The best dinner party favor or hostess gift is breakfast. It says “I’m giving you something to look forward to in the morning, when you are tired from this delicious night we are having together right now.” Brilliant! Eleven Madison Park knows this; they famously end each (lavish) meal with a take-home bag of their incredible granola. It’s the kind of hospitality touch that feels like a value add even when you just forked over a bajillion dollars for a tasting menu.
Last night my friends at Butcher Box (hi, Ashley!!) hosted a cookbook club dinner with the lovely Jenn Lueke, aka @jenneatsgoood. She was just on Today (although not my hour, sadly— Jenn, come back in the 8am hour next time!) celebrating her debut cookbook “Don’t Think About Dinner.” Butcher Box hooked us up with some perfectly cooked steaks, which we devoured while talking about the book.
Jenn strikes me as the kind of gal who color-coded her planner at school; “Don’t Think About Dinner” takes a lot of the dreaded ~mental load~ out of grocery shopping and meal prepping by strategizing entire weeks at a time with interlocking ingredient needs. Nothing better than someone who’s done the thinking for you, eh? I have exactly zero extra brain cells at the moment (they are all in my boobs) so this is exactly where I am at, needs-wise, despite loving to cook. “I want to spare people from decision fatigue around the meal we stress about most,” she said. Her recipes prioritize affordability and whole ingredients that are good for your health, which certain other social media creators can make seem like a one-thing-or-the-other proposition.
But it wasn’t just steak on the menu! Jenn’s adorable concept for the evening was “don’t think about breakfast”— because she made us her viral high-protein breakfast biscuits to take home.
If you eat two, which she recommended and I indeed did, you’ll get about 30 grams of protein to start your day. Then you can feel not just satisfied, but also smug, even if you don’t technically have gym bro health goals. You could, and if you did, well, you would have met them. Jenn reports that these are great to make ahead; she stocked her pregnant sister’s freezer with them before baby D-Day. I wish someone had stocked my freezer with high-protein breakfast biscuits when I was pregnant. I spent the days after giving birth eating beans in a panic. Anyway, having Jenn as a sister sounds nice.
The recipe is on page 73 of the book, and also here.
I have to admit something before I leave you this afternoon.
I’m thinking about dinner.
Loved this so much!!
Emily! Thank you so much for the kind words and being a part of the dinner. I most definitely did color code my planners and still do 🤣💗 Will gladly take your invite 😉