Care and Feeding is about relationships, and we were fortunate to speak with bestselling author Laurie Woolever about her memoir. Beyond being a writer, she is also an editor, public speaker, and former cook. For nearly a decade, Laurie served as the right hand to the late author, TV host, and producer Anthony Bourdain.

Over the years, she has worn many hats, private cook, nanny, caterer, busgirl, recipe tester, farmhand, video store clerk, and food editor. From 1999 to 2002, she was Mario Batali’s assistant, contributing to Holiday Food (2000) and The Babbo Cookbook (2002). She later edited and recipe-tested Bourdain’s Les Halles Cookbook (2004) before working as an editor at Art Culinaire and Wine Spectator.

Her memoir is raw and unflinching, shedding light on the realities of being “the woman behind the man” while carving her own powerful voice in food writing.