The kitchen has always been a magical place for me. As a little girl I loved to watch my yiayia (Greek for grandmother) cure olives and make homemade bread. I still remember the first time she gave me my own little ball of dough and let me shape it into a loaf. It was so much better than Play-Doh! When the aroma of freshly baked bread filled the kitchen, I instantly fell in love.

In 1999 I decided to turn a life-long passion for cooking into a career. I moved to San Francisco, and graduated from the California Culinary Academy, later furthering my education in advanced pastry skills and savory cooking, at the Culinary Institute of America at Greystone. Over the years I have worked at such notable restaurants as Rubicon, The Slanted Door, Ame, LuLu and Yoshi’s, where I was named “one of the cities top pastry chefs” by the San Francisco Chronicle’s head food critic Michael Bauer.

My culinary adventures have taken me to places I never imagined: competing on Top Chef, building cities out of Rice Krispies and chocolate on Food Network, and across the globe to Greece, where I had my own cooking show.

I've also written for a variety of publications including Eater, Huffington Post, and Chowhound.

When I’m not in the kitchen I can usually be found dreaming up big new story plots. After all, food only lasts a few days. A good book has no expiration date!