Founded in 2009 by veteran journalist Corie Brown, Zester Daily (ZesterDaily.com) is an award-winning online publication produced by an international collection of experienced journalists, food writers and wine experts.

Committed to excellent reporting and writing, Zester contributors follow their instincts and interests as they travel the globe in search of stories that matter to our food-obsessed culture. Whether it is wild mushroom foraging, profiles of innovative young chefs, shopping Chiang Mai's food markets, or tasting the current vintage of California olive oil, Zester's stories are always entertaining, informed and accessible.

Zester seeks to engage food and drink enthusiasts in the kind of spirited, intelligent dialogue critical to establishing a more delicious, sustainable and just food culture. A team of seven editors supports more than 50 contributors producing breaking news, feature articles, editorials, cartoons and videos. The weekly Zester Daily Soapbox is a provocative, and often controversial, opinion piece written by an outside author or industry leader.

Advertising supported, Zester syndicates its stories to other online and print outlets. For more information, contact us at: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Zester Daily Staff:

Corie Brown is the founder and general manager of Zester Daily. A former editor and writer with the Los Angeles Times, she received the 2008 University of Missouri Lifestyle Award for her article about climate change and wine, “A Scorching Future,” and currently is researching a book on that subject. In 2006, she won both first and second prize for news reporting from the Association of Food Journalists. Corie was awarded a fellowship by the Foreign Press Center of Japan and worked in that country in the summer of 2010. Previously, Corie was West Coast entertainment correspondent with Newsweek and a columnist for Premiere Magazine. On staff with Business Week in Boston and other McGraw-Hill publications in New York City and Washington, D.C., she has written about energy, the environment and health care. A Kansas transplant to Los Angeles, Corie knows even the laziest person can be a devoted locavore in California.

Corie can be reached at:

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Karen Chaderjian has spent more than 20 years at the Los Angeles Times, working in the arts and entertainment and sports sections. She also edits copy for Truthdig.com. Among the books she has edited are "Suze Orman’s Workbook for The 9 Steps to Financial Freedom" and "Four Seasons of Yosemite: A Photographer's Journey" by Mark Boster, with a foreword by Robert Redford. She served as the consulting editor for TheLatinaVoz.com and earned her master’s degree in social work. Her father Aram, who once co-owned Chad’s Luncheonette in Chicago, inspired her adventures in good eating.

Margot Dougherty is a journalist who has worked as a writer and/or editor on the staffs of Los Angeles, Entertainment Weekly, Life, People and Who (a People spin-off in Australia) magazines. She has covered food, celebrity, fashion and travel over the course of her career and is now a book collaborator and independent writer and editor. Margot's pieces have recently appeared in More, Conde Nast Traveler, Town & Country, Los Angeles and AARP The Magazine.

Wynne Everett is a Chicago-based independent editor and writer. A native of central Ohio, she grew up eating vegetables from her grandparents' farm and beef bought on-the-hoof at the county fair. She is now a vegetarian. Her 20-year career in newspapers has included stints as a courthouse bureau reporter, education writer, city editor, business editor and food section contributor. In 2008, Wynne blogged her experience as a Chicago locavore -- a project that made her a devoted fan of Wisconsin raw-milk cheese and farm-fresh pastured eggs.

Mary Forgione writes for the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune and other publications with an accent on the outdoors and travel. She also serves as editor for the Angeles Chapter of the Sierra Club. Mary believes in living lightly on the planet and that translates into a vegetarian diet and making smart local food choices. An avid hiker and runner, Mary likes speed-touring cities and countries on foot, trying every vegetable and grain along the way.

Meghan Merda is an independent editor based in the Chicago area. Her interest in the politics of food began with her political science and journalism studies at Eastern Illinois University. A devoted farmers market shopper, Meghan gained an appreciation for homegrown food tending her grandparents' large garden during summers as a child. After spending her 20's learning her way around a kitchen, she had to relearn much of what she knew and loved about cooking with the births of her two sons, both of whom suffer from food allergies.

Nichol Nelson hails from Minnesota, but has worked in food journalism in New York and Los Angeles for more than a decade. She served as an editor with Gourmet magazine for six years and has contributed to several other national digital and print food publications. Though Nichol is currently an Angeleno, she sometimes still calls a casserole "hot dish."

Cicely Wedgeworth is a writer and editor whose love of food is intertwined with a fascination with world cultures. She earned her bachelor's degree at Harvard University in social anthropology, and a master's in journalism at Columbia University. At the Los Angeles Times, she worked as an editor for eight years on the foreign and food desks, and also wrote food and travel stories. Cicely lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and works for an online marketing company where she leads content strategy for a portfolio of websites. Her personal blog, Chomp le Monde, explores family-friendly cooking from around the world.