From the award-winning food editor of The Washington Post comes a cookbook aimed at the food-loving single. Joe Yonan brings together more than 100 inventive, easy-to-make, and globally inspired recipes celebrating solo eating. Dishes like Mushroom and Green Garlic Frittata, Catfish Tacos with Chipotle Slaw, and Smoked Trout, Potato, and Fennel Pizza will add excitement to any repertoire and forever dispel the notion that single life means starving, settling for take-out, or facing a fridge full of monotonous leftovers. Yonan also includes shopping and storage tips for the single-chef household, along with creative ideas for making use of extra ingredients. Serve Yourself makes cooking for one a deeply satisfying, approachable pleasure. And with such delectable meals, your solo status could be threatened if you’re forced to share with others!
I was born in Albany, Georgia, the same year the local high school's head cheerleader was none other than Paula Deen. Before I was a year old, my family moved to San Angelo, Texas, where my father was stationed at Goodfellow Air Force Base. When my parents divorced, my bargain-hunting mother had me take advantage of the fact that I still had the base privileges that she had lost; she handed me cash and a list every week and took me to the commissary to shop for the whole family. If I came under budget and got everything on the list, I could splurge on something for myself. (I was 8 and loved every minute of it. When a bag boy followed me out to the car that first time, before he saw my waiting mother, he quipped, "Don't tell me you drive, too.")
My Indiana-born mom also nurtured my cooking bug -- indulging me when I demanded to use her stand mixer to whip the cream and mash the potatoes, and letting my good-old-boy-Texan stepfather teach me to make my first real dish: chicken-fried steak.
Fast-forward a few decades, and I roast my own coffee beans, make my own corn tortillas and pizza dough, cook dinner for friends every chance I get, and watch over a willful red Doberman named ... Red. (Mister Red, to those who know him well. He deserves the title.)
I'm also Food and Travel editor for The Washington Post, where I write regular features, including the monthly "Cooking for One" column that inspired my first book, "Serve Yourself: Nightly Adventures in Cooking for One" (Ten Speed Press, March 2011). I've won awards for writing and editing from the James Beard Foundation, Association of Food Journalists, and the Society of American Travel Writers, and my work has been featured three times in the "Best Food Writing" anthology.
