What Is Communal Table?

A table anchors us to our daily lives. We all have a collection of tables that defines us. I know I do—the round, antique table that took up too much space in my tiny childhood home in Hollywood; Grandma Doda’s well-set lacquer table; Camp Merrie Woode’s sticky, wooden dining hall tables; Misa’s wobbly kitchen table in Hungary, the glass porch table overlooking a Kentucky cornfield at Gregg’s mom’s.

This table—Communal Table– is my attempt to anchor myself to a table that I can share with all of you. Here I’ll post recipes and menus, conversations with people who cook and people who grow our food. Here I’ll pass on what I learn in my never-ending attmepts to become better in my own kitchen. I am passionate about home-cooking, and I want to pass that passion on to you.

Communal Table is a place for people who like to cook, and people who don’t know how to cook but want to, and even for people who just like to sit down for a good meal with other people. Each table has a culture of its own, created by the people who gather there, so pull up a chair and join me at this table. Maybe we’ll laugh. Maybe we’ll cry. We might even laugh until we cry (something I do often). I want to hear what you had for breakfast this morning. Or what you loved to eat as a kid. Or what tables inspired the person you have become. Welcome to the Communal Table.