Ed Levine (born January 27, 1952) is the creator/founder of

Serious Eats Serious Eats is a website and blog focused on food enthusiasts, created by food critic and author Ed Levine. A Serious Eats book was published by Levine in 2011. Serious Eats was acquired by Fexy Media in 2015 and then by Dotdash in late 2020. ...

, the author of the entrepreneurial memoir Serious Eater: A Food Lover's Quest for Pizza and Redemption (Portfolio Penguin/Random House, 2019), and the host of the podcast Special Sauce. He was formerly a frequent ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' contributor. His stories on iconic American foods such as pizza, hot dogs, hamburgers, ice cream and cheesecake have appeared in many U.S. periodicals, including '' GQ'', ''

BusinessWeek ''Bloomberg Businessweek'', previously known as ''BusinessWeek'', is an American weekly business magazine published fifty times a year. Since 2009, the magazine is owned by New York City-based Bloomberg L.P. The magazine debuted in New York City ...

'' and ''

''. In 2016 Levine was inducted into the James Beard Foundation's Who's Who of Food & Beverage in America.

Education

Levine grew up in

Cedarhurst, New York Cedarhurst is a village in the Town of Hempstead in Nassau County, on the South Shore of Long Island, in New York, United States. The population was 6,592 at the 2010 census. The Incorporated Village of Cedarhurst is located in the region o ...

, and graduated from Fairfax High School in

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

in 1969. He attended

Grinnell College Grinnell College is a private liberal arts college in Grinnell, Iowa, United States. It was founded in 1846 when a group of New England Congregationalists established the Trustees of Iowa College. Grinnell has the fifth highest endowment-to-st ...

in Iowa with a BA in music, and in 1985, earned his MBA from

Columbia Business School Columbia Business School (CBS) is the business school of Columbia University, a Private university, private research university in New York City. Established in 1916, Columbia Business School is one of six Ivy League business schools and is one ...

Food criticism

Levine's first book ''New York Eats'' was a guide to New York City's best non-restaurant food. Published in 1992, Levine's research stretched back to the 1970s. A follow-up, ''New York Eats (More)'', was published in 1997. In 2005, he commemorated pizza's centennial in America by consuming 1,000 slices of pizza for ''Pizza: A Slice of Heaven'', which also includes cartoons, poems, and essays about pizza by writers and chefs, including

Nora Ephron Nora Ephron ( ; May 19, 1941 – June 26, 2012) was an American journalist, writer, and filmmaker. She is best known for her romantic comedy films and was nominated three times for the Writers Guild of America Award and the Academy Award f ...

Garry Trudeau Garretson Beekman Trudeau (born July 21, 1948) is an American cartoonist, best known for creating the ''Doonesbury'' comic strip. Trudeau is also the creator and executive producer of the Amazon Studios political comedy series ''Alpha House''. ...

Calvin Trillin Calvin Marshall Trillin (born 5 December 1935) is an American journalist, humorist, food writer, poet, memoirist and novelist. He is a winner of the Thurber Prize for American Humor (2012) and an elected member of the American Academy of Arts an ...

Ruth Reichl Ruth Reichl (; born 1948), is an American chef, food writer and editor. In addition to two decades as a food critic, mainly spent at the ''Los Angeles Times'' and ''The New York Times'', Reichl has also written cookbooks, memoirs and a novel, and ...

Mario Batali Mario Francesco Batali (born September 19, 1960) is an American chef, writer, and restaurateur. Batali co-owned restaurants in New York City; Las Vegas; Los Angeles; and Newport Beach, California; Boston; Singapore; Westport, Connecticut; and Ne ...

, and

Roy Blount Jr Roy Alton Blount Jr. (; born October 4, 1941) is an American writer, speaker, reporter, and humorist. Life and career Blount was born in Indianapolis, Indiana, and grew up in Decatur, Georgia. He attended Ponce de Leon Elementary School and g ...

. Levine also co-wrote, ''The Young Man and the Sea'' which was published in May 2007. It is a collection of more than 100 seafood recipes and fisherman stories from Chef David Pasternack of New York's Esca. In December 2006, he founded the food website ''Serious Eats'', covering cultural trends within the food community, chef gossip, restaurant reviews and message dialogue among readers, involving blogs, video, social network, and community-created food content. In 2010 Serious Eats won two James Beard Awards, one for best food blog and the other for best web video. Columnists on Serious Eats included the James Beard Award-winning columnists J. Kenji Lopez-Alt (The Food Lab) and Stella Parks (Brave Tart). ''Serious Eats'' has been praised by PBS's MediaShift as “the next generation of food media.”"Serious Eats: Food Media 2.0"
Jennifer Woodard Maderazo, July 27, 2007 In 1997, ''Gourmet'' editor Ruth Reichl called Levine “the curator of New York's far-flung food museum” and “a missionary of the delicious…on a crusade to see that the people who make food get the recognition they deserve.”
Ruth Reichl, ''The New York Times'', November 12, 1997

Television and radio

As a television personality, Levine hosted the co-host and consulting producer for ''Reservations Required'' on the Ultra HD Channel. He also created, co-produced and co-hosted (along with ''Vogue'' magazine food critic

Jeffrey Steingarten Jeffrey L. Steingarten (born May 31, 1942) is a leading food writer in the United States. He has been the food critic at ''Vogue'' magazine since 1989. Career His 1997 book of humorous food essays, titled ''The Man Who Ate Everything,'' was a ...

) ''New York Eats'' for the Metro Channel. As a former radio producer, Levine created and hosted ''Dish'' for WNYC, New York's NPR affiliate, which was twice nominated for James Beard Awards for Electronic Media. Guests on Dish included the late Nora Ephron, Calvin Trillin, Frances McDormand, and Joel Coen. He started the podcast ''Special Sauce With Ed Levine'' in 2015 in which he speaks to chefs, restaurateurs, actors and other cultural figures about their relationships to food. The first episode features a conversation with

Phil Rosenthal Philip Rosenthal (born January 27, 1960) is an American television writer and producer who is the creator, writer, and executive producer of the CBS sitcom ''Everybody Loves Raymond'' (1996–2005). In recent years, he has presented food and t ...

, creator of the television sitcom ''

Everybody Loves Raymond ''Everybody Loves Raymond'' is an American sitcom television series created by Philip Rosenthal that aired on CBS from September 13, 1996, to May 16, 2005, with a total of 210 episodes spanning nine seasons. It was produced by Where's Lunch and ...

''. ''Special Sauce'' is produced by PRX. Special Sauce has received multiple nominations for a James Beard Award.

Music

Levine has also co-produced records for

Dr. John Malcolm John Rebennack Jr. (November 20, 1941 – June 6, 2019), better known by his stage name Dr. John, was an American singer and songwriter. His music encompassed New Orleans blues, jazz, funk, and R&B. Active as a session musician from ...

and written about music for ''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first kno ...

'' and ''The New York Times''. As an Associate Producer at the now defunct concert production firm Levine worked on concerts at Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center headlined by artists including Ray Charles, Sonny Rollins, Wynton Marsalis, Tom Waits, B.B.King, and the Staples Singers. Levine also worked as a publicist at Warner Bros. Records on acts including the B-52s, Talking Heads, and Rickie Lee Jones. He received a gold record for his work on Rickie Lee Jones.

Selected writings

"Was Life Better When Bagels Were Smaller?"
December 31, 2003

December 1, 2004

May 25, 2005

February 22, 2006

Bibliography

New York Eats, 1992, St. Martin's Griffin * ''New York Eats (More)'', 1997, St. Martin's Griffin * ''Pizza: A Slice of Heaven'', 2005, Universe Publishing * ''The Young Man and the Sea'', 2007, Artisan Publishing * ''Serious Eater: A Food Lover's Perilous Quest for Pizza and Redemption'', 2019, Portfolio/Penguin

References

External links

Serious Eats

Ed Levine Eats

New York Magazine on Ed Levine

NPR interview with Ed Levine
{{DEFAULTSORT:Levine, Ed 1952 births American food writers American television journalists Living people The New York Times writers Columbia Business School alumni Grinnell College alumni People from Cedarhurst, New York