La Jolla High School grad’s new cookbook looks to make a dinner party ‘whatever you want it to be’

Unlike most cookbooks, an upcoming release by La Jolla High School graduate Natasha Feldman aims to show how you can have a successful dinner party with any amount of cooking (including none).

“The Dinner Party Project,” scheduled for publication Tuesday, April 18, looks at customizing the experience based on one’s cooking skills.

“The goal is to help you find a dinner party menu that works for you without turning into a different person,” Feldman said. “We have this bizarre idea of what a dinner party is … that does not always fit in with the modern world. That makes people think there is this pressure in having people over. The dinner party can be whatever you want it to be.”

The book offers a variety of options, featuring recipes with illustrations and photos, pre-designed menus with ideas of what can be made and what can be outsourced, and flowcharts to help readers find a menu or dish to make based on their skill set.

“Just like you shouldn’t go to the grocery store when you’re hungry, you shouldn’t plan a dinner party menu when you think the sky’s the limit,” Feldman said. “That’s when you bite off more than you can chew.”

Natasha Feldman says “The Dinner Party Project” aims to “encourage people to feel less stress in the kitchen.”

(Provided by Natasha Feldman)

The flowcharts are there to answer questions like “Do you have 10 minutes to cook or do you have all day?” and “Are you comfortable using the oven or do you want takeout?”

“The main way this cookbook is different is that it tells you that you don’t have to cook,” Feldman said. “It’s about getting you in the mood to have friends over and feel confident in your space. You can make a salad and pick up pizza, or you can make a cocktail and order from your favorite restaurant, or you can make a whole menu at home.”

The “vibe of the food is East Coast deli meets West Coast produce,” inspired by her parents’ upbringing in New York and her own upbringing in Southern California, Feldman said. It’s geared “for those that are working and have a limited budget.”

Feldman was born in San Diego and went to Bird Rock Elementary School — her parents still live in Bird Rock — but she moved away from La Jolla for a while during her childhood. She returned in her teens and graduated from La Jolla High. She now lives in Los Angeles.

“I was not a person who grew up cooking, but when I was in college I thought I wanted to learn,” she said. “After college, I went to culinary school and knew it was something I wanted to do.”

But she didn’t want to pursue a restaurant career, so she and a friend started making cooking shows on YouTube, which evolved into cooking classes on Zoom during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I realized there are so many basic skills that some people don’t have, so I started taking notes and asking more questions over thousands of hours of cooking classes and came up with a list of reasons people might not want to host dinner parties,” Feldman said. “I took all those answers and poured it into the book. I hope no matter what age someone is, this is a book that can help them take a step back and think about why they have these ideas about cooking that they might have or any apprehensions about it. I want to encourage people to feel less stress in the kitchen.”

To learn more about and preorder “The Dinner Party Project,” visit noshwithtash.com/the-dinner-party-project. ◆