never meet him again. Follow Alain on Twitter: alainbenzaken.
Kristen Miglore
Editor
Kristen wears many hats at food52: quietly and deftly, she writes Family Meal, Cook Spotlight and various sundry blog posts; styles the Wildcard winners; puts together the newsletter; tweets like a madwoman; and takes care of our messes with a sense of humor when we get in over our heads. Follow Kristen on Twitter: miglorious
Sarah Shatz
Photographer
Sarah has photographed chefs, politicians, cowboys, firefighter paramedics and airplane mechanics for magazines ranging from Esquire to Newsweek to Popular Mechanics. At our first shoot, Sarah was battling a terrible cold but insisted on powering through and shooting for more than 9 hours. Sarah has taken our entire library of food photos, cataloging more ingredients and equipment than can be found in Whole Foods and Williams-Sonoma combined. She also makes a mean curried zucchini and poppy seed bread. Follow Sarah on Twitter: sarahshatz And check out her website: www.sarahshatz.com
Peter Kamali
Web Developer
Amanda has known Peter since his days at Meetup.com, which he co-founded in 2002. He's helped build lots of thriving web communities, and although he's worked with companies of all sizes, he really enjoys getting small startups going -- handy for us! A dedicated vegetarian and environmentalist, Peter cares a lot about the food he eats, where it comes from, and how it's grown. He spends part of his summers in the family garden exercising his apparently very green thumb growing fruits, vegetables, and herbs. Follow Peter on Twitter: peeter
Emily McKenna
Assistant Editor
Emily, who works as a researcher at Food & Wine, spends her weekends testing recipes for the weekly contests and Wildcards, and regularly writes Family Meal and Reciprocity. Emily also seems to get 28 hours out of every 24 hour day. Last fall, she tested 100 recipes in a month for Amanda's New York Times cookbook and sourced ingredients for the entire book. We bow to her efficiency. Follow Emily on twitter: emilymckenna
Stephanie Bourgeois
Recipe Tester
Stephanie is a student in NYU's Food Studies graduate program, and every weekend she dives into the kitchen with a half dozen or more food52 recipe candidates and surfaces again on Sunday nights with her recommendations. Follow Stephanie on Twitter: biffbourgeois
Martine Trelaun
Shop Manager
Martine and Amanda met through mutual friends, and through their love of tea and techy things, became fast friends on Twitter. Martine is a talented designer -- see her work at Design + Know-How -- and is the coolest person in Red Hook. She kindly volunteered to help bring order, harmony and excellent finds to the Shop section of our site. Follow her on Twitter: mtrelaun
Elena Parker
Videographer
The granddaughter of a peach farmer, Elena got her BA in Film Studies from Columbia, where she was the executive producer of CTV News. She then went on to co-write and co-produce the HBO Documentary "Youth Knows No Pain." Elena currently works on video and new media projects for the New York Public Library. Her videos have appeared on the New York Times website and Mashable.com. Elena has produced, filmed and edited promotional materials for "Instinctiv," and she has worked with producer Kathryn Tucker (The Station Agent), NBC/Universal, Funny Garbage and the Museum of the Moving Image, among others. Although she now lives in Brooklyn, Elena hails from Hammonton, NJ, aka "the Blueberry Capital of the World." Check out her blog, drawingtheeye.blogspot.com, and follow her on Twitter: elenakathryn
Rebecca Palkovics
Publicist
When we asked Rebecca what her "desert island meal" would be, this was her response: "Fava bean, mint, and pecorino salad with a glass of Gruner Vetliner." Needless to say, her answer put ours to shame. Growing up, Rebecca developed an appreciation for good food both at home in Pennsylvania and during regular visits to New York, where she sought out the latest restaurants and specialty stores. A graduate of the University of Chicago, Rebecca worked at a boutique public relations firm in Chicago before returning to New York to pursue a Masters in Food Studies at NYU. While in school, she has worked for David Rosengarten and Saveur. Follow Rebecca on Twitter: RPalkovics
Sasha Smith
Wine Expert
We met Sasha through a friend of Merrill's, and were immediately impressed by her wine blog, SpintheBottleNY.com. She engineered our partnership with Bottlerocket Wine & Spirit, films weekly videos and pairs wines with our contest finalists. We love her approachable, food-centric style and her affable presence in her videos. Follow her on Twitter: spinthebottleny
Jennifer Steinhauer
Contributing Writer
Jennifer -- aka "Jenny" -- is an old friend of Amanda's (set her up on a blind-date with her now husband, Tad). She and Amanda bonded over food and used to cook dinner together every Sunday. Now Jennifer is in L.A., where she's the bureau chief for the Times and a regular at the Beverly Hills Farmers Market. She dreamed up the idea to write a column on weeknight cooking for food52 and we happily obliged. Look for her posts, which appear on Mondays -- "Jenny's in the Kitchen." Check out her novel, "Beverly Hills Adjacent," and follow her on Twitter: jestei
Charlotte Druckman
Co-founder of the Tournament of Cookbooks
Charlotte Druckman is a great friend, unmatched enthusiast, and a journalist born, raised and currently based in New York City. Amanda first "met" Charlotte on Twitter, where the two started brainstorming about an NCAA-style online cookbook tournament. All it took was a coffee meeting at Falai Panetteria on the Lower East Side, and The Piglet was born! Charlotte covers food (mostly), style, design, travel, fashion and beauty for various publications, including The New York Times Style Magazine, Departures, Gastronomica and Travel + Leisure. She is currently co-writing "Cooking Without Borders," Chef Anita Lo's cookbook due out in 2011. Oh, and if you live in NYC and don't know Charlotte yet, don't worry, you will -- as far as we can tell, she knows pretty much everyone in the City. Follow her on Twitter: jestei
Christine Yom
Web Designer
Christine loves food and appreciates a clean design that focuses on photography and typography. Once we learned that Christine lent a hand to two of our favorite sites -- bit.ly and Chartbeat -- we were sold. We've been working together ever since to update each section of the site. Christine lives in Queens and frequently braves the BQE for meetings. Check out her website and work at http://pixelandem.com.
Heather Schroder
Agent; International Creative Management
Amanda told her the idea behind food52 over lunch at Mary's Fish Camp and she's been our most enthusiastic advocate ever since. Heather introduced us to Bob Miller at HarperCollins, Pat and Eric at 10x and to some of our best advisors. In addition to being a skillful negotiator, Heather's also an exceptional cook who prepares food for a legion at Thanksgiving and orders Alphonso mangoes by the crate.
Tiffany Piecewicz
Attorney
We met Tiffany through our friend Matt Meeker, a co-founder of Wee-Web.com. A trained opera singer, she went to Johns Hopkins and the University of Iowa, where she got her law degree. Tiffany specializes in legal work for start-ups, which made working with her a breeze. Her family is Polish, so her idea of comfort food is pierogi and golabki, but she once ate termites on a jungle tour in Belize. (Tiffany says: "Our guide claimed that termites taste like peppermint. They don't.")
Jason Rapp
Advisor
We met Jason through a friend early on, and he's been an invaluable resource as we've evolved and grown. He is currently the president of Mahalo, Inc. Mahalo.com is a place where consumers can learn about thousands of topics via articles, videos and question and answer forums. Before he joined Mahalo, Jason advised start-ups on fundraising, M&A, strategy and business development. He was also a senior executive for Barry Diller's IAC, where he was CEO of Gifts.com, and before that, he was head of operations for NYTimes.com. (Yes, he makes us feel like total underachievers!) Jason lives in Santa Monica, California with his wife and two children.
Tad Friend and Jonathan Dorman
Our recipe tasters, advisors and late-night email tolerators. You're the best. Follow them on Twitter: tadfriend and jidorman
