Skip to main content
2020

Food and Country


  • Laura Gabbert, Director
  • Ruth Reichl, Producer
  • Caroline Libresco, Producer
  • Paula P. Manzanedo, Producer

About the Project

At the center of the story is the amazing and endlessly curious Ruth Reichl-- former NY Times food critic, groundbreaking editor of Gourmet, best selling memoirist, and possibly the most respected voice defining American food culture for the last four decades. In the first days, weeks, and months of the pandemic, Ruth becomes obsessed with the food supply chain. How will the country feed itself? How will suppliers on all points in the chain sustain their livelihoods? So she opens her rolodex and takes to Zoom to talk to an extraordinary cast of characters-- from ranchers and farmers to fishermen and world-class chefs. The camera invites us into Ruth's baldly honest and emotional video conversations and also breaks free to meet those she's speaking to-- putting us on the ground at a farm in Ohio, a ranch in Georgia, a small Los Angeles restaurant, and a pantry in upstate New York. With Reichl as our guide, a kinetic and kaleidoscopic portrait of American reinvention and survival emerges.