Sophia Khan is a world traveler and student of life who loves to fuse flavors from different cuisines. She recently received master's degrees in comparative religious ethics and human rights from Harvard and Yale. When she's not daydreaming about bizarre ice cream flavors, she serves as Associate Publishing Editor at the Journal of Inter-Religious Dialogue.
Dr. Ellen Bass, Sophia's beloved aunt and partner-in-paring, is an award-winning pediatrician and mother of four. She derives her culinary inspiration primarily from the cuisine of France. She received her M.P.H. from Yale and M.D. from Georgetown.
Our Story
Amidst the barren frost dunes of her fourth Hanover winter, college senior Sophia phoned Dr. Ellen (Auntie) late one night with a simple, absurd idea: to write a gourmet cookbook...for college students. Four months of eating Mac 'n Cheese out of the box had made the phrase "gourmet college" seem almost oxymoronical to the cynical senior, but Auntie thought they were onto something. Why not find a way to teach students how to make affordable, healthy, quick, and above all delicious food?
Their nefarious plan sat on the back burner for the next year, as Sophia was off on adventures in China and Pakistan. Not until she returned and made what would be a pivotal voyage down to Knoxville, TN in March of 2007 did she and Auntie get to work. The cooking was easy. When it came to concocting and sampling tasty food, everyone was ready to labor over the stove and dinner table alike. Brainstorming chapters, calculating each meal's budget, photographing dips and spreads (they're maddening to capture in a flattering light), recording and editing recipes--these were the tasks of nightmares. Finally, after many months of hard work and dedication, we had a cookbook!
Here we are, four years later, with an awesome agent in our corner, an instructional DVD under our belts, and a release set to hit the shelves in a matter of days! We're so ecstatic and sometimes feel like we must be dreaming. If we are, it's a very yummy dream.
Acknowledgments
Auntie & Soph would like to thank our amazing support system. Without all of you, we could never have seen this through!
Lots of credit and gratitude to the following team members:
Janet Shapiro of Smith Publicity for her brilliant publicity campaign and for her constant enthusiasm and faith.
Amy Collins and her amazing team at New Shelves Distribution in Troy, New York.
Tim Chaney, a brilliant graphic artist and video editor, for the book's cover and for editing and producing the DVD
Hannah Chase, an extremely talented videographer who directed and filmed our demo and instructional DVDs
Steve Bass, a dynamic young jazz musician who composed and performed original music for the DVD
Laura Pappano, Tom Lynch, Olivia Lynch, Molly Lynch, and Donovan Lynch for providing incredible support and a gorgeous kitchen in which to film the DVD
Dante, Georgia, Madeline, Samantha, and Maille Pappano for critical taste testing, unending patience, and creative input
Helen Bass for her keen editorial eye and constant optimism
Iain McConnell for his assistance with filming setup/cleanup and general triage work
Judy Bass for her dedicated outreach and marketing
Brenda and the team at Total Printing Systems for timely assistance in producing a beautiful book
