The bookstore was posh, decorated with a huge rainbow and a yellow brick road, and located right beside a real coffee shop, which was so fancy for my newly-independent teenaged self. The cookbook was Vineyard Seasons by Susan Branch. It taught me to make the most intensely chocolatey cake I’d ever tasted. It taught me to roast garlic to be spread on little olive-oil toasts for “Girl Talk” Hors D’Oeuvre, it showed me that cooking could be sophisticated, and seasonal, and simple. Before Susan Branch there had been 4-H cookbooks, recipes clipped from magazines - Better Homes and Garden, Family Circle and Harper’s Bazaar - the red plaid Betty Crocker, church cookbooks, my grandmother’s binder of clippings and typed recipes, my mom’s recipe box.
I’ve somewhere around 70 cookbooks in my collection now. I’ve been reading food blogs and subscribing to Epicurious, America’s Test Kitchen, and NYTimes Cooking since they started popping up over 25 years ago. I still always don’t know what to make for dinner.
Until now.
In this weekly Substack Publication - Dinner Simplified - I’ll be posting 3 weeknight dinner recipes that you can make this week. Not complicated recipes, not recipes with ingredients that need to be ordered from far-flung internet lands. Tasty recipes that will be new to you, but familiar enough to satisfy those whom you share meals with. I’ll also be posting a weekend challenge recipe that will take some more time, but the results will be worth it.
In the coming weeks we’ll be adding some exciting new elements to our business for those who are local and want to join in. Plans are in the works. Things are happening. Let’s Go!
