Who’s already contributing?

Amelia I learned to cook loitering around the kitchens of family and friends who believed that cooking and sitting down to eat together is often the best part of everyday and a matter of the utmost importance. I am inspired most by the culinary traditions of the Southeast, where I grew up and still live, and of Mexico where I prefer to be when I’m not in North Carolina. Having gained my B.A. in Cultural Anthropology I am fascinated by food cultures, and as I currently slog my way towards a license in dietetics I am learning the science behind them. During the day I work in a natural foods cooperative, pushing pie and bread on the unsuspecting public.

Anthea didn’t learn to bake, it was a genetic gift from her mother’s side of the family. She has a bad (good?) habit of working out to make eating that pie ok, then bringing all of the leftovers to work. Anthea will soon be, again, a Bostonian and is excited to have NESN as a regular cable channel. Getting her Master of Public Policy taught her just how important good beer and coffee are to survival. She can also be found on her blog at http://nightkitchener.blogspot.com.

Eileen Glanton Loftus is a former reporter for the Associated Press. She has written for national publications including Good Housekeeping and Forbes. A mother of three young children, she is on a constant quest to feed her family delicious, healthy food that is not shaped like a nugget. She lives in the suburbs of Philadelphia.
 
 

After a brief and perfunctory stint in non-profit work, Eve stumbled upon her true calling in the kitchen.  This passion was initially manifested through experimental home-cookery and a fledgling food blog, www.WhatColorIsYourApron.blogspot.com.  In hopes of extricating herself from The Desk Job once and for all, she went on to earn a culinary degree at the Natural Gourmet Institute, later worked on the line at Jean-Georges’ Mercer Kitchen in SoHo for a year, and is now trying her luck as a freelance chef.

In her limited spare time, Eve continues to play mad scientist in the kitchen, most recently concocting different Middle Eastern spice blends that she one day hopes to sell to the general, food-lovin’ public.  She also dreams of someday working as a recipe test cook!  And of opening a collaborative café/art house!  But, in general, she strives to share innovative and delicious food with avid eaters on a regular basis.

Although she describes herself as a “chef of very modest talents,” Lena enjoys nothing so much as volunteering for the role of culinary guinea pig and is even willing to help with the dishes for the privilege [Editor's Note: We look for humble people to contribute to Eat With Me, but this is a massive understatement]. An enthusiastic composer of gChat status one-liners, she also enjoys writing about her gastronomic experiences living in New York City. Contact Lena at lena@eatwithme.com.

Sasha lives in Boston and works at Children’s Hospital. She teaches yoga on the side and enjoys doing things that involve the outdoors. She is a sucker for foods that call themselves “natural,” but rarely turns down a chocolate chip cookie or a cupcake.

She has been inspired by her grandma’s meat-filled blintzes and one day aspires to bake without recipes like her mom. There’s nothing more satisfying to her than than her dad’s grilled chicken, nor anything more comforting than her aunt’s broiled beef pilaf. She misses the cooking of her study-abroad host families in India, China, and South America, but finds the common thread among the foods that she loves to be that they are made with love.

Sasha is thrilled to contribute to a site as awesome as eatwithme, and hopes
that the community continues to grow!

Selina’s love affair with cooking began when she lived in a boarding school in Singapore. Unable to digest another generic glob produced by the dining hall crew, she made her very first bread pudding using stale raisins bread, milk and egg borrowed from a roommate, and a dirty microwave.

Since then, she’s moved on from the 3×3 kitchenette to an awesome kitchen with counter space, all-clad pots & pans, and a real stove. She cooks all kinds of stuff: from traditional Indonesian fare to French haute cuisine, from deep-fried chicken to organic quinoa salad. She also likes to create her own recipe and hopes she can publish these in her cookbook someday.

Her other love affairs include photography, squash (the sport, not the vegetable!), scuba diving, and social marketing. Contact Selina at selina@eatwithme.com.

Silvestro Silvestori lives in a 14^th century palace in the historical centre of Lecce, a city regarded by many as the prettiest town in the entire, sunny south of Italy.  He teaches the food, wine, history and culture of the Salentine peninsula. (The Salento is Italy’s ‘heel’, the thin strip of fertile land kissed by both the Adriatic and Ionian seas).

His school, The Awaiting Table Cookery School in Lecce, Italy, runs year round but on special occasions during the year, holds larger classes at a nearby castle, where a local baron recently built a massive 25-cook kitchen for the school’s students.

Silvestro graduates as an Italian-trained sommelier in March, 2010, and will be opening The New Wine School of Southern Italy in October, 2010, a course designed to both build general wine knowledge, but too, to expose students to the incredible, Southern Italian viticultural wealth, still unknown to the vast majority of non-Italians.

Visit his site, www.awaitingtable.com. Sign up to receive the free newsletter, featuring recipes, photographs and details of his month-long bicycle trip every year, all around Southern Italy. You can also follow his daily cooking on Twitter. Email Silvestro.

Susan lives in the Boston area and is a nascent but enthusiastic baker currently obsessed with slow-rising sourdoughs. Other interests include rowing, running, and yoga, mostly as ways to keep up with the ardent love of food and excellent beer. Susan’s day job is a consulting editor and content developer in health and medical publishing. She has a Master of Public Health degree from Tufts, with a concentration in nutrition and healthy aging.

William I could not wait 21 years, let alone 10, for my first taste of wine. My first sip was from a half-empty glass left on the coffee table while my parents were in the other room. I came from a repressed (but very friendly) New England family where having two glasses was cause for alarm and three would always be the topic of breakfast conversation the next day. So I obviously found wine to be immediately alluring, if for no other reason than for the rebellious nature of the substance. I loved the ceremony involved in opening a bottle, from the careful reading of the label, to agonizing over the right glasses, to the search for the bottle opener. In college I was lucky enough to study abroad in Bologna, Italy, where I was exposed to true wine culture. I lived with students from different parts of the country and each would always be extremely excited for me to try a bottle from their region. The subtleties of wine were a welcome change to four college years that were otherwise dominated by beer.

I have a lot to learn about the world of wine and look forward to providing a beginner’s insight into a world dominated by people with grey hair. My favorite grapes so far are cannonau, malbec, and nebbiolo. Once I find a white wine I like enough to remember, I’ll be sure to write a post about it! Contact William at william@eatwithme.com