Jeremy Sewall on Cooking at Home (and Why You Should Buy the Stock)

Jeremy Sewall’s first cookbook, the James Beard-nominated The New England Kitchen: Fresh Takes on Seasonal Recipes, and his follow-up, The Row 34 Cookbook, Sewall and coauthor Erin Byers Murray translated for home cooks the dishes that won him accolades at restaurants like Row 34, Great Bay, Lineage, and Island Creek Oyster Bar.

Now Sewall and Murray are taking a different approach. After months of cooking exclusively at home during COVID, Sewall found new inspiration in his own kitchen. He wanted to create a cookbook that people could use on any given weekday, not just when they were feeling ambitious. The result is Everyday Chef: Simple Dishes for Family and Friends. “Restaurant cooking and home cooking are really different. Both of them are skill sets that you develop over time,” he says. We chatted with Sewall about the book, the secret to great mac-and-cheese, and his other favorite home cooking hacks.

Jeremy Sewall on Cooking at Home

What inspired you to write a home cooking book after your previous restaurant-focused cookbooks?

It was born out of COVID. Restaurants were closed … it was a stressful time. I was home with my three children—five people with nowhere to go. You can only walk the dog so many times. I was cooking at home a lot and started to really focus on it. I found some solace and refuge in cooking. Restaurant cooking and home cooking are really different—both of them are a skill set you develop over time. I started thinking about leftovers, meal planning, and utilizing everything. At home, you’re trying to create a meal that works for everyone.

How does Everyday Chef differ from your earlier books in terms of approach?

I very intentionally wanted people to feel comfortable in a home kitchen. Some recipes are super easy but there are also things that feel special and are very doable at home. My other cookbooks are restaurant recipes that I tried to teach people to make at home. These are home recipes. There’s some celebratory stuff like ribeyes and pasta with clams and rack of lamb, but there’s also chicken and dumplings and lasagne. I wanted to show people that you can make this great dish that looks great but isn’t difficult. For example, I don’t tell you to make chicken stock, I tell you to buy it. That’s very intentional. There are great stocks now compared to when we were kids. All my other books have from-scratch pasta recipes—I love doing that at home—but on a Thursday you’re not going to wake up early and separate eggs. Just buy some great pasta and here’s what you do with it.

How about some other favorite shortcuts?

I have a secret for making mac-and-cheese. We buy Hoosier Hill Farm white cheddar powder from Wisconsin and mix that with milk and some really good cheddar or asiago. I just heat up some milk, add the powder, whisk in cheddar or asiago or parmesan.

For the chicken soup recipe, I like to use chicken thighs. I might roast them or sear them a little, cover in chicken stock and slowly cook them in the oven. I strain that stock and use it for my broth, chop the meat, add sautéed vegetables. I use orzo—you might use pasta or rice. You’re adding a great layer of flavor by cooking those chicken pieces in broth.

Then there’s the sheet tray pizza. You can make the dough or buy it. I have a couple of tomato sauce recipes, one using canned, one using fresh. You can pick your toppings: pepperoni, mozzarella, parmesan, basil, confit garlic.

What about easy desserts?

Chocolate pot de crème is super easy; a great, rich pudding. You can make it ahead, keep in the fridge for a few days. The pound cake is great, too. Save whatever’s leftover and freeze it for the next time you have people over. It’s all about making your life easy and thinking ahead. Don’t overcomplicate it. Make it simple.

Featured Recipes

Baked Eggs with Spiced Potatoes
Pasta with Meatballs and Red Sauce
Chicken, Vegetable, and Orzo Soup
Chocolate Pots de Crème

Amy Traverso

Amy Traverso is the senior food editor at Yankee and cohost of the public television series Weekends with Yankee, a coproduction with GBH. Previously, she was food editor at Boston magazine and an associate food editor at Sunset magazine. Her work has also been published in The Boston Globe, Saveur, and Travel & Leisure, and she has appeared on Hallmark Home & Family, The Martha Stewart Show, Throwdown with Bobby Flay, and Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares. Amy is the author of The Apple Lover’s Cookbook, which was a finalist for the Julia Child Award for best first-time author and won an IACP Cookbook Award in the “American” category.

More by Amy Traverso