Maria Costanzo Palmer

I grew up working in one of America's hottest Italian restaurants, Prima Donna, in the greater Pittsburgh area during the 80s through the early 2000s. When I was a junior in college around 2002, our restaurant ended and the federal government came looking for my father as part of a federal grand jury investigation. Our life has really not been the same since. After he got out of prison and got back on his feet, I collaborated with my former AP English teacher to write 'On the Rocks, The Prima Donna Story,' which has done very, very well and spun a whole bunch of food nostalgia in the Pittsburgh area. This led me to create trademark events called Cooking Books - about an hour and a half of hands-on cooking class followed by an hour and a half sit-down meal and book discussion. Now we also discuss the movie, as the book has film and TV rights and we're in production with Venture Road Pictures. The film will be called 'On the Rocks, The Rise and Fall of the Prima Donna.' I also speak at various events - I was the keynote speaker at the Key for Women KeyBank event, and I speak at schools about resilience and how it's okay to bear your tiger stripes rather than striving to be perfect. Additionally, I run a pop-up restaurant on a biannual basis and work as a grant writer in the Patterson area, doing nonprofit work and giving back to charity. I'm doing everything I can to stay busy, give back, and do things that are enriching and mean a lot personally, while helping my family have that second chance as well.