- In 2021, Jenessa left New York to travel the world in search of food that challenges expectations. She's studied food trends, history, and evolution in New York, California, France, Israel, Singapore, New Zealand, Australia, South Korea, and Japan.
- Jenessa broke into the world of food writing when she stumbled across an all-female-run pastry pop-up in Sausalito, California, selling pastries from behind the counter of an old-school Italian restaurant.
- Jenessa once lived down the street from her all-time favorite bakery, Tapisserie in Paris, a pastry shop from the founders of Septime. The signature maple syrup tart topped with cream remains her most beloved dessert.
Experience
Jenessa is a food writer, fiction writer, literary translator, and practitioner of narrative medicine. Jenessa's work has been featured in Eater, The Atlantic, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Review, Guernica, BOMB Magazine, The Brooklyn Rail, and anthologized in Off Assignment's "Letter to a Stranger" (Algonquin, 2022). She has taught writing at Columbia University, Rutgers University, the National Alliance on Mental Illness, and the Mount Sinai Adolescent Health Center. She is a member of the National Book Critics Circle and serves on the Advisory Council of Off Assignment, a magazine of literary travel writing, and on the Board of Directors of New Neighbors Partnership, a New York-based non-profit that helps newly arrived refugees connect to local community resources.
Education
Jenessa has a bachelor of arts degree in Madness as Metaphor from the Gallatin School of Individualized Study at New York University. In 2017, she earned her master of fine arts degree in fiction and literary translation from Columbia University. In 2019, she earned her master of science degree from the Narrative Medicine program at Columbia University.
