Liz Neumark

On the list of things to get done this weekend, visiting the Frieze Art Fair on Randall's Island was a must-do. I headed up Lexington Avenue from the East 80's at a brisk pace to get to 126th Street for the yellow school bus to the Island. To...

In rapid-fire succession over the past eight days, the bounty of the spring has been unleashed. Ramps, asparagus, fiddlehead ferns, strawberries, rhubarb, lilies of the valley, lilac -- the precursors of the season -- are back despite a hot winter and cold spring and every conceivable temperature fluctuation including near-drought...

Farewell to a jewel of a city. My five days in Prague with the purpose of visiting my daughter, Nell, on her junior semester abroad have been delightful. It is a destination celebrated as the new Paris, an edgy and exciting destination with much to do and see.

We had...

With the precision that comes with years of experience, the bus tour to the work sites of the 2012 Sloan Public Service Award winners, left Hudson Square promptly on March 14, headed to Brooklyn. This is the annual "Oscars of Public Service" organized by The Fund for the...

The phrase "food festival" is so overused.  It is a label plastered onto every gathering that features food, without regard for a genuinely festive component -- and the events are often comprised of entitled attendees and self important or reluctant exhibitors.
 
The NY Vegetarian Food...

It was a busy week with once again, President Barack Obama as the guest of honor as he rolled through Manhattan on mega-fundraising multi-destination evening, one of them included Great Performances.  The protocol associated with the visit, the gravitas of the office, the honor of being in such...

On a weekend of two major annual gatherings in the food world -- the South Beach Wine and Food Festival and the Just Food Conference -- my heart was in the Florida sun, but my body and activist spirit was at the High School of Food...

There is nothing quite as therapeutic as a night in the country, most specifically, Columbia County within close proximity to Katchkie Farm. A cold brisk night, the promise (more accurately, threat) of snow, is the perfect tonic to an intense workweek characterized by unending great food. It is...

Off to the market Saturday morning with Chef de Cuisine Matthew Riznyk of Great Performances in tow to celebrate and explore the color we least expect to see in the middle of the winter -- GREEN! It is truly the season of the storage vegetable and time for farmers to...

Sometimes, it is the thing that is right in front of you that remains hidden in plain sight.

Since inception in 1979, Great Performances has drawn its service staff from the arts -- in fact, they are what sparked the creation of the company -- to provide...

I was waiting for the Giant-49'er game to get started, but it wasn't the football East-West Coast rivalry that was on my mind last weekend. What I was thinking about was their local farm produce vs. ours. Last weekend I spent Saturday in NYC's Union Square Greenmarket and then Sunday...

"In the 35-40 years I have been living in this building, nothing like this has ever happened!" So spoke Julian, the co-op owner with the most longevity, on Sunday evening during the first potluck dinner in our building's 100 year plus, history. His wife Jackie chimed in, "When we bought...

You know how sometimes just saying the numbers of the New Year feels so awkward, it kind of gets stuck in your throat coming out? Not the case with 2012. In fact, it almost feels like a familiar, if not slightly used, year. As well it should! We have been...

400 Mile Drive to Top Rated Farmers' Market!

Circumstances took me to Portland, Maine this weekend, at the end of an unseasonably warm stretch of December weather and NYC holiday party madness. Imagine the elation awakening Saturday morning, in this quiet town, to temperatures in the teens and snow gently...

Within less than 24 hours I had two memorable and quite unique food experiences this weekend. And while that might not be a surprising statement for someone in the food business to make, consider this -- one was a holiday party meal for close to 2,000 guests and the other...

The change in seasons is clear in spite of the balmy temperature as I head up the Taconic Parkway Saturday morning. The leaves are finally down revealing houses, buildings, lakes, and otherwise masked structures along the highway. Regal pine trees and other conifers now stand apart from their previous leafy...

What could have more appeal than a Pickle Festival? And this year, the Lower East Side International Pickle Day was held at the New Amsterdam Market, an historic food site not far from the immigrant roots of our pickling forefathers/mothers.

In a year when nothing really should surprise us anymore... after the earthquake, tsunami, Middle East upheaval, hurricanes, international bankruptcies, congressional gridlock, nascent national protest movement... what's a minor blizzard in October? Try as I might to be shocked or outraged at Mother Nature's bold foreclosure on autumn, I merely...

I confess -- it started about 12 years ago when a neighbor upstate was talking about the vegetables she was getting from a Putnam County organic farm. There was an air of mystery surrounding her description of where they came from.... one had to apply... you had to become a...

I have thought a lot about where change comes from; government regulation; populist movements or private enterprise. This week I was exposed to two very different, yet in some way linked, movements for change, which tie into my question.

I spent time visiting OccupyWall Street, the first truly significant sustained...