About Hudson Valley Food and Farm Tours
Hudson Valley Food & Farm Tours is the brainchild of Amy Bandolik, who grew up in the picturesque countryside of The Hamptons with potato fields and apple orchards as far as the eye could see. She settled in NYC, soaking up fabulous foods from amazing restaurants while enjoying a career as a counselor by weekday and culinary tour guide by weekend. Amy credits her experiences at Foods of NY Tours (as well as her experiences with agritourism in Italy) and the support of her all-star boss and the King of Culinary Tourism, Todd Lefkovic, with the inspiration, training and support necessary to make her next step a success.
After falling in love with the Hudson Valley, Amy decided to leave the hustle and bustle of New York City and pursue her passion for food and farming full time, in this food-forward agricultural region.
In partnership with Foods of NY Tours Amy created a sister business: A unique food and farm tour that would showcase the Hudson Valley’s rich culinary traditions and highlight the hard work and dedication of its local farmers and producers. Amy built an immersive and educational tour experience that would take visitors behind the scenes, and north of NYC, to experience the Hudson Valley’s vibrant food scene to taste its riches.
Thanks to her engaging and informative style and her passion for sharing the stories and histories behind the foods and flavors of the Hudson Valley, Amy’s tours quickly gained popularity. Today, Hudson Valley Food & Farm Tours is a beloved local business that promotes the region’s unique food and farming culture, providing visitors with an unforgettable taste of the Hudson Valley’s rich culinary heritage.
Meet Our Team
Amy Bandolik
Amy Bandolik is a culinary curator, a coffee adorer, a community organizer, a natural connector and an unconventional counselor. She lives in (and loves) New York’s Hudson Valley. Amy holds a master’s degree in Counseling Psychology.
Over the course of her career she has received accolades and praise for her unconventional approach to her role as counselor at New York University. Her passion is helping people find their passions.
On one bright and breezy Fall day Amy found herself standing inside a lecture hall at NYU leading a seminar entitled, “Don’t Quit Your Day Job” while having an epiphany about her own day job. That lead her to start giving Food Tasting Tours in NYC’s Greenwich Village on Saturdays, as a hobby. A few months later, she quit her day job to work full time, as Creative Director, for the culinary tour company (Foods of NY Tours).
Fast forward a decade to 2018, she developed the highly regarded Hudson Valley Food & Farm Tours where she shares the region’s amazing food & history, mountains & monuments, stories & sights with locals and visitors via a curated food-tasting tour. Her tours bring commerce to the family-owned farms and food purveyors that make this part of New York State so special.
Amy is also the Market Day Assistant at the Beacon Farmers’ Market, where she contributes to their mission of supporting local farms, engaging the community and creating a more just food system. You can see Amy on her tours or visit Amy every Sunday at the Beacon Farmers’ Market where you can pick up some delicious greens fresh from the farmer, get your hands on newly foraged mushrooms and sip some locally ground coffee. And while Amy didn’t initially dream of a career in the culinary industry, she considers her career to be a dream come true.
Ryan Cummings
Ryan is a tour guide, filmmaker, musician– as well as amateur historian, food philosopher and actor. While hailing from Staten Island he grew up mostly in the Hudson Valley and no matter how far and wide he has lived and traveled always finds himself coming back to this beautiful stretch along the mighty river just north of the greatest city in the world, NYC!
Ryan holds a BFA in Theater Training where he performed in over 20 productions in his youth and even trained for a time in England with members of both the Royal Shakespeare Co. and the Globe Theater. This however gave way to a career in filmmaking where he has both written, directed and edited several feature films– including being a part of the post-production team for DALAI LAMA AWAKENING, a documentary about the Dalai Lama narrated by Harrison Ford. After five successful years working in film in sunny Los Angeles Ryan returned to Brooklyn in 2016 to get his Masters in Film from The Feirstein Graduate School of Cinema where he studied under several Academy Award winning directors and producers. In addition to his films Ryan is a studied musician who has written more than 30 songs and played in bands from NYC to L.A.! He is an avid traveler, runner and hiker and started touring with Foods of New York upon returning from his West Coast advehtures in 2016.
Ryan appreciates the ironical humor of being a multi-faceted artist who ended up working in restaurants for almost 20 years– but is happy to have finally found a day-job that combines his love of storytelling, New York history and his vast experience with food and the service industry!
Ryan can be found in NYC most Friday’s at noon giving FONY customers a taste of “The Heart and Soul of Greenwich Village”; on most Saturday’s up in Beacon, NY with the “Gourmet Beacon Food Tour”; and in Beacon and the extended Hudson Valley area on certain Sundays each year with the day-long adventure: “Hudson Valley Food & Farm Tour”.