PANELISTS OR
SPEAKER
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BIOS
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SALON
ROLE
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Betty Hallock
The Los Angeles Times
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Audrey Bernstein
Oh Audrey
Chief/Founder
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In a short period of time, Audrey has run an eclectic gamut of activities that have culminated in not only a diverse range of expertise, but with an internationally-known and sought-after social circle comprising some of the top talent in contemporary music, fashion, and art. Audrey is the go-to girl for top national publications for advice on style trends, party-planning, and general taste-making. In 2006 Audrey was chosen as the West Coast face of Boots UK, and was invited by Vogue to host their annual Holiday Television Special. This fall Audrey was a expert for the Martha Stewart Radio show, for her lifestyle tips and advice, www.Oh-audrey.com is her namesake website. |
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
David Vega
Edible LA
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Bio Coming soon
www.EdibleLA.com
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Carole Bloom
Chocolate Expert and Author
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Carole Bloom is a European-trained pastry chef and confectioner, author of eight cookbooks, food writer, cooking instructor, media chef, and spokesperson. In addition, she has worked in world-class hotels and restaurants in Europe and the United States, and has been a consultant for both new and established culinary enterprises.
Carole is author of bestselling books on chocolate and baking such as:
Truffles, Candies, & Confections, Chocolate Lover’s Cookbook For Dummies, and The Essential Baker.
http://www.carolebloom.com
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Speaker /
Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
R Jason Middleton
Editor in Chief
LA.com
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Jason migrated to LA for an LA woman -- and he wound up at LA.com. That's a leap from his first gig as an agate clerk at an afternoon newspaper, um, years ago.
From reporting he moved into graphic design and was an art director/designer in Houston. Now, he's combining those tools to help his team create a vibrant voice of commentary, awareness and entertainment in the world's sexiest city.
LA.com
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Anne Smith
Owner & Director
The New School of Cooking
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Anne Smith is the owner and director of the New School of Cooking, which has been open in its Culver City location since 2000. Smith cooked professionally as a young adult in restaurants, catering companies and a Wyoming dude ranch before pursuing a career first as a graphic designer and then in commercial television production for ten years. She spent most of her production career fantasizing about how to return to a career in food. In 1999, she moved to Los Angeles to create The New School of Cooking with a staff of the best instructors in southern California. Smith has always been passionate about food and is well educated in international cuisine, culinary trends and specialty ingredients.
www.newschoolofcooking.com
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Lesley Balla
Editor
Eater LA
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A notable blogger and freelance food and travel writer, Lesley has been immersed in the Los Angeles restaurant scene since 2001, when she relocated from Portland, OR via Martha’s Vineyard, Key West, Baltimore and Cleveland. Having worked in restaurants for more than 10 years, she loves everything about the industry—the people, the customers, the creativity, and of course, the food and wine. She’s as obsessed with celebrity chefs as she is the bartender at the dive down the street, as passionate about pristine sashimi as the best In-n-Out Double-Double money can buy. Working endlessly to keep up with the Los Angeles scene on Eater LA, you’ll never catch her without a pen and digital camera to dig up the next big story. Luckily, she still finds time to travel, experiment in the kitchen, or kick back with a great pinot noir when the fancy strikes.
www.EaterLA.com
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Lindsay William-Ross
Co-Editor
LAist
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By day you can find Lindsay William-Ross teaching English at Cal State L.A., and by night you’ll probably find her at home, watching Law & Order: SVU reruns. Although she was born in Vancouver, grew up in Toronto, and is madly in love with New York City, she has called Los Angeles home since 1990. She likes it so much, in fact, that she teaches the city’s history and literature as part of one of her writing courses. Most of her favorite LA things are as steeped in nostalgia as the heyday of the neighborhood indie coffeehouse; so maybe it’s the fact that both the plant-life and her ability to wear flip-flops are sustained year-round that keep her here. Lindsay also loves to read about, write about, cook, eat, and take pictures of food.
www.LAist.com |
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Stacey V. Bowers-Bolden
Author, The Clubs of LA
Screenwriter
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Bio Coming Soon
From TCB Cafe Publishing
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Sarah Feinbloom
Director & Producter
"Searching for the Heart of Chocolate"
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Sarah Feinbloom is an award-winning filmmaker whose work includes documentaries, dramatic narrative, and fundraising videos. Her films on the religious lives of teenagers, and child-trafficking in Thailand have been featured on NPR and PBS stations, and shown nationally and internationally. She thoroughly enjoyed making her latest film, a chocumentary-Searching for the Heart of Chocolate, which involved lots of taste-testing and sampling.
View
"Searching for the Heart of Chocolate" Trailer
A delicious romp through the rich and creamy, melt in your mouth, passionate world of chocolate. Follow filmmaker Sarah Feinbloom as she searches for the origins of her chocolate obsession, interviewing chocolate enthusiasts along the way, delving into chocolate cake, art, fantasy, chocolate croissants, spirituality, sex, love and hot fudge, and journeying to the past to uncover chocolate’s place in our hearts.
Articles about Sarah
SF Chronicle
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Cherie Mercer Twohy
Chez Cherie Cooking School
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Cherie Mercer Twohy owns Chez Cherie Cooking School in La Canada, CA where the motto is "Laughter is brightest where food is best." She combines her love for food and teaching with a sense of fun that encourages students to relax and enjoy their time in the kitchen. Her interests in food and travel have inspired culinary tours and trips, including a recent tour of Tuscany that culminated in a private lesson by Paul de Bondt, one of Europe's finest chocolatiers. Cherie is recognized as a Certified Culinary Professional by the International Association of Culinary Professionals
www.chezcherie.com. |
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Nan Marchand
Pasadena Convention & Visitors Bureau
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Nan Marchand is the executive director of the Pasadena Convention & Visitors Bureau (CVB) where she oversees the organization’s marketing and sales efforts to attract meeting and convention business, as well as leisure travelers to Pasadena. She has more than 20 years of hospitality industry experience and has been active throughout her career that includes past president of the California Travel Industry Association and served as a member of the Travel Industry Association’s Pow Wow planning committee, National Tour Association’s marketing committee and the Los Angeles Convention & Visitors Bureau’s marketing committee.
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Amy Reiley
Master of Gastronomy, Le Cordon Bleu
Author of Fork Me, Spoon Me: the sensual cookbook
Creator of EatSomethingSexy.com
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Amy Reiley has a passion for food and wine that far surpasses connoisseur status. She is the America’s foremost expert on Aphrodisiacs and was one of the first Americans to earn a Master of Gastronomy awarded by France’s culinary temple, Le Cordon Bleu. She has published two books - Fork Me, Spoon Me: the sensual cookbook, and Chile Aphrodisia that introduced the American public to the sensual art of cooking. As an internationally recognized journalist, Amy has shared her food and wine knowledge to such publications as Sunset, The Wine News and Marie Claire magazine. Now Amy has taken her passion home, building a state-of-the-art-kitchen classroom to hold private cooking lessons in her Los Angeles home!
www.forkmespoonme.com
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Salon Tasting Panel /
Book Author Signing |
Sarah
The Delicious Life
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Bio Coming soon
http://thedeliciouslife.blogspot.com |
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Rachel Rifat
Chocolate Snob Blog
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Rachel Rifat is devoted to luxury and gratification of the senses as a result of her experience in the food production industry. Currently, she presides over a chocolate appreciation society and her time is spent discovering the world's most fabulous chocolates. In addition, she runs chocolate tasting courses and advises many top chocolatiers.
Rachel’s chocolate-snob blog reveals her brutal honesty and adventurous spirit that has created passionate gastronomes around the world. With irreverence she states, “Life is too short for bad chocolate.”
Rachel has written How to Make Out in the Supply Room that will be published by Running Press (2008). In 1999, she was awarded the title, Los Angeles Business Woman of the Year. She has been published and written about in The Wall Street Journal, People Magazine, Entrepreneur Magazine, and The Los Angeles Times. She speaks French, Chinese, and Spanish.
www.chocolate-snob.com
www.chocolate-snob.blogspot.com
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Clemence Gossett
Gourmandise Desserts
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Bio Coming soon
www.gourmnandisedesserts.com
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Carrie Kommers
dineLA.com.
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Bio Coming soon
dineLA.com |
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Diane Rossen Worthington
Cookbook Author, Radio Host
SeriouslySimple.com
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Long considered an expert on California and contemporary American cuisine, Diane Rossen Worthington is the author of 18 cookbooks, an award-winning radio show host, food and travel writer, and nationally syndicated columnist for Tribune Media Services, former Editor-in-Chief of Epicurus.com. and food consultant.
She has appeared frequently as a media food expert on television and radio shows, including The Today Show, Fox and Friends, The Television Food Network, CNN, and NPR. She twice won the prestigious International James Beard Award for "California Foods with Diane Worthington," the talk show she hosted which aired every Saturday morning on KABC Radio in Los Angeles. Diane Rossen Worthington lives in Los Angeles, California.
SeriouslySimple.com
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Jenny Peters
Editor in Chief
Brentwood/Distinctive Living magazines
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Bio Coming soon
www.Brentwoodmagazine.com
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Andrea Lowell
Reality Television Star
The Surreal Life on VH1
TV Host
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Bio Coming soon
VH-1.com
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Linden Goh
Actor / Director
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Linden has worked in the US, Asia and Australia for directors such as Francis Ford Coppola, Jackie Chan and Alex Proyas.
His credits include a recent guest role on THE WEST WING, the US films COUNTERSTRIKE for Lions Gate and FRANCIS FORD COPPOLA'S DR JEKYLL AND MR HYDE for American Zoetrope, Jackie Chan's NEW POLICE STORY, the Japanese feature ACRI for Sony Pictures, and numerous Australian film and TV projects including SINGAPORE SLING, WATER RATS, G.P., HOME AND AWAY, PIZZA and BREAKERS, as well as theatre, award-winning short films, industrials, TVCs and radio.
www.lindengoh.com |
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
Theresa Wahl
Auntie Em's Kitchen
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Bio Coming soon
www.auntieemskitchen.com
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Salon Awards Tasting Panel |
A.K. Crump
TasteTV and ChocolateTelevision
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Salon Tasting Panel /
Book Author Signing |
