Kristine Sherred
Kristine Sherred covers how restaurants, markets and drink businesses evolve, with a focus on ownership changes, reopenings and the small details that define a place. Her stories for The News Tribune, carried by AOL, lean on a working knowledge of food and beverage to explain not just what is new, but how it fits into the broader dining and retail landscape.
Restaurant openings, remodels and ownership changes
Sherred consistently tracks the life cycle of local restaurants, from first opening to major remodels and handovers. In one piece, she reports on a waterfront restaurant that has expanded its space, introduced new pancakes and reopened after a significant remodel, emphasizing both the physical changes and what is new on the menu.
She also examines what happens when established spots change hands, as in her coverage of one of Tacoma’s best-known restaurants getting new owners and the implications for Primo Grill’s future.
Her work on a dumpling restaurant opening ahead of schedule at Tacoma Mall highlights soft-opening dates, grand-opening timing and precise location details within the mall complex, reinforcing her attention to practical information diners use. Across these stories, she treats restaurant news as a business and community beat, not just a lifestyle feature.
Food businesses that blur categories
A distinctive thread in Sherred’s coverage is her interest in hybrid concepts that combine food, drink and retail. She has profiled Tacoma’s newest brewery that also operates as a family-friendly Mexican restaurant, underscoring its dual identity as both taproom and full-service eatery. In another story, she writes about a new 6th Avenue shop where coffee and beer share space with indie-cycling essentials, framing it as “all natural” and treating the cycling retail side as part of the same neighborhood ecosystem as the drinks program. Her coverage of a reopened neighborhood market describes the business as a locally owned convenience store, growler-fill station and soon-to-open coffee shop, again showing her interest in multi-use food spaces that serve several community roles at once.
Desserts, snacks and travel-friendly treats
Sherred’s beat includes a notable emphasis on sweets and snackable items, often tied to regional pride. She has written about an ice cream producer described as making some of the region’s best ice cream, highlighting a new shop that will also feature a smashburger window, and treating the combination of dessert and burgers as part of the draw. In a more personal food column, she explains why she always packs Almond Roca in her suitcase, using the candy as an entry point to discuss travel habits and attachment to local products. These pieces broaden her remit beyond restaurant service to the ways people carry regional foods with them, whether across town or on the road.
Markets, malls and changing food corridors
Many of Sherred’s restaurant and retail stories are also about place and how specific corridors change over time. Her coverage of a historic Tacoma neighborhood market returning after a 14-month closure frames the Delightful Market as a convenience store, growler-fill station and future coffee shop that serves its immediate surroundings as much as destination diners. At larger retail hubs, she follows the steady build-out of a new dining mix, as in her reporting on restaurant additions at Tacoma Mall’s “Village” and the early opening of a dumpling specialist there.
Across these stories, she ties openings and reopenings to shifts in how residents use malls, streets and corners, showing food as a driver of neighborhood change.
Beat focus and professional background
Sherred is the food and dining reporter for The News Tribune, a role she has held since 2019. Before joining the paper, she spent around a decade in Chicago working for restaurants, a liquor wholesaler and a culinary bookstore, experience she brings into her coverage of food, beverage, hospitality and agriculture.
She describes herself as a food reporter who covers food, beverage, restaurants and agriculture with an in-the-trenches approach grounded in time behind the bar and within the industry.
Her public profiles emphasize interests in food security, sustainability, restaurant and agricultural labor, small business development, culinary culture and alcohol in society. While much of her syndicated work on AOL focuses on openings, remodels and concept stories, that broader brief shapes the questions she asks and the issues she is equipped to follow when covering the business of food.
4 more food journalists.
Aaron Guerrero
Aaron Guerrero is head of the digital department at Miami’s Community Newspapers, where he pairs restaurant coverage with community-facing content. He focuses on how Miami-area restaurants evolve, celebrate, and experiment through new concepts, menus, and neighborhood-focused dining experiences. He reports on restaurant openings, such as an Italian food hall at Plaza Coral Gables, new executive lunch menus, and wood-fired Latin steakhouse brunches, explaining what sets each venue apart. He also covers awards, like a Wine Spectator honor for an Italian chophouse, and events that turn dining rooms into social hubs. His bylines extend to features on sports-themed gatherings, civic renamings, local visits to restaurant programs, sponsored community pieces, and official notices. His work is straightforward and descriptive, helping readers and local businesses connect around specific openings, promotions, and dining experiences.
Aarron Fleming
Aarron Fleming reports on how courts, jails and public safety systems work over time. He is a reporter at The Daily Memphian covering public safety, the local court system, suburban news and business developments in North Mississippi. His work follows trials, sentencing, appeals, plea deals and judicial decisions, including major cases tied to Tyre Nichols and rapper Young Dolph. He also covers jail conditions, inmate deaths, crime data, prosecution units, trafficking, shootings and public-order incidents. His suburban reporting examines cannabis businesses, restaurant openings and how commercial growth affects communities such as Olive Branch. Fleming previously covered education in the same newsroom. He uses clear, unadorned prose to explain legal steps, deadlines, institutional problems and the political, commercial and community effects of public-safety decisions.
Alana Al-Hatlani
Alana Al-Hatlani is a food writer and editor who treats recipes, restaurants, and food features as ways to explore culture, community, and the business of eating. She works on the food team at Southern Living, overseeing and contributing to print recipes and reported features. Her pastry-focused, restaurant-tested perspective comes from time in restaurant and bakery kitchens. She helps plan and write monthly food packages, including “The South’s Most Treasured Desserts,” and wrote “8 Summer Recipes Our Editors Make Every Year.” She also writes recipe tips, ingredient explainers, restaurant guides, and reported stories about workers, owners, and communities. Her subjects include regional specialties, dining scenes, kitchen basics, and food industries. Her work has appeared with OpenTable and Yahoo. She reports on the ground, explains techniques clearly, and connects specific dishes and places to larger stories about food and livelihood.
Alana Edgin
Alana Edgin is a business reporter whose strongest focus is food, restaurants and consumer-facing businesses. She works at the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal and has also had work syndicated across AOL and Yahoo News. She covers new openings, closings, expansions and franchise growth, along with retail, health, services, corporate news, data incidents, business support programs and sponsorships. Her reporting includes detailed roundups of new restaurants and businesses, coverage of El Pollo Loco’s opening, and stories on burger trucks, dessert shops, Vietnamese sandwich restaurants and gourmet markets. She also contributes to food and drink reviews, including fall coffee and jerky comparisons. Edgin reports with practical “what, when, where” details, structured comparisons and clear explanations of how offers, partnerships and business changes affect consumers and the local economy.