Growing up in Glastonbury, Madison Shapiro loved watching Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives on the Food Network. She would watch with her sisters, Carly, Sara, and Julia. “We’ve always been a food-centric family,” explains Madison. The foursome eventually convinced their parents to start taking them to some of the Connecticut eateries featured on the show. “We’d make a little road trip out of it,” she says. “That’s when we started getting more into the restaurant scene.”
It was those culinary pilgrimages that planted the seeds for the sisters to become what they are today: @SisterSnacking. Their Connecticut-based road trips expanded to worldwide treks, with more than half a million followers on Instagram following along for their restaurant reviews, honest recommendations, and best-of lists. They launched the page as a just-for-fun project back in 2015, while Carly and Madison were still in college, posting photos of trendy restaurants in the tristate area. But their following started to massively grow during COVID. “We were all together in Connecticut, and we started making a ton of videos at places we knew and loved,” says Madison. With the world stuck at home, clips about where to go for takeout took off. Madison remembers one video about $54 omakase to-go boxes at Sushi By Bou in N.Y.C. as an early viral hit, because the idea of to-go fine dining was so novel at the time. Not to mention the concept of posting story-driven short-form video about a restaurant was pretty new, too. The combination of high-quality video, the sisters' honest, magnetic narration, and the timing of the pandemic was kind of a perfect storm—people loved their videos, and were actually getting food from the spots the sisters posted about. “Restaurants were struggling during the pandemic. It was really cool to see our content translate into helping these businesses stay open,” says Carly.
In the last four years, all four sisters have transitioned into working full-time for the family brand. “SisterSnacking was growing exponentially, and for all of us it was impossible to have, essentially, two full-time jobs,” explains Sara. Whether they’re traveling around New England or Europe, their food reviews cut through the hype and showcase the best of the best in restaurants and menu items. “The fact that we can stay so close with our family while doing what we really enjoy is very cool,” says Madison.
While they’ve covered some of the best restaurants in the world, from Paris to Florence to every corner of N.Y.C., “it feels really special when we have a Connecticut review that takes off,” says Sara. And they have certainly had some: SisterSnacking was one of the driving forces behind the popularity of Westport-based PopUp Bagels. “My friend out in the Hamptons told me: you need to get these bagels,” recalls Madison. “We drove an hour to Westport and met owner [Adam Goldberg] that day. We made a TikTok review, and it got 300,000 views, which at that time was really impactful,” she says. PopUp Bagels and the Sisters began an ongoing relationship from that moment on— they did a co-branded Cacio e Pepe schmear, the bagels were served at Madison’s wedding, and this summer, they orchestrated a collab between the legendary blueberry pancake cinnamon rolls from The Hive in Jersey City, N.J., and PopUp Bagels, offering a limited-release blueberry pancake cinnamon roll schmear. “It's been really cool to put our name on something and to see the way that people react to it. The feedback has been incredible,” says Madison. PopUp Bagels aren’t the only Fairfield County eats they love: their other favorite spots include Kawa Ni, Sally’s Apizza, Nômade Lounge, lobster bombs from Ford’s, Battimelli's A&S Italian Fine Foods in Fairfield, and Colony Grill.
“I don’t think we realized how strong of a following we had in Connecticut,” says Sara. “We were posting about [Connecticut] bakeries, and grinders, and the best burgers, and the best breweries— things that were nothing like what we had been doing before— and we got such a positive response from our Connecticut followers. It was very meaningful.” So next time you want a meal that you’ll still be talking about days later? See what the Sisters recommend @sistersnacking.