Dinner Recipes

The office potluck was in three hours and I’d completely forgotten. Everyone else would be bringing their signature dishes—Maria’s famous three-layer dip that takes her … Read more

It was 11:47 PM on a random Wednesday, and I had a bone-deep craving for fried chicken. Not just any fried chicken—the kind with skin … Read more

Introduction My husband claimed he hated shrimp for fifteen years. Fifteen years. He’d push them to the side of his plate at restaurants, make a … Read more

I was standing in the canned goods aisle of my local grocery store last Tuesday when a woman next to me dropped a can of … Read more

My neighbor wasn’t trying to impress anyone. I’d stopped by to borrow a pie plate—completely mundane, right?—and the smell hit me before I even got … Read more

I was at my daughter’s third-grade parent-teacher conference when Mr. Henderson, the math teacher who looked like he hadn’t smiled since 1995, started talking about … Read more

There used to be a tiny Southern café off Highway 61 in Mississippi called The Gilded Yam that made sweet potato casserole like nothing I’ve … Read more

My sister-in-law had refused to touch sourdough discard for three years. Three years of me mentioning the jar in my fridge, the weekly feedings, the … Read more

My mother-in-law, a woman who could make a roux in her sleep and had opinions about cornbread that bordered on religious, claimed for forty years … Read more

An older woman named Clara watched me fumbling with a bunch of asparagus at the farmer’s market, trying to find the thinnest stalks. She didn’t … Read more