“Serve Yourself,” from Joe Yonan, the awarding-winning food editor of the Washington Post, is an exciting journey into the joys of solo dining at home. Yonan is a man who values cooking and is willing to put his time where his mouth is.
Featuring beautiful photographs by Ed Anderson, this recent release from Ten Speed Press features sophisticated recipes that venture far beyond the expected. Reading about Smoked Trout, Potato and Fennel Pizza, Gingered Chicken Sandwich with Avocado and Mango, or Farfalle with Cantaloupe and Prosciutto, all made me want to run to the kitchen and follow Yonan’s heartfelt commitment to treating himself well. As he says in the preface, there is nothing like cooking “without worrying about satisfying anyone’s hankerings but your own.”
The ingredients and techniques are intriguing and hip, and guaranteed to up your self-esteem while you sit down to dinner (or lunch or dessert, which are all included) alone. Left to our own devices, who hasn’t eaten some horrible leftover, just because it was there, and then felt much the worse for it?
As Aaron Neville sings in Tell It Like It Is, “life is too short to have sorrow. We could be here today and gone tomorrow.” Joe tells it like it is, at its tastiest. He includes clever and creative condiments – Herbed Lemon Confit, 12-Hour Tomatoes and Red Pepper Chutney for starters – which could turn plain pasta or flatbread into an incredible meal quickly. He also gives useful tips on storing the inevitable odds and ends – part of a fennel bulb or part of a can of coconut milk – that accrue when cooking for one.
I tried Yonan’s Smoked Trout, Potato and Fennel Pizza for a variety of reasons: his No-Knead Pizza Dough intrigued me, I’m crazy for preserved lemons, and I was curious about his broiling technique - all new takes on pizza for me, no stranger to homemade pizza.
The recipe had two sub-recipes, the dough and the lemons. On the down side, the timing required starting three days ahead of dinnertime. On the up side, both dough and lemons are made in quantity, and both keep. For an organized cook, make ahead parts can be a tremendous asset.
After baking and devouring the pizza, the up side was heavily weighted. I would make it again and often, particularly now that I have dough in the freezer and preserved lemons in the fridge. Full disclosure: I shared.
These smart, sophisticated, delicious recipes scream, “self love!” and I mean that in the best possible way. Written with wit and wisdom, I am inspired to live better, eat better, eat more thoughtfully, chew more slowly, and savor the nights I am not cooking for an 11-year-old. After all, if I am not going to take care of myself, who is?
Lisa Cherkasky is a food stylist, recipe developer, and food blogger in Arlington, VA.
