Aliza Green, CCP

Author, Traveler and Expert on Culinary Ingredients
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Website: http://www.alizagreen.com 

Aliza has been traveling and loving it from a very early age living abroad as a young girl in Holland, Israel and Mexico. In her youth she spent five years working just long enough to earn money for another long trip--backpacking her way across Canada, the British Isles, Italy, Spain, France, Holland, Scandinavia, Greece, Israel, and Turkey. Her love of food and travel led to a culinary career in her home city of Philadelphia as a chef, consultant, and author.

At the age of 27 Aliza earned a four-star chef rating and was acclaimed “a pioneer woman chef who has influenced and trained many others.” The Philadelphia Inquirer named her as one of the city's ten most influential people on food, because of her work with local farmers and her near-fanatic commitment to authentic, made-from-scratch food such as black squid-ink pasta (for which she extracted the ink sacs herself), fragile stuffed zucchini blossoms, and fresh pomegranate sorbetto (one seed at a time).

After her children were born, Aliza expanded her horizons to television and print food styling, food and menu consulting, and food and travel writing. Since 1997, Aliza has authored or co-written twelve cookbooks including a James Beard Award winner, Starting with Ingredients, and her ever-popular Field Guide series. Her most recent book, Making Artisan Pasta, has been flying off the shelves. Aliza is well known for specializing in uncommon ingredients: their culture, history and uses.

In pursuit of recipes and the stories behind them for her books and articles, Aliza traveled to Brazil, Venezuela, Aruba and other Caribbean Islands, Mexico, France, India, Turkey, Greece and Italy. “Italy is my first love for food and art. I studied Italian privately for five years while working as chef of a wonderful Northern Italian restaurant.” Aliza enjoys talking to people from all walks of life and making connections with everyone from museum guards and taxi drivers to cooks and market vendors, often through sharing stories about food.

Aliza’s experience in launching and organizing events and culinary organizations helps her to excel as Epicopia Experience Director. She is the founding chair of the American Institute of Wine & Food’s Delaware Valley Chapter and served on the AIWF national board for three years. She was a delegate to Slow Food’s Terra Madre Torino, Italy in 2006. As President (and 25-year charter member) of Les Dames d'Escoffier International Philadelphia Chapter, she helped organize its national conference in 2009 and served as Director-at-Large on its National Board.

A frequent speaker at conferences and symposiums, Green’s subjects range from Cooking with Unusual Herbs and Spices, to Meat Trends for the Professional, and Citrons: A Rare and Revered Fruit. Maintaining her own website and blog helps Aliza continue to make international culinary and travel connections and new friends world-wide.