Margaret Littman

Taking a look at programs and organizations that cut waste and redirect food to the hungry
Imagine the entire space of Nissan Stadium filled to the top with uneaten produce. The lettuce you forgot about in the back of your crisper. Those melon-sphere garnishes served with your omelet at brunch last week. Imagine an arena’s worth of that, piled layer upon layer, rotting away every day.
The stats are mind-blowing: Up to 40 percent of all food in the U.S. is thrown away.

There’s a number everyone in Nashville knows. No, not the new area code (that’s 629). No, not the address of the cheapest parking when headed downtown (2 Victory Ave.). Word around the city has it that, on average, 100 people move to town every day.

Whether it’s an exact number or not, it underscores the fast growth that Nashville and the middle Tennessee area it sits in have seen in recent years.

In this year’s ICBA LIVE host city, booming growth is music to community bankers’ ears.

From going plant-based to spending less and cooking more, here are some helpful tips for sticking to your New Year’s pledges
You made ’em — you might as well keep ’em. We’re talking about New Year’s resolutions, those pledges of optimism you vowed to keep last week. But unless you promised a life of pure asceticism, you probably still want to go out and have a social life. You can make that happen, too.
We’ve taken a look at the most common resolutions and scoured local food and drink options...

Nashville likes its liquor. There wouldn’t be decades of songs about tears in your beer without the aforementioned beers. But the city’s drinking scene is more than just Broadway. For the latest installment of PUNCH’s “A Night at the Door,” which explores what gatekeepers witness nightly in cities across the country, we started at Tootsies World Famous Orchid Lounge on Broadway, which is indeed world famous.

Our obits for the eateries that closed this year, and a look at what might be reborn where
A restaurant’s closing isn’t an actual death, of course, yet many of them we mourn. Most of us end up short of candlelight vigils and rending of garments, but we often post loving social media tributes and engage in long discussions about the departed. Some losses are mourned more deeply than others.

“Never been to Mississippi, and I see no reason to ever go,” went the sentiment I saw repeatedly on social media after the U.S. Senate runoff in the state last week. But travel enlarges us. It humanizes those and that which we fear.

Each May, about 168,000 locals and tourists stream into Churchill Downs to witness America’s greatest horse race, the Kentucky Derby. While the Derby is a must-do event, it’s also a time of year when hotels book up and attractions close because everyone else wants to see the Derby, too. Visiting the City of Beautiful Churches another time of year means you can take advantage of Louisville’s horse-racing traditions, but still see everything else that makes the city so awesome. Here’s our list of 10 things to do, see, eat and drink in Louisville over a long weekend.

Lipscomb and Fisk — both launching hospitality management education programs — plan to find out
It is a bit of an open secret: For all of Nashville’s “It City” culinary-scene chops, local restaurant service is not all that. Yes, restaurant food here is among the country’s best, from the variety of offerings to the quality. But service? Not so much. Servers are usually polite — hey, that’s the Southern way — but they may not know what it actually means to offer quality service.

In February 2017, Jocques Clemmons was killed by a police officer after a traffic stop and foot chase in the parking lot of James A. Cayce Homes in East Nashville.

The Metropolitan Nashville Police Department conducted an internal investigation of the incident and the Nashville District Attorney decided not to prosecute the officer responsible for Clemmons' death.

Clemmons was Black; the officer was white.

There’s a reason country music’s megastars (we’re talking the people who sell out stadiums) live in suburban Franklin and Leiper’s Fork, just to the south of Nashville proper. These towns seem like they’re straight out of a movie set, with perfectly manicured landscapes abutting preserved Civil War sites.

While it is kinda crazy postcard pretty, the area’s worth visiting even for those of us who don’t look like we just stumbled out of Instagram.

If Janett Liriano has her way, you won’t be using your FitBit much longer.
Liriano is CEO of Loomia, a New York-based firm at the intersection of tech and fashion. The company creates “intelligent drapeable circuits” that are soft enough to be embedded into textiles and can be safely washed and dried. Instead of wearing a step tracker on your wrist, it could be embedded into your running shoes.
That’s just the beginning of what these circuits can do. Those shoes might not just track your step...

“Ten years ago most people here did not know what this brown paste was,” says Anthony Brahimsha of the chickpea dip that is now nearly ubiquitous on menus in the U.S..
Born to Syrian parents, Brahimsha knew that hummus in the Middle East is much better than that found in American grocery stores. With the help of Mike McCloskey, owner of Select Milk Producers, the sixth largest dairy cooperative in the country, he developed a hummus called Prommus that is higher in protein –– three times that ...

It’s a funny story. Not funny strange, but funny ha ha. At least Mickey McConnell hopes it is.
McConnell spent most of his adult life — or, he jokes, what might pass as “adulting” these days — working in restaurants, particularly in restaurant management. It’s a gig he describes as “not a hard job, but a long job.” The late nights kept him from having much of a social life, and eventually he decided enough was enough. He wanted to spend more time with his songwriter wife Sarah Martin McConnel...

Melanie Faye grew up in Nashville, but she doesn’t credit Music City with her success. She credits Guitar Hero. Yes, that Guitar Hero, the video game that allows players to mimic the sounds and moves of their favorite stars. For Faye, it was Michael Jackson.
“I don’t think growing up in Nashville introduced me to guitar players,” Faye says. “My parents were chemists. I was not able to go to bars and see local shows. Guitar Hero introduced me to all this music I was not exposed to. Guitar Hero...

Saving the best for last. It’s a concept oft used for dessert. And, perhaps for that perfectly aged bottle of wine in your cellar. But for a visit to North Dakota? Yes, that too.

North Dakotans know their state doesn’t necessarily spring to mind when travelers brainstorm hot vacation destinations. But for many Americans, ticking off a visit to all 50 states is a point of pride, and you just can’t do it without North Dakota. So the state created a Best for Last Club that rewards visitors who finish their 50-state bucket list tour in North Dakota with swag.