a selection of my work
WRITING
“In Defense of Fridgescaping: The TikTok trend has gotten tons of backlash, but the refrigerator has long existed to be shown off,” Eater, with co-writer Stephanie Ganz, October 2024.
“Out of the Box and Into Cake, It’s Barbie!” Eater, July 2023.
“When You Think Brunch in Texas, You Need to Think About Brunch Shaped Like Texas,” The Spruce Eats, April 2023.
“Cultivating LGBTQ+ Roots To Thrive Within Farming,” The Spruce Eats, January 2023.
“The '90s Time Machine: 42 Moments That Defined a Decade in Food,” The Spruce Eats, December 2022.
“How This 130-Year-Old Kitchen Tool Holds My Family’s History,” Food52, July 2023.
“The Enduring Art of Turning Butter Into Sculptures,” Food52, March 2023.
“The Victorian Origins of the Heart-Shaped Chocolate Box,” Food52, February 2023.
“On Being Bad and Snacking Well,” Cake Zine: Wicked Cake, Fall 2022.
“This Cocktail Essential Is My Secret to the Best Thanksgiving Feast,” Food52, November 2022.
“3 Iconic Cocktails That Changed the Way We Drink,” Food52, October 2022.
“Why All Your Holiday Cocktails Are Better Off With Bitters,” Food52, December 2022.
“Level Up Your Labor Day Recipes With This Bar Cart Staple,” Food52, August 2022.
“Abrams BBQ & Seafood,” Our State Magazine, 2018.
“This Weekend, Shake Your Fist at the Oscars and Make a Recipe in Honor of ‘Little Women’,” The Kitchn, February 2020.
“The Best Part of Grocery Shopping in Texas Will Make You Very, Very Jealous, “ The Kitchn, Mary 2019.
“Chicken Bridge Bakery Feeds Bodies and Minds with Baked-In Messages of Resistance and Solidarity,” Indy Week, June 2017.
“Lone Star Leftovers,” The Local Palate, November 2017.
“A Texas Christmas Feast,” Sift: King Arthur Flour, Holiday 2016.
“A Cure Thing: How the sausage gets made at Elias Cairo’s Olympia Provisions." Culture: the word on cheese, Winter 2016.
“Hidden greenhouses in the Icelandic countryside grow and serve tomatoes,” The Boston Globe, September 2015.
“Egyptian Breakfast Beans with Feta, Lemon Oil, and Green Chili Relish,” Culture Magazine, Summer 2015.
“At Damnation Alley, small-batch spirits with a hyper-local twist,” The Boston Globe, January 2014.
“Baker goes the distance for weddings,” The Boston Globe, October 2012.
“A melon primer at the height of the season,” The Boston Globe, July 2012.
FOOD + CULTURE RESEARCH
Trained in Gastronomy and American Studies, I use my experience as a food writer and photographer together with my academic skills to create approachable, engaging food history content for articles, recipes, social media content, and more.
“‘Pain au Levain’: Reproductive Rights, Recipes, and Community Cookbooks,” The Recipes Project, August 2024.
“The Woodstreet Cake: A spiced holiday cake with a spicy history,” Folger Shakespeare Library, December 2023.
Ebony Cookbook spotlight with Great Jones, 2023.
“Posset Goes Viral (Again): The Instagrammification of a 17th-Century Dessert,” Perspectives on History, American Historical Association, September 2023.
“The Complex History of Drink Yaupon Tea,” Life&Thyme, August 2022.
“The Many Layered Cake: The Power of Women’s Domestic Digital Culture,” Southern Cultures, 2022.
Jane Austen & Co.: "Eating With Austen," featuring food historian KC Hysmith, 2020.
“It's Never Just about Food: Teaching Homeschool Food History from a Pandemic Pantry,” Gastronomica: The Journal for Food Studies, issue 3, volume 20, 2020.
Pickle History for Chef Vivian Howard, Part of her pickle history talk at the 2019 Chow Chow Festival in Asheville, NC and later used in her PBS show, Somewhere South.
Semiotics of the Kitchen, 2.0, Inspired by the feminist parody video and performance piece released in 1975 by Martha Rosler, semiotics of the kitchen, 2.0 addresses and highlights food related issues of 2018.
“A Ritual is Brewing: Tea in New England,” tell New England, 2016.
“New England's Historic Rum Trade,” tell New England, 2015.
RECIPE DEVELOPMENT
Years spent working in historical cookbook archives and my training in Gastronomy has provided me with an in-depth understanding of how to develop and write recipes for all kinds of cooks. I’ve created dozens of recipes for digital platforms and print publications (including cookbooks). Here’s a few of my favorites.
“Strawberry shortcakes with sorghum whip,” Carolina Arts & Sciences Magazine, Spring 2022.
“Spring Flower Shortbread Cookies,” Bella Luna Toys, March 2021.
Jane Austen Inspired Recipes from Eating with Jane Austen, Jane Austen & Co.
Homemade Dill Fridge Pickles, Oprah.com.
"Mother Granola," Grlsquash: Mothers/Foremothers 1, 2018.
Summer Cornbread Panzanella with Honey Dressing, Eat Boutique.
Sprouted Wheat Jalapeño Pretzel Braid with Skillet Queso, King Arthur Baking.
Bloody Mariachi Cucumber Shots, No. 4 St. James.
ACADEMIC WORK
Trained in Gastronomy and American Studies, I use my experience as a food writer and photographer together with my academic skills to create approachable, engaging food history content for articles, recipes, social media content, and more.
Chapter, “My Life and Labor as an Instagram Influencer Turned Instagram Scholar,” in Food Instagram: Identity, influence, and negotiation by Emily Contois and Zenia Kish, Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2022.
“Cactus.” In We Eat What?: A Cultural Encyclopedia of Unusual Foods in the United States, edited by Jonathan Deutsch, Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood, 2018.
“Mealtime Etiquette,” In The World of Antebellum America: A Daily Life Encyclopedia, edited by P Brewer, RS Cowan, R Roberts, ABC-CLIO, 2018.
Instagram Essay, “FreeFireCider: Folk Herbalists, Feminist Hashtags, and the Instagram Modernity,” The Recipes Project, 2017.
“The Future Publics of Food Studies: A Conversation with KC Hysmith and Emily Contois,” Graduate Journal of Food Studies, 2017.
“Russian American,” In Ethnic American Food Today: A Cultural Encyclopedia, edited by Lucy M. Long, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2015.
Review: The Secret of Cooking: Recipes for an Easier Life in the Kitchen, by Bee Wilson. Gastronomica 1 February 2024; 24 (1): 83–84. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/gfc.2024.24.1.83
Review: “Sound Never Tasted So Good.” Reviews in Digital Humanities, II(8). https://doi.org/10.21428/3e88f64f.c6a2b438
Review: Baking Powder Wars: The Cutthroat Food Fight that Revolutionized Cooking By Linda Civitello. Indiana Magazine of History, 114(2), 154–156. Retrieved from https://scholarworks.iu.edu/journals/index.php/imh/article/view/30753
Review: Helen Tangires, Moveable Markets: Food Wholesaling in the 20th-Century City (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2019, $59.95). Pp. 312. isbn 978 1 4214 2747 8. Journal of American Studies. 2021;55(1):E7. doi:10.1017/S0021875820001620
Review: Martha Lloyd’s Household Book: The Original Manuscript from Jane Austen’s Kitchen: by Julienne Gehrer, Oxford, Bodleian Library in association with Jane Austen’s House, 2021, 312 pp., $45.00, ISBN 978-1-85124-560-4. Food, Culture & Society, 27(3), 912–914. https://doi.org/10.1080/15528014.2022.2094158
GUEST SPEAKING + PRESENTATIONS
Guest Lecture, “The Phone Eats First: Digital Media and Influencers From an Inside Perspective,” Food Media, Boston University, Professor Potter Palmer, 2024.
Invited speaker, “Archival Research & Historical Recipe Creation,” International Association for Culinary Professionals, Professional Interest Sections, Fall 2024.
Speaker and invited guest, "‘push button magic’: a short history of technology, automation, and AI in the kitchen,” Ethical and Social Impacts of Robot Kitchens, US National Science Foundation, Funded project on AI kitchens and robot cooks (2022-2026), Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, 2023.
Speaker and invited guest, “Our Story is Told Through Our Plates: Southern Foodway and The Global South,” Carolina Public Humanities, 2022.
Guest Lecture, “Unboxing Cake Mix: Gender, Anxiety, and Post-War Legacies,” University of North Carolina, Von Diaz, 2022.
Guest Lecture, "Food Styling Workshop," Food Media, University of Tulsa, Dept. of Media Studies, Professor Emily Contois, 2019, 2020, 2022, 2024.
Invited Panelist, "Food Studies x Food Media: How We Write About Food," Association for the Study of Food and Society Annual Conference, University of Georgia, Athens, Summer 2020.
"Future of Food Studies and Media Studies," Association for the Study of Food and Society Conference, University of Alaska, Anchorage, 2019.
“FreeFireCider: Folk Herbalists, Feminist Hashtags, and the Instagram Modernity," Southeast American Studies Association, Emory University, Atlanta, 2019.
Panel organizer and moderator, “Unscripted: Cake and Critical Intersectionality,” The Cake, Playmakers Repertory Company, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, 2017.
“’Civilized Tinklings’: Gentility, Ritual, & Social Distinctions in the Southern Tea Ritual," Association for the Study of Food and Society Conference, University of Vermont, 2014.
AWARDS
The History Book Award of Excellence, Edible North Carolina, The North Carolina Society of Historians, 2023.
The History Book Award of Excellence, Saltbox Seafood Joint Cookbook, The North Carolina Society of Historians, 2023.
Winner, Best Writing on Food — Student Division, Association of Food Journalists, 2015 | “At Damnation Alley, small-batch spirits with a hyper-local twist.” The Boston Globe, January 7, 2014.
"Liberty Tree Shrub." Finalist for the Smithsonian Raise-A-Glass Cocktail Contest, 2014.