Alice Fauconnet was born in the South of France and studied Social Anthropology in Paris. Having always been passionate about human rights and social justice, she became a vegan for animal rights in 2012. In 2016, she co-founded New Roots, a vegan cheese company, in the heart of the Swiss Alps. New Roots’ mission is to provide an ethical and sustainable alternative to animal-based cheese. To achieve this, they craft cheese from organic, homemade plant-based milk, using ancestral techniques of fermentation and ripening. Their range includes alternatives to camembert, ricotta, cream cheese, as well as Swiss classics such as fondue and raclette. Today, Alice is a public speaker and a social media manager at New Roots.

Jonathon Alsop is founder & executive director of the Boston Wine School, author of The Wine Lover’s Devotional and In Vino Veritas, and a commentator for National Public Radio. His new book Wine Life: A Collection Of Verses will be published in 2024. Jonathon began writing about wine, food and travel in 1988 and emerged as a wine expert through his syndicated wine column In Vino Veritas. He has contributed numerous articles to the Associated Press, Frequent Flyer Magazine, La Vie Claire, Beverage Business Magazine, Mobil Travel Guides, Fodor’s Travel Guides, Boston Globe, and many others. Jonathon is a contributing journalist and commentator on a variety of wine topics as a monthly guest on NPR: WGBH/Boston Public Radio, Under The Radar With Callie Crossley, and Boston Sunday Review. He is a frequent guest speaker at universities, corporate events, and wine trade shows around the world. Quarry Books published Jonathon’s first book, The Wine Lover’s Devotional: 365 Days of Knowledge, Advice & Lore for the Ardent Aficionado, in 2011. The Devotional is now available in Japanese and Chinese. Look for Jonathon’s trademark blackboard of wine fundamentals around the world, from Boston to the Kimpton Hotel Vintage Portland in Oregon to The Place on Jumen Lu in Shanghai.

Heather Paxson is interested in how people craft a sense of themselves as moral beings in their everyday lives, especially through activities having to do with family and food. She is the author of two ethnographic monographs: Making Modern Mothers: Ethics and Family Planning in Urban Greece (University of California Press, 2004)a study of changing ideologies and practices of motherhood and fertility control in Athens, and The Life of Cheese: Crafting Food and Value in America (University of California Press, 2013), analyzing how craftwork has become a new source of cultural and economic value within American landscapes of production and consumption. Her current work concerns the practical and semiotic work of moving perishable foods across international borders. After serving as Area Editor for the James Beard Award-winning Oxford Companion to Cheese, she co-edited Cultural Anthropology from 2018-2022.  At MIT, Heather teaches courses on food, family, craft, ethnographic research, and the meaning of life.  She received her Ph.D. in Anthropology from Stanford University and B.A. from Haverford College.

Julia Hallman is the owner of Formaggio Kitchen, a family-run business that operates a small group of specialty food stores (with an emphasis on cheese) in the Boston-area as well as an online presence that ships nationwide. Formaggio Kitchen’s mission is to support small, artisanal producers from around the world with an intent to preserve and highlight traditional techniques. At any given time their flagship store on Huron Ave in Cambridge has 200-300 different types of cheeses (and even a cheese cave below it to store them) as well as hundreds of other specialty food products that have deemed the store “a gourmand’s paradise.” Julia’s journey into the food world can be traced to her childhood in Eastern Oregon where she grew up on a small farm. From there she traveled to the Boston area to become an undergraduate student at Tufts University and soon discovered Formaggio Kitchen. Eventually, she joined the team in 2007 for what was supposed to be a three-month seasonal position. The rest is history—Julia worked her way up to a full-time employee, then buyer, then General Manager in 2017, and eventually assumed ownership of all three Boston-area stores in 2022. All the while she gained experience in every aspect of the business from cheese mongering to traveling internationally to source new products. Julia is passionate about many things, most notably cheese, gardening, cooking, travel and specialty foods. She has made it her personal mission to demystify the cheese world, make artisanal cheese accessible to all, tell the stories of these small producers, and honor their hard work and traditions.

Terri Lawton is the President of the Massachusetts Cheese Guild, a not-for-profit corporation advancing the production, image, and enjoyment of premier cheeses from Massachusetts. Terri used her degree in Agriculture from Purdue University as a springboard into a career in food safety, artisan cheese making and farm business management. As part of her degree in Agriculture from Purdue University she developed a business plan to return to the family farm and improve the financial sustainability of the farm by implementing farmstead cheese production. Upon completion of her degree at Purdue, Terri did a year of service with Americorps program. She then joined the team of food safety experts at the Massachusetts Department of Agriculture as a Dairy Inspector. In this role, she visited more than 150 dairy farms in Massachusetts to analyze their milking process and ensure their compliance with food safety regulations on a regular basis. Terri started a farmstead cheese business on her parents farm, which launched in May 2009.  After establishing the business and training a cheese maker, Terri stepped back to start a family and help other farmers improve the sustainability of their farms through various changes in management or production. Terri worked to help other dairy farms develop farmstead cheese production as part of MDAR’s Farm Viability Team. Terri is now the owner of Oake Knoll Farms, LLC, an 11th-generation family farm that has thrived on the same land since 1732. Oake Knoll Farms, established in 2019 through the merger of OKA Real Milk and Foxboro Cheese Co., is dedicated to preserving time-honored agricultural traditions while embracing modern, eco-friendly practices to produce high-quality raw milk, yogurt, and cheese. She is devoted to producing sustainable, high-quality dairy products that uphold the well-being of both the community and the animals on the farm. Today Terri spends her time teaching her children about life, farming and producing food for the people of the community.