SMALL BITES is the food blog of The Journal News and LoHud.com. You can find Westchester restaurant reviews, Rockland restaurant reviews, dining recommendations and recipes from Liz Johnson, food editor at The Journal News and LoHud.com. Plus wine, cocktails, chefs, gourmet shops and bloggers on vegan, Latin, Indian and seasonal cooking.
contributors
Liz Johnson
Liz Johnson is the food editor of The Journal News and LoHud.com, which is funny, because when she was young, she was a picky eater. She hated lima beans, onions and liver, and, despite growing up in Texas, spicy food took some getting used to, too. Time abroad in France taught her to love stinky cheese, and traveling through Asia and living in Mexico showed her how delicious spice can be. Liz graduated from Clarkstown South High School and earned her English degree at SUNY Oswego, where she mostly subsisted on pizza and beer.Since then, her culinary palate improved. (In fact there’s nothing she won’t taste at least once.) Since she began writing about food for The Journal News in 2000, she’s covered restaurants, cooking trends and cocktails—winning three best feature-writing awards for the Association of Food Journalists and two Associated Press awards along the way. She has been a television food correspondent for “The Hudson Valley’s NewsCenter Now,” on RNN, the Regional News Network, the editor of the annual Wine & Food magazine, a James Beard Foundation restaurant awards judge and a contributor to the food pages of national and regional magazines.She lives in Nyack with her husband and daughter on a tiny suburban lot they call their farm—with fruit trees, an herb garden, and a yardful of lettuce, tomatoes, onions, shallots, cucumbers, zucchini, radishes, cabbage, peppers, Brussels sprouts and carrots and four big blueberry bushes. Follow her on Twitter, like her Small Bites Facebook page, and follow the food boards on LoHud’s Pinterest page.
Megan McCaffrey
Megan McCaffrey is a food writer for The Journal News, at LoHud.com, and contributor to the Small Bites Blog. She has a degree in Digital Media from Fordham University and naturally, a love of food. She lives in Ridgefield, Connecticut with her husband and three young children.
Rinku Bhattacharya
Rinku Bhattacharya, the Spices & Seasons blogger, is a daytime financial professional, who spends the rest of her time immersed in food. Rinku is the author of the blog, Cooking in Westchester, where she shares her life experiences, original recipes that combine Indian spices with produce from her backyard and local farmers markets. Rinku is blessed with a gardener husband, who always surprises her with a prolific and fresh supply of produce to keep her creative instincts flowing. Rinku has been teaching recreational cooking classes for the past six years, and her newly released cookbook the Bengali Five Spice Chronicles, highlights and offers many simple recipes from Eastern India. Rinku can be found on Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest.
Patrice Costa
Patrice Costa, who writes Behind the Kitchen Door, is a passionate foodie who is on a culinary mission to learn it all from local chefs. She looks forward to sharing her experiences as she goes behind the kitchen door in some of her favorite restaurant kitchens. When not on blogging assignments, she can be found happily working in the kitchen of Harvest on Hudson. She also contributes to our Chef-tography board on Pinterest.
David Dallow
Hello all, my name is David Dallow. I am an avid eater, enthusiastic cook and devout lover of all things food-related. One day I had the brilliant pretty good idea of combining food with another passion of mine, writing. On that historic day, WestchesterFoodie.com was born! Now in its third year, my humble website has become an invaluable resource, providing recipes and restaurant recommendations to at least 12 or 13 local residents. Rumor has it that 7 even liked them! I am grateful to Liz for allowing me the Small Bites stage from which to speak to you all about restaurants, food and food-related topics of interest. It will be my goal to be interesting, informative and entertaining. Hopefully I will be more successful in this goal than in the one to become a competitive eating champion. That was disappointing. And disgusting. When I’m not cooking or eating I teach martial arts and get bullied by my FoodieKids. The irony is not lost on me.
Jodie Deignan
I Eat Plants columnist Jodie Deignan went vegetarian in 2004 and fully committed to veganism in 2007. By day she’s a psychiatric nurse practitioner, working with children and adolescents, and by night she spends a lot of time cooking delicious vegan food for herself and her friends. She’s a bit of a picky eater, with a special distaste for mushrooms, seaweed, raw tomatoes, and eggplant, among other things, though she’s discovered along the way she’s a little more open-minded than she once thought. She blogs at The Picky Vegan. Follow her on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest.
Aimee & Kevin Ellis
Foodies 101 husband and wife columnists Aimee & Kevin Ellis came to our attention when they guest blogged for HVRW Fall 2012 for the first time. By day, they both work in customer service and sales, but in their downtime they love to travel, try new restaurants and experiment with recipes in their own kitchen. They strive to support small and local businesses and really enjoy blogging about their experiences. With Kevin being an adventurous eater and Aimee being picky, they form an honest, unique and curious voice that will easily allow you to go along with them for the ride. They blog at Eats and Treats and you can follow them on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest.
Arlen Gargagliano
Latin Twist blogger Arlen Gargagliano blogs about her food travels and explorations at In the Kitchen with Arlen and on Facebook. She’s a featured chef-author on Cookstr.com, and regularly teaches classes at Don Coqui in New Rochelle. Her website is arleng.com. Arlen, who has coauthored books with many, four with local chef and restaurateur Rafael Palomino, has also written her own cocktail and appetizer books: Mambo Mixers and Calypso Coolers.
Christina Halpin
Christina Halpin is attempting to do it all, taste it all and sip it all. With a full-time E-Commerce gig in NYC and a growing family at home in Yonkers , her plate is pretty full. However she’s attempting to prove there’s always – ALWAYS – room for seconds . . . maybe even thirds. She got her first Small Bite while covering spots for HVRW for the blog and developed a taste for all the foodie goodness that Westchester has to offer. She’ll share her “Mama’s Night Out” adventures to local eateries and events and also shares her own hosting and cooking exploits. She Instagrams a great deal and you can also follow along her kitchen food-ventures under the hashtag #teenstestkitchen.
Todd Matthews
Todd Matthews is the founder of WestchesterEats.com, and a published food writer who has created and tested recipes for Saveur Magazine, Readers Digest and others. A graduate of The Institute of Culinary Education, Todd studied under Chef Nick Malgieri, and where he worked alongside Julia Child and prepared dinners alongside celebrity chefs at James Beard Foundation events. From menu development and wine selecting through his restaurant consulting work, to his years at NBC News in New York, Todd has always shared his knowledge and observations in an honest, straightforward style. You can follow Todd at WestchesterEats.com and via Twitter @WestchesterEats.
Donna Monaco Olsen
Contributing blogger Donna Monaco Olsen is the co-coordinator for Westchester Community College’s Continuing Education program, called “A Taste of Westchester.” She writes the program, which offers more than 30 classes each semester, by recruiting chefs to do cooking demonstrations in their restaurants for both education and fun. Check out the classes at the WCC web site. Along with her husband, she reviews restaurants during Hudson Valley Restaurant Week and posts them on Small Bites. She’s also the author of the Chef’s Tip column. In her off time she creates custom designed cakes and cupcakes at The Cupcake Kitchen & Luncheonette in Irvington.
Maria Reina
Seasonal Chef blogger Maria Reina comes to food world as a third career, spending a great portion of her adult life in the field of Human Resources. With her private company Bella Cucina Maria, she is a personal chef, caterer and recreational cooking class teacher in Westchester and Fairfield Counties. She’s an avid food television watcher and cookbook collector, always looking for a new take on a traditional dish. In her free time she loves hanging out at local farmers markets, chatting with farmers and doing cooking demos with their seasonal ingredients. In addition to her blog, which is loaded with easy recipes, you can follow her on Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest.
Margaret Rizzuto
Contributing blogger Margaret Rizzuto is a portrait and food photographer with an interest in vegetarian and raw foods (though she does admit to occasional indulgences in seafood). Margaret lives and works in Lower Hudson Valley where she loves being surrounded by the beauty of nature, the farms, and of course, great food. She admits to being obsessed with the Food Channel to the point where she’ll even watch shows where meat is being cooked—meat that being a vegetarian she knows she’ll never cook. She loves all the techniques, ingredients and creativity that go into cooking. When not shooting, Margaret can be found in her garden battling slugs or in her kitchen trying out a new recipe. To see some of Margaret’s food work visit www.mrpculinaryart.com or see her portrait work at at www.margaretrizzutophotography.com
Westchester Breakfast Club
The founding members of the Westchester Breakfast Club (Sylvia Louie, Jeffrey Louie, Andrew Louie, Reid Aronson, Shelley Gazes, and Patrick Gallagher) all grew up in Westchester, and we know how easy it is to fall into a bit of a restaurant rut, particularly when it comes to the first meal of the day. But Westchester has so much more to offer for morning meals and we won’t rest until we’ve sampled it all. We try both breakfast and brunch at all types of places, from a pancake breakfast at a local farm to a very formal brunch in an elegant restaurant, a cafe to a local diner, even a Moroccan brunch. And yes, we’ve gone to IHOP. We each write reviews in our own unique voices, and just try to give our honest, no-frills assessment of our meals. With a dash of humor thrown in. Read our full reviews at www.westchesterbreakfastclub.com and follow us on Facebook!
