The Art of Eating In: How I Learned to Stop Spending and Love the Stove [Hardcover]

Cathy Erway (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 18, 2010

In the city where dining is a sport, a gourmand swears off restaurants (even takeout!) for two years, rediscovering the economical, gastronomical joy of home cooking

Gourmand-ista Cathy Erway's timely memoir of quitting restaurants cold turkey speaks to a new era of conscientious eating. An underpaid, twenty-something executive assistant in New York City, she was struggling to make ends meet when she decided to embark on a Walden- esque retreat from the high-priced eateries that drained her wallet. Though she was living in the nation's culinary capital, she decided to swear off all restaurant food. The Art of Eating In chronicles the delectable results of her twenty-four-month experiment, with thirty original recipes included.

What began as a way to save money left Erway with a new appreciation for the simple pleasure of sharing a meal with friends at home, the subtleties of home-cooked flavors, and whether her ingredients were ethically grown. She also explored the anti-restaurant underground of supper clubs and cook-offs, and immersed herself in an array of alternative eating lifestyles from freeganism and dumpster-diving to picking tasty greens on a wild edible tour in Brooklyn's Prospect Park. Culminating in a binge that leaves her with a foodie hangover, The Art of Eating In is a journey to savor.

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Though it covers the same time frame as Erway's Not Eating in New York blog, this isn't a repurposing of her posts—rather, it's a memoir with recipes, a rapidly growing genre. The premise is simple: adding up the money's she spent on repeatedly eating out for lunch and ordering takeout for dinner, the 20-something Brooklynite decides she'll start preparing all her meals at home, and sticks with it for two years. (All that saved money comes in handy when her boyfriend breaks up with her and she has to find her own apartment, but then there's a new dilemma; as her mother points out: what do you do for dates when you can't go out for dinner?) Erway is up for just about any food-related adventure, whether it's making inroads into New York's underground supper club scene, pulling discarded food out of trash bags, or testing the power of menudo (a Mexican stew) to cure hangovers. And the recipes—ranging from a simple asparagus salad to chipotle cornbread stuffing and a soy-sesame filet mignon with wasabi mashed potatoes—will have readers racing to their stoves. (Feb.)
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Review

"Best Cookbooks of 2010" - SeriousEats.com

"Cathy is passionate about sustainable eating and living, and the fact that in writing about her renouncement of eating out in New York , she was also able to paint a vivid portrait of the many innovative movers and shakers in the food scene here, is very telling. There is much more to eating in this, the greatest restaurant city in the world, than restaurants."
-Julie Powell, author of Julie and Julia

The Art of Eating In (hardcover) inspired the Huffington Post''s "Week Of Eating In" and earned author Cathy Erway a "Ladies We Love" distinction from Ladies Home Journal

"The Top 10 Eccentric Brooklyn Food Personalities of 2010"
-Eater.com

"Deserves a toast."
-USA Today

"Another good book born from a blog [...] It is, as food critic Robert Sietsema writes in his introduction, a ''Portrait of the Artist as a Young Cook,'' an insight into Brooklyn''s youth culture. And it looks -- breakups, tiny kitchens and all -- like fun."
-Los Angeles Times

"Those who loved Food, Inc. will delight in Brooklyn blogger Cathy Erway''s new book The Art of Eating In-a yearlong account of getting familiar with her stove."
-Daily Candy

"Erway''s journey is one of a young artist finding herself, as a cook, as a member of several interesting communities, as a family member, and as a writer."
-Bookslut.com

"Erway is up for just about any food-related adventure [...] And the recipes will have readers racing to their stoves."
-Publishers Weekly

"Most remarkable is not the fact that she made it that long without eating out [...] Rather, it''s how appealing and simple the author makes it seem. [...] the author gleefully mixes and sautTs through life, making you want to grab a spoon and help. Like a great dinner party, Erway''s memoir is full of fabulous food and engaging conversation."
-Kirkus

"Follow along on Cathy Erway''s culinary adventure; not to the latest celebrated restaurant, but to her own kitchen where she finds something even more important than just better food-she finds herself."
-Giulia Melucci, author of I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti

"Cathy offers practical yet creative advice for living a frugal, healthier and smarter lifestyle with her tales from the kitchen. She also shares entertaining stories about the characters she has encountered through her culinary adventures - I''ll never look at the weeds in my yard the same way again."
-Heather Lauer, author of Bacon: A Love Story

"Cathy Erway is my blog Yoda, and spiritual sister in the pursuit of home cooking. For a whole generation of folks raised on take out, here''s your essential new guide on HOW and WHY to rock your mealtime, old school."
-Lucinda Scala Quinn, author of Mad Hungry: Feed Men & Boys and Executive Food Director, Martha Stewart Omnimedia

"The ESPN of indie cook-offs is Ms. Erway''s blog, Not Eating Out in New York. It provides listings and recaps of local events, and a thoughtful take on the alternative food scene."
-The New York Times

"In total, this book is really one woman''s coming of age novel, with recipes, a sort of Portrait of the Artist as a Young Cook."
-Robert Sietsema, The Village Voice

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 18 and up
  
• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Gotham (February 18, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1592405258
• ISBN-13: 978-1592405251
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 5.7 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #474,429 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Born in New York and raised in New Jersey in a multicultural household, Cathy Erway is a lover of food of all kinds. An avid amateur cook, she decided to purge her diet from restaurant or take-out food and began blogging about it on Not Eating Out In New York. In between posting recipes for the busy-but-thrifty, she explored the underbelly of the city's home-cooking culture, visiting urban farms, foraging, trash-diving and hosting cook-offs and supper club dinners. In the end, she came away with a greater conscience about where food comes from, what it takes to produce it, and most importantly, how to have a great time cooking it with others. Her memoir, The Art of Eating In, recounts those discoveries with recipes along the way. It spans three Brooklyn apartments, several job changes, breakups, family tragedy, and some unconventional "dates" outside restaurant walls. Is eating in an art in New York City? If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere.

Cathy writes about food, sustainable farming and green living at The Huffington Post, Saveur.com and Edible Brooklyn, and has written for Brooklyn Based and The L Magazine. She hosts the weekly radio show, Let's Eat In, on Heritage Radio Network on Mondays. She has organized or participated in several fundraisers for Just Food and Slow Food NYC, and co-founded the Hapa Kitchen supper club, which creates local and seasonal food inspired by its members' half-Asian heritage.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An Intriguing Memoir, February 22, 2010

By 

Heather Deitchman (United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Art of Eating In: How I Learned to Stop Spending and Love the Stove (Hardcover)

I read about Erway's book in a magazine article that included a recipe for corn and cranberry pancakes (delish!) and I figured I should get her memoir with recipes included. The book encompasses Erway's decision to eat in followed by various things she learns in the process.

I appreciate that the book is not full of whining entries regarding how hard it was but rather examined how much life changes when you choose to eat in. I have not read the blog so I cannot comment on the differences in writing style but the book flows well and has an easy to manage format.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A memoir with a great aftertaste, March 13, 2010

By 

Rose Keefe "author" (Canada) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The Art of Eating In: How I Learned to Stop Spending and Love the Stove (Hardcover)

"The Art of Eating In" chronicles the two-year hiatus that self-titled "foodie" Cathy Erway took from New York's restaurants and eateries. She started a blog to keep friends and a growing fanbase apprised of her culinary journey, and condensed its highlights into a book.

Eating out is so customary in the Big Apple that some apartments don't even have kitchens installed. But for Erway, struggling to support herself as an underpaid executive assistant, this tradition was draining her wallet at a dangerous speed. She decided to stick to home-cooked meals, taking the first step on an odyssey that introduced her to cook-offs, supper clubs, freeganism, and the edible plant life in Brooklyn's Prospect Park.

Although Erway originally stopped eating out for financial reasons, this is not a self-help book for cost-conscious diners. She focuses on the way her life changed after swearing off restaurant food, making "The Art of Eating In" a memoir with a little social studies thrown in for added flavor. Each chapter includes delicious recipes, but the focus is really on the people she met and the anti-restaurant activities she took part in along the way.

Not every blogger successfully migrates their online content into print. Erway is one of the exceptions. "The Art of Eating In" is an enjoyable read, with lots of food for thought as well as the grocery list.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fun read, not a cook book, February 22, 2010

By 

Nick Gray (NYC) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Art of Eating In: How I Learned to Stop Spending and Love the Stove (Hardcover)

This young woman in New York City decided to not eat out every night for two years. The book lists the adventures she has in home cooking. I really enjoyed the common-sense yet well-written perspective on HEALTHY, good eating. The book offers great food advice without being boring like most cook books (sorry to any other food authors out there!).