Plus a Campari Shandy and a company I love.͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
| | Today I celebrate (and mourn!) our Founding Editor Kristen Miglore’s last day at Food52. Kristen, known to so many of you for her inimitable voice, her hawk eye for a Genius Recipe, and her lively, reassuring presence here on Food52, was the first person Merrill and I hired back in 2009.
Our criteria for hiring at that point were: Can you cook? Are you nimble? Kristen could do both times a million. While Merrill and I figured out how to get advertising on the site and how to pitch investors, Kristen kept the trains running. She shopped for groceries, tested recipes, styled photos, wrangled freelance writers, and edited everything that went on site. As we were all working in my apartment, she even wrote blog posts with my toddlers on her lap.
| | | | | What I am most grateful for is her abiding influence on the tone of Food52. She infused our emails, tweets, and blog posts with rigor, empathy, and sly humor. I always loved this paragraph from her first Genius Recipes column about The River Cafe’s Strawberry Sorbet:
“The process is enough to convince anyone, young or old, that the kitchen is an exciting place to be. Just 3 ingredients make a series of quick, colorful transformations. In less time than you might spend watching babies doing funny things on YouTube today, you get to see not only what strawberries look like as they surrender and slacken into a hot pink soup, but also what happens when chopped lemon and sugar become one—going from sandy to molten slush in just a few pulses.”
In a few incisive sentences, she welcomes everyone, makes you smile about baby videos, and draws you into a marvelously simple recipe. | | | | | | | Kristen went on to write New York Times bestselling and James Beard Award winning books based on her Genius column. | She also created a hit podcast, The Genius Recipe Tapes, and a YouTube show.
A wonderful thing about the internet (yes, there are still wonderful things about it, right here on Food52!) is that Kristen’s great work won’t go away. When I miss her voice—which will be constantly—I’ll turn to her recipes for April Bloomfield’s Lemon Caper Dressing and Jennie Cook’s Zucchini Butter. Or watch her make Mike’s Famous Crispy Fried Eggs. Or revisit any of her hundreds of amazing stories and recipes across the years.
Kristen, we thank you for sharing your vast talents with us, and we look forward to seeing what you do next!
Other Notes From the Week: | | | | | - Need a summer thirst-slaker? Get your hands on an icy shandy, which is usually made by combining beer and lemon soda, or sometimes beer and ginger ale. But my all-time favorite iteration is this Campari Shandy from Delancey in Seattle.
- Need a good read to go with your shandy? Irene Yoo looked back at her childhood, which was split between Korea and America, and the foods that shaped her.
- Everyone loves a secret ingredient. Anabelle Doliner traced the origins of her grandma’s lemon cake—and what set it apart.
- Declaring a best store-bought barbecue sauce is like declaring a best mayo or best cola – a lose-lose endeavor. Our brave Editorial Assistant Paul Hagopian took on this thankless but tasty task and shared his top barbecue sauce pick. The community had some thoughts!
A Brand I Like: | | | | | | | - We recently launched more than 450 new products, but I wanted to note one stand-out: Mepal’s EasyClip Glass Food Storage Boxes. Netherlands-based Mepal has been designing handsome, well-constructed storage products for 70 years. This is their first foray into glass containers, and they have airtight lids that open with an easy click. They’re also stackable and microwave- and oven-safe. Here are a few other Mepal products I own:
| A New Program- Did you know we now have a Curator program that’s painless to join—and profitable! Sign up and you can earn commissions on any products your followers purchase.
| | | | | | Stay cool! |  | Amanda Hesser
Founder & Executive Chair | | | | | | | | | | |
