Meet the Taste of Home Editors

Taste of Home‘s editors are proud to be home cooks and entertainers, just like you. With backgrounds in writing and journalism, we’re passionate about discovering the latest trends and recipes, highlighting tastemakers in the food world and sharing those a-ha cooking tips and tools we can hardly live without.

We’d love to introduce ourselves.

Jeanne Sidner

Chief Content Officer

Jeanne Sidner is Taste of Home‘s Chief Content Officer, overseeing the brand’s vibrant and talented editorial, art and culinary teams. This position allows her to pair her love of great writing and design with her other love: whipping up fabulous food to share with family and friends. Jeanne lives in Milwaukee, where, as a third grader, she learned to bake in her mother’s kitchen. She is a collector of vintage Pyrex mixing bowls, interesting cast-iron pieces and all types of plants.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: French Silk Pie

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Mark Hagen

Executive Editor

The former owner of his own catering business, Mark Hagen has been part of the Taste of Home team for the past 20 years. A comfort-food junkie, he has written for Quick Cooking, Light & Tasty and Country Woman magazines as well as various Pillsbury and Betty Crocker cookbooks. When he’s not spending time in the kitchen with his West Highland Terrier, Rocco, he’s working in his yard, doing stand-up comedy or devouring a platter of nachos. (Most likely the latter.)

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Blend of the Bayou

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Ellie Martin Cliffe

Executive Editor

A member of the lifestyle media since the mid-aughts, Ellie Martin Cliffe joined the Taste of Home team in 2010 and has since edited and written for books, special interest publications, the flagship magazine and the website. These days, she leads the growing team of digital and magazine editors, sharing tasty recipes, no-fail cooking tips and entertaining inspiration. Gluten- and dairy-free since 2017, she’s a staff go-to on allergy-friendly foods. If you don’t find her tapping away at her laptop, look for Ellie in her family’s urban veggie garden, at her sewing machine or on a local trail, biking with her spouse and first grader.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Mom’s Super Stupendous Potato Salad

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Rachel Seis

Deputy Editor

Rachel Seis has been an editor at Taste of Home magazine since 2014, doing everything from writing and editing articles, planning editorial content, taste-testing recipes and more. She studied magazine journalism at Ohio University and worked in marketing and lifestyle blogging before landing her job at Taste of Home. When Rachel was 8 years old, she placed first in a local writing contest and won a soft pretzel-making cookbook, inspiring her to bake by herself for the first time (there were many, many soft pretzels made in the years to come).

While she’s still a soft pretzel fan, these days Rachel loves attempting to re-create her favorite restaurant dishes in her own kitchen—especially any type of spicy Thai noodle dish. Outside of the food world, Rachel loves to travel, is a big exercise nut, adores live music and standup comedy and tries to spend as much time outdoors as possible.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Egg Roll Noodle Bowl

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Lara Eucalano

Senior Editor

Lara Eucalano is an editor who manages Taste of Home‘s extraordinary community of contributors. She assigns and edits content about techniques, tools and, of course, food trends. Lara’s degree in English from St. Norbert College helps her ensure that every piece of content is clear and accurate. You can find her at home in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, gardening with her wife, Cassie, and keeping an eye on her flock of backyard chickens.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Two-Berry Pavlova

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Emily Racette Parulski

Senior Editor

Emily Racette Parulski manages Taste of Home‘s newsletter team and is a lead editor for affiliate. She graduated from Bradley University and has been writing and editing food and lifestyle content professionally for almost a decade. When she’s not working, she can be found in her kitchen baking something sweet or enjoying a scoop of custard somewhere in Milwaukee.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Chicken Potpie Galette with Cheddar-Thyme Crust

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Christine Rukavena

Senior Editor

Christine Rukavena loves to read, curate, sample and develop new recipes as a senior book editor at Taste of Home. A Culinary Institute of America alumna with honors, she creates cookbooks and food-related content. A favorite part of the job is taste-testing dishes. Previous positions include pastry chef at a AAA Five Diamond property. Christine moonlights at a boutique wine shop, where she edits marketing pieces and samples wine far higher than her pay grade.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Parmesan-Coated Brie

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Julie Schnittka

Senior Editor

Julie Schnittka coordinates Taste of Home’s newsstand publications. She became a foodie when she first started with the brand in the 1990s and helped launch the cookbook department. Julie’s passion for trying new recipes on family and friends is evidenced by her ever-growing, bulging file of printouts that she intends to get through one day. When off the clock, she enjoys reading, biking, eating out and walking her puggle, Howie.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Chicken Cheese Lasagna

Rachel Vigoda

Senior Editor

Rachel Vigoda joined the Taste of Home team as a senior editor after several years of writing about food, travel and entertainment for a variety of newspapers and magazines and running a food-focused news site for Eater. When she’s not tracking culinary trends and collaborating with TOH editors on digital content, you can find her experimenting with vegan recipes, checking out new restaurants near her home in Philadelphia and planning weekend getaways, usually inspired by her travel guidebook, Moon Pennsylvania.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Best Hummus

Amy Glander

Editor

Amy Glander is a book editor at Taste of Home where she gets to pour her passions for food and storytelling into trade and series cookbooks. A graduate of the University of Wisconsin with a degree in English, Amy has more than 20 years’ experience in the book publishing industry. She’s written and edited a variety of nonfiction about food and entertaining, crafts and hobbies, gardening and outdoors, photography and memory-keeping, and more. Amy believes in the beauty of home cooking and the stories that connect us to food, home, friends and family.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Mint Frosted Chocolate Cake

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Lisa Kaminski

Editor

A passionate home baker, Lisa Kaminski grew up in the kitchen learning all the best tricks from her mom. She channels this love of all things sweet (and occasionally savory) into Bakeable from Taste of Home, the hub for all things baking. She also serves as the editorial lead for the Test Kitchen-Preferred program where she gets to research and sample all kinds of ingredients and treats.

A graduate of Edgewood College, Lisa now lives in Milwaukee with her husband, Michael, and two cats. At home she’s usually crafting, reading or paging through a new cookbook. You can keep up with her on Instagram at @cabininthecity.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Chocolate Babka

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Caroline Stanko

Editor

Caroline Stanko spends her days researching, writing and editing SEO- and other channel-driven content for Taste of Home. As the editorial lead for the brand’s video team, she also schedules and writes scripts for many of the videos you see on the site. Caroline got her start in the publishing world as an editorial intern for Taste of Home while earning her bachelor’s in writing-intensive English from Marquette University in 2016. Since then, she has worked her way up from associate editor to editor of the brand. When she’s not typing away at a keyboard, Caroline spends her time mixing up a killer cocktail or burning through her to-be-read list.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: It’s a tie between Malted Chocolate & Stout Layer Cake and Zucchini Pizza Casserole

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Hazel Wheaton

Editor

A writer and editor who has worked in publishing for 30 years, Hazel Wheaton has worked in the fields of travel, food and jewelry arts. She has had the rare privilege of learning about food by listening to local experts and tasting everything she was offered—including almond pastries in Morocco, whisky and haggis in Orkney, escargot in Lyon, spiced lamb in Abu Dhabi, and dried shrimp at the night market in Taipei.

A native of central Pennsylvania, she’s a devoted fan of her own local cuisine as well, including scrapple, shoofly pie and apple dumplings. After taking culinary classes in Philadelphia, Hazel sadly decided her feet weren’t cut out for restaurant work but has found her own place with food at Taste of Home. An enthusiastic baker, she’s known for her cookies, cakes and other baked goods. And she still wishes she could cook like her mother.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Lovely Lemon Cheesecake

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Katie Bandurski

Associate Editor

Katie Bandurski’s enthusiasm for food runs deep. Growing up, she loved rifling through her grandmother’s cookbook collection. Today, she spends her time creating content for tasteofhome.com, specializing in affiliate content, holidays and email newsletters. Katie graduated with honors from Drake University in 2018 with a major in magazine journalism.

When she’s not whipping up a new recipe, you’ll find Katie exploring the Midwest, sampling vegetarian eats and counting down the days until Christmas. Katie lives in Shorewood, Wisconsin, with her boyfriend, John.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Bake Sale Lemon Bars

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Annamarie Higley

Associate Editor

Annamarie Higley primarily helps plan, write and edit Taste of Home magazine. She also works on the Test Kitchen Insider newsletter and contributes to tasteofhome.com. In the past, she’s written for brands including Brit + Co, Edible and #HackTheMenu, all of which have helped fulfill her longtime desire to work in food media. When she’s not hemming and hawing about comma placement, Annamarie loves traveling to new cities (based largely on the local fare, of course), hiking, collaging, reading and cooking.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Chorizo Pumpkin Pasta

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Lauren Pahmeier

Associate Editor

Lauren Pahmeier focuses on search engine optimization for Taste of Home, making sure that readers can find all the recipes and other food-related articles they need on Google. When working remotely from Minneapolis, she assigns and writes articles and contributes toward other SEO-related efforts. While studying for her bachelor’s degree in professional journalism from the University of Minnesota Twin Cities, she served as the co-founder and editor of her school’s chapter of Spoon University, and since then has freelanced for Eater Twin Cities.

Outside of work, Lauren’s hunting down the newest restaurants, specialty coffees and most indulgent desserts in the Twin Cities while simultaneously practicing her food photography for @_whatsforsupper_, where she documents her favorite food finds.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Thai Peanut Chicken Casserole

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Christina Herbst

Assistant Editor

Christina Herbst is an assistant editor for Taste of Home, specializing in content creation and SEO. She has more than two years of food writing experience under her belt since graduating from Bradley University with two degrees in social media marketing and advertising communications. In her spare time, you can find Christina reading in a coffee shop, hopping around Milwaukee’s food scene, working on a DIY project and capturing everyday moments on her camera (especially of her latest meal!).

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Apple-Mustard Chicken Tenders

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Amrita Thakkar

Assistant Editor

Amrita Thakkar is an assistant editor who helms Taste of Home‘s food news coverage. She’s an enthusiastic Trader Joe’s shopper and Instagrammer, with a background in restaurant marketing and a love for global cuisine. She lives in Milwaukee, where she enjoys experimenting with grilled cheese recipes, lingering in bookstores, fiddling with her camera and perfecting her yoga practice.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Dark Chocolate Layer Cake

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Hannah Pugh

Assistant Editor

With a background as a barista, baker and cafe manager, Hannah loves how food—especially homemade baked goods—can connect people and brighten their days. She now brings that passion to Taste of Home as an assistant editor where she writes recipe collections and product reviews, and curates email newsletters.

Hannah graduated with honors from Wheaton College where she served as the managing editor of her school’s academic journal, The Pub. Since then, Hannah has freelanced for Peachtree Publishing Services as well as various blogs and social media accounts. In her free time, she enjoys reading, experimenting with vegan recipes and exploring Chicago’s many cafes, restaurants and parks.

Favorite Taste of Home recipe: Vegan Peanut Butter Cookies

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Want to join our team? Look for openings on Trusted Media Brands’ careers page.

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