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Making recipes with a smaller yield can be practical. They require fewer ingredients, less space to store leftovers, and provide fewer opportunities for food waste. Some high-yield recipes are not conducive to scale-down. And eating for days in one cooking session can be effective, but it’s not always the goal. Not to mention the fact that although many dishes improve with time, others taste best when freshly prepared.
“There’s nothing I love more than a really good friend who I haven’t seen in ages and just a night of talking and good wine and food at a distance,” says Graham. “They are those moments in life that enrich me.”
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“(My reality was) the not-so-pretty side of food, shall we say. High visibility jackets, crates and boots and rotting fruit and vegetables a lot of the time. So then to be able to go home and actually be like, “Wow, I need a big escape” and find the beauty in all of those things and have that balance. And also, just the chaos of the world to create this real bubble at home and in the kitchen.
When Graham launched her newsletter, she didn’t expect it would lead to a book. But it allowed her time and space to explore what was most important to her in cooking. “It really made me look at all the things I was missing, which was casual Tuesday dinners with my mom or being able to wake up in the same house as my best friend and make pancakes and share them.”
Graham started by asking his mother and friend to subscribe. In the first six months, her newsletter grew faster than she imagined possible. Now she hears from readers all over the world.
“I get weirdly emotional when I talk about my newsletter,” she says with a laugh. “I find it so rewarding to be able to write like this every week. And I write for work and in so many different other capacities, and it’s just not the same. I really wanted the book to feel like a continuation of that.”
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For the most part, the recipes serve two people. When she asks chefs to put in extra time or effort—in making a slow-cooked lamb and cinnamon stew that simmers for more than three hours, for example, or a shrink-wrapped chocolate cake (baked in a smaller than standard 6-inch pan)—the portions are big enough to enjoy more than once.
“I’m never going to tell you to make a cake that makes two slices,” says Graham. “But I’m also not going to tell you to make a cake that’s so big that a number 10 slice won’t taste great on Day 3.”
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Where leftovers are likely, Graham suggests ways to turn them into something new. If you have extra chocolate sauce after making her “best” banana split, you can turn it into truffles. Or, after you’ve had your fill of crudités, toss last night’s anchovy and walnut dip into hot pasta for lunch (as Graham did the day we spoke).
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A few recipes feature “blow-out ingredients,” like truffle tagliatelle—“I wanted people to feel like they could recreate that kind of restaurant specialty, a feel at home.” But overall, Graham considered attainability and affordability, repeating key ingredients throughout a book.
A sense of nostalgia, nostalgia and longing influenced Graham’s approach to cooking. She was born in Sydney and grew up in Singapore, where “food is a national obsession”. When she returned to Australia aged 13, she missed what she thought was home. Then, at 18, she moved to London, where she lived in “a whole new world” of fruits and vegetables and experienced the seasons in a different way. The greatest joy, however, remains England’s proximity to continental Europe. “I’ll never get over the thrill of Paris being two hours away by train. That’s never exciting.”
Graham writes about creating a table that invites people to linger long after the meal is over. The Spanish have a word that captures this idea, without a direct English translation: sobremesa – when the company and the conversation are so compelling, you don’t want the magic to be broken. Night turns to day and you’re still at the table.
“I think these are the happiest moments of my entire life. That after-dinner thing (where) you might be fighting over the last piece of cake left on the plate. I’m often the last person to leave a restaurant when the staff puts the chairs on top of the table. And you can create this at home the same way.