Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant: Confessions of Cooking for One and Dining Alone

Product Details

In this delightful and much buzzed-about collection of essays, 26 writers and foodies invite readers into their kitchens to reflect on the secret meals they relish when no one else is looking. Part solace, part celebration, part handbook, Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant offers a wealth of company, inspiration, and humor—and finally, recipes that require no division or subtraction.

Featuring essays by:

Steve Almond, Jonathan Ames, Jami Attenberg, Laura Calder, Mary Cantwell, Dan Chaon, Laurie Colwin, Laura Dave, Courtney Eldridge, Nora Ephron, Erin Ergenbright, M. F. K. Fisher, Colin Harrison, Marcella Hazan, Amanda Hesser, Holly Hughes, Jeremy Jackson, Rosa Jurjevics, Ben Karlin, Rattawut Lapcharoensap, Beverly Lowry, Haruki Murakami, Phoebe Nobles, Ann Patchett, Anneli Rufus and Paula Wolfert.

Customer Reviews ::

So tired of hearing about tiny New York kitchens - D. Alden - Inver Grove Heights, MN United States
I saw this in a bookstore while I was out of town and was tempted to buy it. After finding it at the library, I am so glad I did not. I read the whole book, but out of some pathetic sense of obligation. To be fair, M.F.K. Fisher's essay was good, but that's no surprise. What was surprising was the amount of bitterness and bile hidden (barely, I might add) underneath prose that was supposed to be self-deprecating but really just sounded, well, whiny and self-involved. There were several essays bemoaning a tiny New York kitchen: we get it, the apartments are like closets, etc. I can't imagine that anyone but New Yorkers found this interesting. The rest of us are tired of the cliche.

And the recipes! Yikes: avocado raita? I mean, I get we all eat weird things when we're alone, but that's not a reason to share the recipe. Maybe the recipes were supposed to be some sort of joke, but if so, it fell very flat.

I read this because I like to cook and to eat, but I'll bet there are far more entertaining and interesting books on eating alone. At least I hope there are.