When I left San Francisco, it was to follow my ambition of becoming a writer. This was 2011. I lived on the Lower East Side, biked and walked everywhere, earned an MFA in nonfiction from The New School, and, like all writers, wondered how to pay the bills.

Compared to New York, San Francisco was a suburb. But that suburb set the stage for life now. During my decade-plus working in San Francisco's tech scene, I witnessed first hand the booms and busts of the Internet. I steeped myself in computer code, Silicon Valley clichés, and branded polar fleece jackets. I understood how the web worked but it was no match for my other love: food.

In grad school, food always seemed to wend its way into my stories. Sometimes it was to highlight what I came to think of as my unique superpower: I could see through food, a skill that came from living with Type-one diabetes for decades. Sometimes it was to bring readers along on my travels––dinner at a Kyoto ryokan, trailing a baker at 4:30am, or visiting a French chocolatier at his Queens production facility.

it wasn't until I blended my two pasts--food plus tech––that my career took off. My first taste of the sector was when I discovered smart people targeting solutions for food waste. Then I followed the incubators supporting New Foods. Since then, I’ve written on the promise of fake eggs, the potential of peas, and how artificial intelligence saved a winery. My work has appeared in The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Wired, Time, Bloomberg Businessweek, Insider, and many more publications.

My decade living in San Francisco, and working in tech, helps me understand the rush to invest in today’s food startups. I know well from experience not to get swept up in the frenzy. My hard-earned belief in technology is matched by an equally precious hope for foods that come from the natural world. These days you can find me in Northern California where I’m burning off calories by hiking and biking.

You can support independent journalism by buying my book from Bookshop.org, Audible, your local bookstore, and Amazon.

I’m represented by Sinsheimer Literary.

Available to participate in your next food-tech panel, podcast or conference.