ICE at 50: Cathy Lo, Senior Staff Editor at NYT Cooking, Listens To Learn

Two things Cathy Lo, Senior Staff Editor at NYT Cooking and an ICE 50th anniversary distinguished alumni honoree, is not: a person who seeks attention and a person who yells.

In our “look at me” world, these qualities aren’t always rewarded; in mid 1990’s French restaurant kitchens, like those where Lo completed one of her two ICE externships, they were downright rare.

Loud chefs, however, aren’t why Lo became a food and recipe writer (versus a restaurant chef).

“I've always known that I wasn't cut out for the restaurant world,” she says, “...but I wanted to at least set my foot in a restaurant kitchen and see what it was like and how I would do.”

Though the restaurants she staged at were “really interesting and very different,” Lo’s experience confirmed her preference for food media.  

After graduating from ICE, Lo worked at Good Housekeeping, first as an Editorial Assistant and then as Associate Food Editor. It was a 20-year gig that taught her much of what she knows.

“There were a lot of chefs who passed through the kitchen… Even though I wasn’t directly involved in working with [people like Daniel Boulud and Emeril Lagasse], I got an exposure…that was pretty special.”

“You can’t work in a test kitchen and not absorb things,” she adds.

In 2017, Lo was promoted to Food Editor for all of Hearst's women's lifestyle publications. (This included Good Housekeeping, Country Living, Woman’s Day, Redbook and Dr. Oz, among others.) Three years later, she was Hearst’s Senior Food Editor.

In 2022, a former colleague alerted her to an open spot on the cooking team at the New York Times. For Lo, the role’s appeal was based as much on who she would get to work with — Melissa Clark, for example — as it was on the Times’ stature as a publishing behemoth.

She landed the job and has since been testing and editing recipes written by in-house and freelance developers for a readership that exceeds 100 million visitors per year.

We asked Lo about her culinary school experience, her advice to aspiring food writers and what a typical day in her work life looks like. Here’s what she had to say. 

* The following interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.

ICE: Can you tell us about your decision to attend culinary school and the professional path that followed?

Cathy Lo: I was working in a publishing company when I decided, “Hey, I really like food.” I had gotten into cooking for myself. I think one of the first things for me was a recipe in Bon Appétit magazine. I believe it was a London broil marinated in something I can’t recall now, and it was served with potato gratin with boursin cheese, which was very of the moment then. And I was like, “This is really cool.” So I just started cooking and having more of an interest in food – reading about it and looking at culinary schools… [I thought] there's media and publishing and then there's the food world, so maybe I can intertwine my interests.

ICE: How was your culinary program and externship?

CL: I did evenings and weekends at what was then called Peter Kump’s, [and] I think because it was the evening program, my fellow students and I were kind of in the same situation — working but thinking about a career change, as opposed to people who are maybe younger or in different situations that allow them to attend during the day. We were an eclectic bunch, and it was exciting. My externships were in two different restaurants. I've always known that I wasn't cut out for the restaurant world, but I wanted to at least set my foot in a restaurant kitchen so I would understand what it was like.

ICE: And then what was your transition from school to real-world professional life like? 

CL: After I graduated from culinary school, I sent out my resume and, like, 50 letters — because that’s what you did at the time, mailing them — to wherever I could think of, and I got a job at Good Housekeeping magazine as an editorial assistant in the food department. My background in publishing probably helped. I worked in the test kitchen with Susan Westmoreland, who is wonderful. She was my boss for 20 years and a great influence on my career.  

ICE: We interviewed Susan Stockton — like you, an ICE 50th anniversary distinguished alumni honoree — a few weeks back, and she mentioned the many chefs she met over the years working at Food Network. I imagine the same is true of Good Housekeeping.

CL: I remember one of the first chefs was Emeril [Lagasse]. At the time we were working on something called, “In the Test Kitchen,” I think, and so people like Daniel Boulud and Emeril would come through. I’m fairly certain Lydia Bastianich came through. Even though I wasn't directly involved with working with them, I got an exposure to the food world and restaurants from that side of it, so that was pretty special. You can't work in a test kitchen without absorbing a few things.

ICE: What was it like working in the test kitchen environment?

CL: [When I] eventually started helping to edit the recipes that would come through — we had a full staff and freelancers doing recipes — we'd have literal tastings several times a day and so I would go out to the “taste bar,” which is what we called it, and just taste the food and critique it and, you know, give our opinions and what might work and what might not work. And over the years, I got more and more experience, and then I started doing some recipe testing as well… and then Good Housekeeping became part of a larger women's lifestyle group [at Hearst Magazines]. So, starting from editorial assistant, I just kind of worked my way up to one of the [multi-magazine lifestyle group] food editors. We were a very small, very tight food team, and we worked together very closely.

Then I got a call from one of my former colleagues who said there was a spot at the New York Times — and I had always admired the people at The Times, Melissa Clark being one of them.

ICE: I’ve not met her myself, but other food media and ICE distinguished alumni — Adeena Sussman, for example — have referenced her. 

CL: Well, I can tell you that she is one of the loveliest, kindest people. And she was one of my food heroes — we share a love of anchovies and garlic — and now we work together. She comes into the office at least once a week, if not more, and I still feel this sense of awe that she's a coworker of mine.

ICE: When did you realize you had a passion for food? Did you grow up pulling on a family member's apron or was it an interest that developed later? 

CL: I grew up in the Bronx. I was born in Trinidad, but I I came to the States when I was one. So I'm pretty much a Bronx girl. But my mother would cook Trinidadian food. My dad was from Panama and he didn't really cook, but he made one thing that I remember, and that was tostones. He had a rock that was for smashing the tostones before frying them. So that is one of my first memories of food. But it was always about consuming. Like, I wanted my dad to make tostones, but I didn’t watch him use that rock or cook at his side at the time.

And then I studied abroad for a semester in the South of France. We ate some wonderful things, [but] if I went back now, I’d do things differently. On a trip to Greece, we stopped on the beach and the French women we were traveling with harvested sea urchins. They cut them open, and there was a restaurant nearby so they got some bread and we ate the sea urchin on the beach with bread. At the time I thought that was really cool and interesting, but for some reason [cooking] was just this latent interest that didn't didn't appear until later in life. It showed after college, when I started cooking more for myself.

ICE: What does a typical day look like for you? 

CL: I'm part of the recipes team that helps produce all of the recipes that go on NYT Cooking and in the New York Times magazine, so my day consists of talking with recipe developers and columnists. Recipes also come in from chefs, so I work with them to adapt the recipe from restaurant recipe writing. I might say, “Hey, the ‘normal, everyday’ person who’s not a professional chef can’t get this type of mushroom. What can we substitute?” And I work with them on proportions. I might also be testing that recipe in my own home kitchen, which is good because that means it's practical to how people will be using it.

ICE: What do you love about your job? 

CL: I really love that at NYT Cooking we try to preserve the voice of the person who's developing the recipe — you know, the voice of the recipe, the soul of the recipe. There’s a general style guide — a certain way of writing recipes for a certain publisher — but we try to keep the spirit and the voice of the developer, as well as the essence of the food. It's challenging because [the recipe must be] correct, but being respectful of the people behind the food is really wonderful.

ICE: What would you tell our students about how to become a food writer and recipe developer? 

CL: I don’t love doing this myself, but my advice would be to go to events. Be out there. Talk to people. Even if it's not something you think can help you directly, networking is a valuable way of learning about the world. And there are other ways of getting into the food world, other things that you can do. If you want to write a cookbook, you could [work with an existing author] testing recipes, or if you're into food styling, you could assist somebody at a photo shoot… and then maybe there’s somebody at the photo shoot who also wants to write a cookbook.

ICE: What I’m hearing — correct me if I'm wrong — is to say yes to things even if you don’t know, in the moment, exactly what the opportunity will be and how it will serve you in the future. Does that feel right?

CL: Yes. I think it's important to be receptive. You can learn a lot from listening and absorbing.

ICE: Let’s talk about mentorship and people who inspire you or from whom you've learned. 

CL: I'll go back to Susan Westmoreland. Susan taught by example. People loved her and she was received and greeted warmly. My next boss was a great mentor in a different way — more “You should push yourself. You should do more things.” So there's something to be said for both kinds of mentors: the ones who push you out of your comfort zone and the ones who nurture you and say, “Hey, you're doing a great job.” You need both, I think.

ICE: Do you have a particular culinary school memory?

CL: I remember that we were partnered up, and my partner Charlie was this very tall Scottish gentleman who was really no-nonsense. He was great, just wonderful. We were making sauce Américaine, and we had to cut a lobster in half to kill it. I just could not bring myself to do it. So he did it. But then the lobster is just like, still moving. Maybe this is not something you can put in the interview?

ICE: I mean, for culinary school, I feel like it’s good to understand where the food we eat comes from.

CL: True. Anyway, there's no punchline to this. It just stands out as a memory, and actually, I still cannot bring myself to do that. But it was really delicious.

QUICKFIRE QUESTIONS 

Favorite kitchen tool? Microplane. 

Salty or sweet? Oh, absolutely salty. 

Favorite food holiday? Valentine's Day. 

Favorite food city? New Orleans. 

Favorite cuisine? I can't say that I have a favorite cuisine. Right now, I'm really into exploring Japanese food. But I move around. That could change. 

Go-to “easy” recipe? I actually had it as leftovers for lunch today. It’s what I call broccoli pasta, which is just broccoli cooked with pasta and sautéed garlic and anchovies and chickpeas. Then that's all kind of tossed together. It's very easy and super fast. 

Go-to "wow" recipe? Anything with duck.