Fran McManus

FRAN McMANUS started Understanding Flavor to explore her longtime interest in the ways that flavor is developed on the farm and in the kitchen. Fran began her farming life on a New Jersey sheep farm where she helped raise wool for the hand spinning market and dye yarns for the hand knitting market using natural dyes. It was there, observing the differences in fleece quality from breed to breed and noticing how the color strength of dye plants varied from year to year, that her interest in the influence of genetics, climate, and farm management on the quality and health of animals and plants began. She went on to become marketing director for the Whole Earth Center, a 39-year-old natural foods store in Princeton, NJ, and to co-found Eating Fresh Publications. Fran writes frequently about food and farming and is editor of Eating Fresh from the Organic Garden State, and co-editor of Cooking Fresh from the Bay Area and Cooking Fresh from the Mid-Atlantic.

MICA ANGELA HENDRICKS created the illustrations that appear on the Anatomy of Flavor note cards and the Understanding Flavor web site. Mica was born into the traveling circus of military life and was very fortunate to have seen a decent chunk of the world as a result. She graduated with a BFA in Illustration from Savannah College of Art & Design, and has worked as a graphic artist and freelance illustrator for over ten years. Her work can be seen on her web site at www.micaangela.com, in magazines such as Bust, CFQ, and Drink, as well as in a 6-book series of children’s book on pirates. She is married to a soldier currently attending flight school, and is a happy mother to a baby girl.

Mica Angela Hendricks
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