Friday Links || 7.24.15

Happy Friday!

This weekend, I’m planning on honing some recipes for a Food Whore cookbook (yes, you heard that right… a special addendum that might be five or so recipes). I’m also writing a piece based on this article in the New York Times that'll be published elsewhere not here. (I have experience in this realm because I was the Community Director of HowAboutWe.com for awhile.) D and I are also going to Aruba in a couple weeks... so I maaaaay need some new summer dresses. 

Anyways, onward to links and things!

Setting up for the YaleWomen event

This past Monday, I had a w-o-n-d-e-r-f-u-l time chatting with about twenty-five YaleWomen about writing and finding an agent. I was joined by my agent, Stefanie Lieberman, who also happens to be a Yalie. (The next question people ask -- did the Yale connection help? Well, I didn’t seek her out because she was a Yalie, and I don't think I got a leg-up because I was a Yalie. But I think it did contribute to why I signed with her over the other offering agents. A different kind of assortive mating, I guess?)

I met lots of great people, across the board: a lawyer, actor, magazine writer, economist, academic, recruiter, a woman who worked at the Algonquin circa the famed Algonquin Table. Not everyone was a writer, but everyone was curious about the rather curious publishing process. Definitely a night to remember and cherish.

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When you’re not “actively” doing something, do you listen to music? Or podcasts? Or do you let yourself sit with your thoughts? I’m more of a former and latter, but I want to get into podcasts more. Selected Shorts is one of my favs and I liked these two food-themed ones: Cannolis and Carroll (not, as I previously thought, about cannolis in Carroll Gardens, but a story about cannolis and another by Lewis Carroll) and Food Fantasies: Peas, Pancakes and Pretensions, with stories by Lydia Davis, Nora Ephron… and Gustave Flaubert.

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My second book is set at a culinary school, and I was struck by this article by Eater: Three Charts that Prove Why Culinary School is Not Worth It. The numbers are quite compelling, but of course there are other things at play: perhaps you want to be a private chef, not a restaurant chef, in which case you’ll earn more. Or perhaps you’re forty-years-old and want to learn the basics quickly and efficiently (as opposed to, say, working at a restaurant where you’ll only learn their cuisine).

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My friend Alice just launched this amazing clothing line called UNIFORME. Here’s part of her mission statement, which I love:

I aim to make simple, beautiful garments that are seasonless and easy to wear; impeccably tailored, luxurious clothing at a price within reach.  I worked with patternmaker Nicolas Caito to develop seven interpretations of the classic white button up, accompanied by a simple tee shirt and three styles of bottoms. The pieces were inspired by the uniform dressing and consumption more typical to menswear, to buy less and buy better. That is, to make well-considered purchases based on the design, materials, construction and longevity of a garment.

Get 20% off during this pre-sale time with the code FRIENDSANDFAMILY. I’m craving this piece. (And, fun fact: the lookbook is shot in Pleasantville, my hometown!)

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And, last, the couture shows. I'm obsessed with the Elie Saab collection. Especially this lacy illusion netting jumpsuit avec cape. What did you think?

Book Club Bites: Pomegranate Lemon Bars

Lemon bars were one of the first things I baked -- from a box, of course, and I’ve repressed the exact procedure. Was it curd on top, or some sort of cornstarchy-sludge? Did I make it, or did I squeeze it out of a baggie?

It took me years to figure out that lemon bars aren’t hard to make at all. You probably have all the ingredients right now: flour, sugar, butter, and lemons. But for the best lemon bars, you need a lot of lemons.

I’ve experimented with other flavors: lime, lemon-grapefruit, and now this: a pomegranate lemon bar. I like the berried base that underpins this dessert. Citrus is a top-note flavor, while pomegranate is a mustier, base note player.

Plus, pomegranates are often on my mind so I had to incorporate them into a recipe. There’s a pomegranate on the cover of Food Whore but pomegranates don’t appear in the text of the book. Not once.

So why did I suggest a pomegranate for the cover? Well, they’re juicy, luscious, sexy -- all things I wanted my book to be. Not really in terms of scenes (don’t get your hopes up for back-to-back sex scenes), but more on a sentence level. Sentences can move with a sensual quality.

Also, I summoned some middle school Latin and loved the connection to Persephone and Hades. Do you remember that story? Basically, Hades tricks Persephone into eating a couple pomegranate seeds, sentencing her to a life in the underworld. Because of her love of food, she makes a deal with the devil.

And that… the pomegranate… is basically my book.

RECIPE: (adapted from Ina Garten’s lemon bar recipe)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

Bring 1 cup of pomegranate juice to a simmer and reduce on low for ten minutes. Turn off heat and let cool.

In an electric mixer, cream 2 sticks of room-temperature butter and ½ cup of granulated sugar until fluffy, about 3 minutes. In a separate bowl, combine 2 cups of flour and ⅛ teaspoon of kosher salt. Slowly add to the mixer on low until just incorporated. Remove dough and roll into a ball on a well-floured surface. Press onto a 9” x 13” baking sheet, then chill for 15 minutes.  

Poke holes into the dough with a fork (so it doesn’t bubble up), then bake for 15-20 minutes until very lightly browned (keep in mind that it will get baked again with the curd, so no need to go all the way now).

For the filling, whisk 6 extra-large room temperature eggs, 3 cups of granulated sugar, 2 tablespoons of lemon zest, ¾ cup of freshly squeezed lemon juice, ¼ cup of the reduced pomegranate juice, and 1 cup of flour. Pour over the crust, then bake for 35-40 minutes, until the filling is set. Let cool to room temperature.
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Cut into squares (or triangles if that’s your fancy). In a food processor, powder ⅓ cup of dehydrated strawberries. Sprinkle on top with powdered sugar.

Index-Carding Your Way to a Finished Book

There are many strains of the dreaded Writer's Block, but typically it comes down to: what do I write next? 

Now, some writers will want to "feel out" the direction -- and I do that, too! For a couple pages or so. But after a certain point, you might feel silly or delusional -- like running on a treadmill and telling yourself you're actually getting to your destination.

I'm all for letting your characters guide you (rather than having the story guide them like pieces on a chessboard). I'm all for creating original, surprising structures. And I'm all for writing exercises and playing around the character, dialogue, pacing, whatever.

But I'm also for clear planning. Setting goals. Not wasting time. 

So I'm a huge fan of outlining. Here's a little vid that explains my index card love in some more detail...

Restaurant Critics 101: Ruth Reichl

Last week, we covered Frank Bruni, the New York Times restaurant critic from 2004 - 2009. Today, we’ll cover Ruth Reichl, the Times’ critic from 1993-1999.

Reichl has written many memoirs about her life in food, but her book Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret Life of a Critic in Disguise focuses squarely on her time as a reviewer. Here are some insider tidbits, many of which found their way in my book somehow:

1. As a woman who used to dumpster-dive in Berkeley, Ruth made it a point to represent all types of people (rich, poor, beautiful, plain), and all types of restaurants (ethnic places that veered from the white tablecloth French, Italian, and Continental cuisine of the day).

2. While Frank Bruni shied away from disguises because they made him look and feel silly, Ruth plunged into them, with wigs, makeup, wardrobe, manicures and entire personalities and backstories. Her first disguise was Molly, a Midwestern woman who wore an old but well-preserved Armani suit. Her mother’s friend Claudia, an acting coach, put it this way: “If you are intent on deception, you must go all the way; the restaurant critic of the New York Times can not afford to look foolish.”

3. One of Ruth’s most famous reviews originally had two parts: one, a 4-star review when dining with her boss and his aristocratic wife, and another 1-star review when she dined as Molly. The Le Cirque review was eventually unified into one article with a 3-star rating. Ruth wavered between 2 and 3, but as her editor said, “It doesn’t really matter. The only thing that people will care about is that you’re taking the fourth star away.”

4. Restaurants offer a bounty (~$500) to anyone who spots the New York Times critic.

5. Though New York Times dining critics are anonymous, they wield immense power and social clout -- though is it for a limited time? You are, in a sense, a king or queen of New York.  Celebrities and visiting dignitaries call for restaurant recommendations. But once you leave the post, the offers fall off. As Carol Shaw, Ruth’s friend and the secretary of the Living desk said, “You’re just a byline. Take a good look. The minute you give up the job, you become a nobody.” (Note: Likely not really the case. Look at Ruth herself, Frank Bruni, Sam Sifton… Mimi Sheraton! -- all with vibrant, dynamic careers -- and they can show their faces now.)

6. Ruth bought her designer disguises at various consignment stores, including Michael’s Resale, a shop on the UWS that only accepts garments that are less than two years old (unless it’s Chanel, Pucci or Hermès).

7. Though clothes started as a way to dine unnoticed, Reichl began to see how clothes could transform how you look at the world -- and how the world sees you.

8. Ruth often tussled with the idea of being a food critic. At one time, she was a cook and healthy-eating advocate, someone who always got the worst table and paid in cash because she didn’t have a credit card. At the New York Times was she just telling rich people where to eat and feel coddled? But in a column titled, “Why I Disapprove of What I Do”, she says:

Going out to eat used to be like going to the opera; today, it is more like going to the movies.

And so everyone has become a critic. I couldn't be happier. The more people pay attention to what and how they eat, the more attuned they become to their own senses and the world around them.

Ruth wrote that almost ten years ago… and those statements are truer than ever.

Chewy Chocolate-Mint Brownies

And so the paradoxical summer baking streak continues. 

Well... what's paradoxical about chocolate mint brownies? It actually makes perfect sense to me. 

I got this recipe from NYT Cooking, which I'm turning to more and more these days. (It's the email blasts, I think. I love an email blast that sounds like it's written by a real person, not a click-optimizing program.) 

This recipe is adapted from Katharine Hepburn's brownie recipe but with a few important tweaks. 

First, there are no nuts. These brownies are for D's birthday and he is anti-nuts in dessert (unless they're peanut). We will disagree about this until the end of time, but a birthday dessert is no time to be contentious. No nuts. 

Second, I cut the already tiny bit of flour (1/4 cup) with almond flour. Why? I wanted to make this a practically flourless cake. And, see above, I also like nuts in my dessert but Dave doesn't. How to hide them... 

Third, I browned the butter because browned butter begets better brownies (yes, that's how I say it in my head). 

And, last, I added mint extract. Just the tiniest bit because you don't want this to taste like toothpaste! I had no way of knowing this in the beginning, but the mint extract does something interesting. This is no regular brownie. It's a cross between a brownie, fudge, and the chewy/candied part of a meringue. It's sticky yet chewy, rich yet... and that's where the mint comes in. The mint cuts the richness and brightens the flavor in the same way lemon or red wine vinegar might brighten a savory dish. 

RECIPE: (adapted from Katharine Hepburn's Brownies from NYT Cooking) 

Preheat oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit. Melt and brown butter in a saucepan. Add 1/2 cup of Dutch-processed cocoa then set away from heat, above five minutes. Add two eggs -- one at a time -- and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla and 3 drops of mint extract. 

In a separate bowl, mix 1 cup of sugar, 1/8 cup of almond flour, 1/8 cup of regular flour, and a pinch of salt. Add to cocoa butter mixture and stir until just combined. 

Pour batter into a greased 8" x 8" square pan. The brownies are very flat so don't worry if it seems like the pan is too big. Bake for 35 minutes, then cool slightly and cut into squares. Like all brownies, these are good warm. But because of the mint, they're also great cold. 

Restaurant Critics 101: Frank Bruni

I have a go-to line when describing my book: the story of a girl who secretly writes the New York Times restaurant review because the real critic has lost his sense of taste. And every time I say that, 1 out of 3 times people will ask, “is it autobiographical?”

“Ha, I wish!” I usually say (though Tia goes through some hardships I’d rather not).

What happened, actually, was a lot a lot of research. I already had some front- and back-of-house restaurant exposure. That info is also relatively easy to get -- on TV, in chef memoirs, in pretty profiles in glossy magazines.

But the life of a restaurant critic? By its very nature, it’s a more clandestine field -- which is exactly what drew me to the topic in the first place.

So over the next couple months, I’ll be going over some of the real-life facts that informed my quite-fictional story. First up -- the most recent memoir from a New York Times restaurant critic: Born Round: The Secret History of a Full-Time Eater, by Frank Bruni.

I’ve seen Frank Bruni speak in person and he seems like a great guy -- kind and funny, smart but also not above some gossipy snark. Here are some key tidbits that I found interesting and made their way into my book in some way or another.

1. Restaurants keep photos of key critics back-of-house. Here's a flyer that was sent to Eater.

2. Bruni would visit a new restaurant at least two months after opening. Earlier than that and the restaurant “might demonstrate a shakiness -- or, conversely, a focus, that wasn’t a reliable indication of what was to come.” Visits were spaced out at least a week apart. Bruni would often eat out seven nights a week, sometimes eating more than one dinner a night. 

3. Bruni typically ate with three guests. Four apps. Four entrees. Four desserts. No duplicate orders!

4. The New York Times has an arrangement with American Express in which critics can use fake names.

5. Despite what you may think about competitiveness, restaurants share information, at least when it comes to critics: pseudonyms, frequent dining companions, photos and videos. If a restaurant manager spotted Bruni, he or she would often tell colleagues from neighboring restaurants so they could see him in-person.

6. Many critics say that even if a restaurant has IDed you, that doesn’t change the dining experience that much. The menu, the decor, the staff: you can only do so much on the fly. But Bruni says the feeling (if not the food itself) did change when he was “made.” A female waitress is swapped out with an attractive male waiter. Waitstaff get overly solicitous. Both Nobu 57 and L'Atelier de Joël Robuchon offered to do his dry cleaning after some relatively minor spills.

7. Bruni also had self-doubt. He would often ask himself, “How could I ever be 100 percent sure I’d given a restaurant a fair shake? How could I know I’d experienced and assessed it in the most accurate light?”

8. Unlike Ruth Reichl, Bruni only wore disguises for three restaurants: Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s V Steakhouse, Per Se, and Jeffrey Chodorow’s Wild Salmon. He just felt silly, his guests couldn’t stop giggling, and they were of dubious utility (he was IDed at Per Se).

There’s a LOT more to Born Round than restaurant review stuff and this one-note listicle doesn’t do it justice. It’s really a story about family, addiction, and caring for yourself. Definitely give it a read!

PS: Born Round's cover art inspired my own. I love the look of a besmirched tablecloth. Sometimes eating out isn't so glamorous... 

Peanut-Brown Butter Blondies

Call me a contrarian. I grow my hair long in summer, cut it in winter. Order the fish at a steakhouse. Make salads in the winter... and bake in the summer. I don't know why!

Forget for a moment about the heat factor. To me, summer is about easy improvisational meals. Something on the grill. A picnic of finger foods. A cocktail of two ingredients, tops. 

Baking, of course, is not improvisational. It's precise and fickle. You have to plan ahead because you can't easily substitute ingredients. But for some reason, I've had the urge to bake this summer. Just this past month I've made this tahini banana bread, these cornmeal currant thyme cookies, this "life-changing loaf", and now these -- peanut-brown butter blondies, like a cross between peanut butter cookies and toffee cake (ie: good in any season). 

I adapted this from Martha Stewart's Cookies which organizes its chapters in the same way I think about cookies: light and delicate, chunky and nutty, crisp and crunchy, cake and tender, and so on. 

Maybe one of these summer days I'll make these into ice cream sandwiches or sundaes (with some butter pecan ice cream as a comp... or strawberry ice cream for contrast). But for now, they're great au natural. 

RECIPE: (adapted from Martha Stewart Cookies) 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Line a 9" x 13" pan with parchment, then butter and flour. Melt 2 sticks of butter until a golden brown. Remove from heat and cool. 

Whisk 2 1/4 cups flour, 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder, and 1 1/2 teaspoons salt. In the bowl of an electric mixer, use a wooden spoon to mix the brown butter with 2 cups of brown sugar and 1/4 cup of granulated sugar. Add the paddle attachment and turn mixer on medium-high speed, adding three eggs. Mix until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add 2 1/2 teaspoons of vanilla extract while beating. Slowly add flour mixture, then add 1 cup of roasted unsalted peanuts until thoroughly integrated. Pour into pan and bake for 35-40 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean. 

Excellent warm, room temp, or cold (we've been keeping them in the fridge... steamy weather mold is no joke!) 

Sunday Writing Inspo - Georgia O'Keefe

"You have to be courageous to be a painter. Every day, I feel like I'm walking a knife's edge. And you can fall off -- but you fall off, so what. At least you made something true to you." 

- Georgia O'Keefe 

A Book Trailer!

Until I started writing a book, I didn't even know books had trailers. But they do! And a lot of them are amusing. 

Like this Jonathan Franzen one in which he's grumpily disparaging book trailers...in his book trailer. 
Or this one from Tim Ferriss that wins on action and style. 
Or this one for Michelle Hodkin's The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer. (As D so helpfully suggested, "just put some softcore porn in your book trailer like this one!")

Well, here's a start to Food Whore's multimedia debut. This is just to whet your appetite (sorry, sometimes on-the-nose food language cannot be avoided). There are no shirtless young men or white male writers complaining... but it does have some sexy chef action per certain FW scenes. Hope you enjoy!

Tahini Banana Bread

For some, this is a breakfast cake or something to nosh with afternoon tea. But if your family is like mine and doesn't like anything too sweet, then behold the perfect dessert. 

I made this for my Dad's birthday last weekend because it has all the hallmarks of a Tom-family classic. Fruity, nutty, not too sweet. This is a banana bread with a velvet cape, made luscious with sesame and tahini. 

To be totally honest, I also made a coconut-mango panna cotta that was a complete fail. I used coconut sugar with the coconut milk, so that layer was an unappealing medium-toned brown. The top never evened out, so it had a lumpy look to it. And then, it never completely set! 

So we spooned the failed panna cotta over this dessert, and that added a little fruit and moisture. But I wouldn't recommend it. 

RECIPE: Adapted from El Rey's Sesame Banana Bread, from Bon Appetit

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Toast 2 tablespoons of white sesame seeds in a dry skillet until fragrant, about 5 minutes. 

Blend 4 very ripe bananas to a smooth puree. In a separate bowl, mix 1 3/4 cups cake flour, 3/4 teaspoon baking powder, 1/2 teaspoon baking soda, and 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt. In an electric mixer, whisk 2 large eggs, 1/2 cup vegetable oil, 2 tablespoons of tahini, and 1 tablespoon vanilla extract. Add 1 cup of dark brown sugar and 1 cup of turbinado sugar and banana puree. When well blended, whisk the dry ingredients. Fold in toasted sesame seeds. 

Pour batter into an 8" x 8" cake pan and sprinkle with 1/2 cup of sesame seeds. Bake for 60-70 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean. Let cool completely in pan, then serve. 

Friday Links | 6.12.15

Hey there... it's Friday! 

This past week I took a little break from blogging. Next week, I'm workshopping the second 20-page installment of my next book (tentatively titled THE COOKS) and I was working pretty intently on that. I've also been thinking about how to create the best possible content for you guys  -- quality/quantity? Food/fiction (or fashion)? 

As the book launch approaches, there's also a lot more to do: galleys to send, emails to write, people to meet, events to plan. There's the private writing and the public connecting. Now have to figure out where this blog fits into that... 

So, expect some tweaks in blog frequency -- perhaps 1-3 times per week? I'll be picking up the slack on Twitter on Instagram. 

But on to links! 

This Sunday, I'll be attending the #BeABoss food and fashion event, hosted by Taste the Style and Local Creative. Panelists include female restaurateurs, mixologists, designers, shop owners and more. Ladies getting things done, on their terms. I'm there. 

I've also gotten more involved with two great groups: YaleWomen, a group of female alums (undergrad and grad) who come together for chats about life, work, and art. The second is Books for Asia, an amazing organization that sends over 1 million books a year to locations in countries in need. Not so much Japan and South Korea... but places like Nepal, Thailand, Pakistan. Everything from children's books to academic texts to novels. I'm planning two events with tthose organizations this summer. Expect invites soon! 

I aspire to cut a mango like this.

planning Near & Far / via 101 Cookbooks

This cookbook process post from Heidi of 101 Cookbooks got me thinking about my own process. It should come as no surprise that Heidi – who was on the vanguard of beautifully photographed food blogs – is very hands on with the layout and flow of her book. This is not the sort of thing you want to improvise.

But when it comes to fiction, it seems we have a bias against outliners. I know I posted that EL Doctorow quote (“Writing is like driving at night in the fog. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way), but to be honest, that's not how I do it.

Why the stigma? People think that an outline takes the romance out of writing (nope). It means you're following a formula rather than feeling the rhythms of the story and characters (not at all). Outlining is for genre writers, not literary writers (um, snobby much?). To me, there's nothing romantic about fumbling in the dark. I know too may authors who start writing a novel, only to realize that it's “not going anywhere“. But then, you've lost the energy to turn back, or – even more heartbreaking – to just delete the past 50 pages and start over. If you knew where you were going... wouldn't that be better? 

I'm not sure outlining works for everyone. But if you want to storyboard – do it! Personally, I think it's very hard to create a sound plotline with believable characters while also creating artful and beautiful sentences. So – my advice – give yourself a break and plan it out.

What do you think? Are you an outliner or not?

RECIPE: If you're grill-less like me, grease a grill pan. Mine is Le Creuset. Set it on the stove and heat until very hot, when a splash of water immediately sizzles and evaporates. (Otherwise, just heat a real grill as you do.) 

Slice a peach and plum. Lay on the grill along with some cherries and cook until grillmarks show, about 2 minutes on each side.

The peaches will get the best sear (they are the driest and you can see the black against the orange pretty well). The plum is too wet to sear but it will emit the most wonderful, surprising smell. And you will feel guilty about grilling perfectly delicious cherries ($7.99/lb!), but they will be even juicier after a kiss of heat.

How long did it take you to write your book? The timeline.

The #1 question people ask me: How long did it take to write your book? The answer is a year and a half. But it took me five years to get a book deal. How? 

Here's how it went down. Writing a book is a test of endurance. And in my case, how often you can age your main character up and down without strangling someone. 

Sunday Writing Inspo | Salman Rushdie

"And in the best of the old yarns, the ones we ask for over'n'over, there are lovers, it's true, but the parts we go for are the bits where shadows fall across the lovers' path. Poisoned apple, bewitched spindle, Black Queen, wicked witches, baby-stealing goblins, that's the stuff."

- Salman Rushdie, The Moor's Last Sigh 

Friday Links | 6.5.15

Happy Friday! This week, I’ve been saddled by one of those hot-to-cold weather sicknesses. I went out on a cold misty morning in a little silk summer dress and that did me in. But I’m almost 100% and looking forward to the weekend. Tomorrow, D and I are leaving for PA for a hiking + poker + writing retreat trip. D is a big poker player, and every once in a while we spend the night at a casino -- he plays, I get a massage, do a little shopping, and write. It’s a pretty good deal.

Here are some things that caught my eye this week:

Smog meringues. Meringues are 90% air, making them a major flavor component. A group of scientists created smogs from London, Atlanta, and L.A. using “precursor ingredients” (those three cities represent three very different types of smog. Beijing, for example, is London-style and Mexico City is L.A.-style). Well, do they taste any good? No. As Edible Geography says, “our hope is that the meringues will serve as a kind of ‘Trojan treat,’ creating a visceral experience of disgust and fear that prompts a much larger conversation about the aesthetics and politics of urban air pollution”.

Restaurants add reservation cancellation fees to the menu. This is a hot, hot topic but nothing new (see Grub Street, Eater). As Pete Wells writes:

Whenever I give up my credit card number and am told I’ll be charged for bad behavior, I hear several messages, none of them warm and fuzzy. It says that I’m not trustworthy. It says that the restaurant sees me as a revenue source before it has had a chance to treat me like a guest. It says that a reservation isn’t an appointment with pleasure; it’s an obligation to be kept.

Though at the same time, restaurants need to safeguard themselves from over-enthusiastic diners who book and dishonor reservations willy-nilly. An empty table means lost revenue, rejecting would-be (and ready to eat) customers.

I used to work in the world of high-end reservations and can tell you that many restaurants don’t want to charge or chastise you. A place like Carbone (where there is a $50 cancellation fee) is busy every single night. You might think, what’s the big deal? If I don’t show, then someone else will take my place. Sure. But that also means that the host/ess has to juggle people around. Maybe there aren't people waiting because everyone thought you need reservations. Tables will have to be rearranged. “Guaranteed” revenue becomes “if they decide to show up” revenue. If you get a table for 2 or 4 on a hot night, at a hot time, then you took it away from other people who thought ahead to make a reservation. Restaurants wants to make people happy (while also making money) and no-shows hinder both of those goals.

And speaking of high-end restaurants, I found Ruth Reichl’s impromptu dinner at Per Se so charming. You go for a drink, then you stay for some apps, then all of a sudden you have a whole meal.

Remember that HarperCollins Bloggers Fall Preview I wrote about last week? Here’s a behind-the-scenes look from BookChickdi at some of their picks.

And finally, some house lust. This house in Missoula, Montana is STUNNING. Who needs the Hamptons? 

Sweet Potato Roasted with Coconut

This is more hefty than a snack, more slight than a meal. And that's a good thing. 

On Tuesday nights I go to a writing workshop and leave the house around 6:45. I probably could eat a full diner, but I don't want to be too full during class. I also don't want my hunger to distract me. (I've never been the type of person who can just "forget to eat". What? My whole day revolves around eating.) 

So the other day I made this as a pre-class snack -- one sweet potato, roasted with coconut oil, topped with Maldon sea salt and coconut flakes. Like these soy-mirin-sesame glazed yams, this is a lovely blend of sweet and savory. I was inspired by coconut curries with starchy potatoes, yams, butternut squash. Maybe next time I'll make this with curry, but not before class. It's one thing to stain your own writing with curried fingers. Quite another to stain your classmate's. 

RECIPE: Preheat toaster oven to 450 degrees. Prick sweet potato with fork, slice into rounds, and rub with coconut oil. Roast for 15-20 minutes, or until a fork can easily slip into the slices. Sprinkle with coconut flakes and sea salt. 

Matcha Almond Date Smoothie

Have you had the green tea crepe cake at Lady M? It's a delicate confection made with 20+ crepes layered with super-light pastry cream just barely kissed with the green, slightly bitter taste of matcha. These aren't pancake-y crepes, they're paper-thin and imperceptible on the tongue. You see them individually in the cross-section, but that's an illusion. The cream soaks into the crepes so your fork (yes I eat desserts with a fork, I find it's easier to piece off the exact bite I want) just glides on through. 

Now it might seem ascetic to go on to describe a smoothie, but in fact they share the same flavor profile. A creamy base. An earthy sweetness. A plushness. And then, the matcha to give it all shape. 

I got this recipe from this Instagram from Kat Odell, Eater's Drinks editor. Is this drink trendy? Yes. Insufferably so? Perhaps. But, who cares. It tastes like cold drinkable cake. 

RECIPE: Blend 2 grams matcha, 16 oz water, 1 date, handful of almonds. Add crushed ice, if it's really hot. 

Book Buzz | Daniel Tammer & Different Ways of Knowing, an Illustrated DIY Manual

Every weekday, Publisher’s Marketplace emails the latest publishing deals in print, digital, audio and foreign sales (over 200 deals/week). Here are some of my favs -- not necessarily the biggest names or the buzziest deal… but the ones that piqued my interest for one reason or another.

Last week, deals slowed down significantly because of BEA. But there were some gems in there....

A WORLD OF WORDS by Daniel Tammet
Agent: Andrew Lownie at Andrew Lownie Literary Agency
Editor: Tracy Behar at Little, Brown
Description: An exploration of language and what it can teach us about our minds and lives.

Daniel Tammet is also the author of Thinking in Numbers (a nice complement to A World of Words) and the memoir Born on a Blue Day, a memoir about his life with high-functioning autism and savant syndrome.

My youngest brother Chris is autistic but we didn’t know that until he was three or so. Before then and before he could talk, he could identify letters. Point to one, and he’d name it for you. We thought he was a genius, and in a way, he is. I always cringe when I tell people my brother is autistic and they’ll say something like, “Oh, I’m so sorry.” Don’t be sorry. Chris is happy, loved, and intelligent in a way that’s no less valid just because it’s not measured on our typical IQ scale.  Excited to see how Tammet builds out the canon of “neurodiversity”. We still have a lot to learn.

THE BORDER OF PARADISE by Esme Weijun Wang
Agent: Amy WIlliams at The Williams Company  
Editor: Chris Heiser at the Unnamed Press 
Description: The inheritance of madness in an iconoclastic family - the scions of a piano manufacturing fortune - set in mid-twentieth century Brooklyn, Taiwan, and Northern California.

I love a multi-generational saga, and upon research, found that I identified with Esme’s long and winding path to publication.

As she writes in her announcement post:

“The book was molting and metamorphosing over and over again. What had once taken place in contemporary Northern California was now beginning in World War II-era New York. Characters disappeared and new ones came in their place. Plotlines wilted on the vine. I wrote vastly different endings, and then went back to write vastly different beginnings. By the time I finished my first draft, which clocked in at 300+ pages, three years had passed, and the Nowaks had become real enough for me to dream about at night.”

I hear ya, girl!

from @yumisakugawa

PRETTIER SMARTER BETTER by Yumi Sakugawa
Agent: Laurie Abkemeier at DeFiore and Company
Editor: B.J. Berti and Courtney Littler at St. Martin's
Description: Illustrated advice for streamlining and improving your home life, looking and feeling better, and creating fun and artsy DIY projects that can brighten your living space.

Yumi's cute and quirky illustrations are all the more winning because they have heart. Does "improving your home life" have a lot of heart? Not always. So, excited to see what Yumi does here. 

Sunday Writing Inspo - E.L. Doctorow

“Writing is like driving at night in the fog. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.” 

- E.L. Doctorow 

Friday Photos | Post- #BEA15 Edition

me and my amazing editor Chelsey at the HarperCollins BEA party.

This week was huge. For the first time, I felt like an AUTHOR. 

I've never been too particular about calling myself a writer. You don't have to be published or work for money. If you say you're a writer, you're a writer. 

But this week, something happened. The book --  thus far, my somewhat private writing that I shared with a few key people (my agent, editor, close friends, my boyfriend) -- went public. Really public, at BEA. Now people have books in their possession. They will read them. They will think thoughts and I won't be there to say, oh I meant this and not that. The work now stands on its own. 

I've already written about my signing and how I was totally blown away by the turnout. This post is about everything else -- the pics on my phone, the events after Javits closed, the thoughts still on my mind.

First, events. I had been to BEA two years before (as a reader not an author), so I understand the floor. It's really not that different as an author as opposed to a reader. You see what books are coming down the pike. You wait on lines to get books or posters signed. You see celebrity authors (or, perhaps a celebrity cat as I did one year). I'm never going to be a book buyer so that whole wheeling-and-dealing side of BEA will never be part of my experience. 

But what was new... the parties! 

On Wednesday night, I went to an event with about 40 book bloggers. They got a head start with a presentation that looked like this... 

As one blogger said to me, "If HarperCollins treats its authors as well as it treats its bloggers, then you're in good hands." 

Then after two hours, the bloggers moved to another room where they mingled with... the Authors. At first, it had tinges of a meat market, like I was being paraded into a room for others to size me up. But that was before I met anyone (and because my mind tends towards skewing things in strange ways). Everyone was so nice! So many READERS. Many bloggers read one book/day. Others have been doing this for years, creating communities of thousands.

I got to talk about my book, my writing process... all that. But for me, the best part was connecting with these uber-readers, the evangelists, the ones who hyperventilate at the thought of meeting their favorite author. They make you love books even more. 

Here are some pics from early in the night, before the room got packed ...  

And then the next night... another party. While the blogger party was intimate and a little networky (not in a bad way!), the HarperCollins BEA party was celebratory and familiar. It was held at a gorgeous 2-floor space in Tribeca with a roof deck overlooking the Hudson River. 

Who was in attendance? Any author who was involved with BEA, plus their editors, agents, publicists, and marketing teams. Both HarperCollins and Harlequin were there (the former owns the latter). I'd say there were 400-500 people there. 

And that night was a little strange because again I was put in that Author camp. Sure, one of many many authors (most with many more books under their belt), but still. People went out of their way to make sure I was entertained. I had a separate check-in area. People introduced me as "Jessica Tom, the author", which made me chuckle the first couple times I heard it. The event seemed to say: HarperCollins couldn't publish books without authors. Thank you. And that was cool, to be a seed that helps grow this massive industry. 

I got to meet the many people who make the book what it is: sales, marketing, pr and the editorial team. I got to meet Meg Cabot (who, rather charmingly, was still wearing her BEA badge though everyone else had long taken them off. ("I learned it from an old-time author. Make sure people know who you are!" Which is ironic because... she's Meg Cabot.) 

I also did this fun promo video for Go Set a Watchman, Harper Lee's historic much-anticipated book. All authors were asked to answer one of three questions. I answered the prompt, "The Book That Changed My Life." I answered The Secret History by Donna Tartt. If you haven't read it, it's juicy yet literary, sexy and suspenseful. It made me want to be a writer. 

Because I'm a dweeb, I matched my dress to my cover art. This is a vintage Bill Blass...

... with Amrita Singh earrings and Jil Sander shoes (not that you can see them).

All in all, this was the most eventful week of my writing career. Getting an agent, signing a contract... those were big and amazing, too. But they were all leading up to this moment: a physical book, a community of readers, the ability to say "I'm the author, Jessica Tom." 

I'm not quite used to that yet... but I hope to get there soon.

NB: These books are galleys for press, bloggers, etc and are in somewhat limited supply. Even my parents don't have one. If you want, you can pre-order yours here and get it at your door on October 27.

And, here's my BEA post about my first signing. Seventy people came! 

My first signing at BookExpo America #BEA15

This isn't the cutest photo of me at BEA. But it is the most representative (smiling as wide as my mouth allows). My very first book signing was by far the coolest thing I've done with Food Whore (not that sitting in front of laptop for years of my life is much competition). Here's how it went down and some quick thoughts (still processing the coolness of it all). 

First, what is BEA? It's a trade show for industry professionals: booksellers, librarians, editors, agents, sales/marketing teams, reading app entrepreneurs, literary tote bag designers... you get it.

It's pretty amazing to be in the company of thousands of other book lovers. How often do you see billboards and giant banners for books?  

I got there an hour and a half before my 3pm signing so I could walk the floor, visit the booths, and -- let's get real -- cool off because I was sweating like crazy from the walk from Penn Station to Javits Center. I should have taken more photos, but I did catch this: tea settings at the Chinese booths. One can only do business over tea! 

I also scoped out my autographing area. Here's the sign that announced my session. The excitement builds...

And this is what the lines looked like one hour before my signing session. The photo on the left is of the low-numbered tables (1-5). And the photo on the right is of the high-number tables (10-15). I was Table 14. 

So, I was expecting...15 or so people over 30 minutes. And I was totally fine with that! I had a camera tripod so I could take photos with people, a mailing list sign-up sheet, and of course the tats. I was going to take my time. There were a lot of big-name authors signing the same time as me, so I was happy to just enjoy the experience and meet a handful of readers.

Long lines for established authors.

What I was expecting. (Not being pessimistic... just looking at the facts!) 

Fifteen minutes before showtime, my publicist and I went to the green room to relax. I wasn't nervous and I didn't really think through what I was going to say or write. I thought I'd just wing it the few times it happened. 

Then we went through the "backstage" area, where everyone's galleys had been organized. 

I thought I'd take a moment to get settled in ... get out my water bottle, my Sharpies. Fan out the tats. 

But instead, WHEN I OPENED THE CURTAIN, I saw this...

HUMANS! WAITING! For ME! Seventy people, to be exact. More people than could fit in the allotted 30 minutes, so we ended up moving over a table and going 15 minutes overtime. Thanks to my agent, Stefanie, who took these photos of me smiling like an idiot.

This woman researched my book and marked me in her day's schedule. 

That auburn-haired woman to my right? That's Carol Alt! 

I signed galleys for booksellers, bloggers, agents. I signed for a library benefit auction and a hospital library. I signed for a woman who said, "don't make it out to me because my husband is a foodie and he will get jealous." 

People were drawn by the title. I met a woman who said this was the first thing she was going to read on the drive home (as long as you're not driving, I said). Twitter pals who I had never met IRL came.

One woman said the tats reminded her of the time her parents paid to remove her tattoo -- 10x more than what the tattoo cost (I hope that isn't real, she said). Other people told me that I should definitely make the tat official.

@yolandashoshana said my book was her top book haul acquisition...

This signing exceeded my expectations by leaps and bounds and I'm SO grateful for all the people who stopped by. Can't wait to sign to do more events and maybe sign a book for you. ;) 

P.S. If you like, join my mailing list so you can get news about signings, appearances, etc.