Projects
Take a spin through what I’ve got cooking — more on each below:
Cooks Without Borders
The Brenner Report
The Masa Movement Project
The Communal Table Talks
Leslie Brenner Concepts
Cooks Without Borders
Leslie’s cooking website, founded in 2015, brings you recipes steeped in culture — and the stories behind them — from around the world.
At CWB you’ll find recipes that’ll blow you away with deliciousness, food stories with cultural depth, cookbook reviews, live Q & A’s with fascinating people in the food world, a CookShop offering our favorite cookware, tools, unusual ingredients, books — and more.
NEWS: In April 2023 Leslie launched a CWB newsletter through Substack.
The Brenner Report
Leslie’s email newsletter about food, the food world and cooking. Subscription is free.
The Masa Movement Project
In March of 2021, I became interested in a fledgling masa movement developing across the U.S. Chefs, aficionados and entrepreneurs had become passionate about nixtamalizing heirloom corn from Mexico, grinding it into masa and making delicious things and businesses using it. There’s also a home-cook analog — newly available masa harina made from the heirloom corn. Interest became obsession, and my deep dive into the subject — covering the people who nixtamalize, the cool businesses springing up around masa, and the endless ways to cook with it — has commandeered a good chunk of my life and work. That’s the Masa Movement Project.
The project is ongoing, including a series of stories at Cooks Without Borders called The Masa Life.
Heirloom maíz from Mexico, and masa made from it
The Communal Table Talks
An award-winning chef, a critic-turned-consultant and a creative design-thinker put their heads together — with the entire community — to reimagine restaurants. The series of free-flowing conversations is hosted by Bradford Thompson, Leslie Brenner and CarloMaria Ciampoli.
Leslie Brenner Concepts
Leslie’s consulting business. Leslie Brenner Concepts offers restaurant consulting, holistic marketing, quality control (The Restaurant Doctor and Restaurant Tune-Ups), PR, food and beverage business development, talent recruiting, menu development, wine list development and more.
