TOC 2016 Challenge
Our winter update!
This year, the Tables of Contents Reading Series will turn 10. I should go back and look at the date of our first reading with Becky Dinerstein and co. in the back room of Egg on North 3rd Street sometime in fall of 2016. Unfortunately it seems the inbox that held those early planning emails died with the old domain name, so the oldest TOC correspondence I’m able to pull up is from June 2017, just under a year into the series.
I had returned from opening Egg in Tokyo earlier that spring, and we were getting the series simmering again with a night featuring Victor LaValle, Sarah Gerard, and Adam Gopnik. A video of that reading lives on, our first piece of “official” documentation I think. We’re all so young! I remember sending an invite to that reading to all the authors who had been part of TOC to that point, 21 writers, some of whom have returned to read with us over the years (some more than once - hi MHB!)
Now, in 2026, our author alum list includes over 250 readers, a not-insignificant part of the contemporary literary canon. While I loved the novelty and creativity and chaos of organizing those early TOC readings, I certainly didn’t expect that we’d still be hosting such incredible writers, and continuing to feel so much joy and fulfillment doing it, nearly a decade later.
I don’t remember the last time we took two consecutive months off from the Reading Series. We often take a winter break, but this year we felt like we needed a bit more of a breather, so after going dark for January (aside from a lovely bespoke event to celebrate the launch of Emily Nemens’s novel CLUTCH) we decided to take February off as well.
We’re using this time to rest, to be present with everything that’s happening in the world around us (which, devastating and disheartening as it is, can also be upsettingly easy to sweep past on the way to our next task), and to dip in to some of the back-burner ideas we’ve had for other ways Tables of Contents might take shape the world.
Fear not! The monthly readings will be back soon enough. In fact, go ahead and save the date for March 10th, which will be a very special return to the table. That event email will be coming your way soon, we’re just cooking up some other offerings in the meantime.
One of those projects is nudging this newsletter into fuller form, one that can carry more of the taste and texture of TOC to both familiar faces and to folks who live further afield. We’ve seen a lovely oven-spring of followers these first few weeks of the year — welcome! — as well as some new paid subscribers, whose support helps make this all possible.
On that front, we wanted to share a bit of what will be hiding beneath the paid subscriber cloche going forward. For starters, each month we’ll be sharing recipes for one cocktail and one dish from the previous month’s reading, so you can reheat some of the TOC experience at home.
We plan to add in some other treats below the fold as we go, and hope you’ll be enticed to join us there, both for the perks and also as a way to support our work more broadly, from the reading series to the residency and beyond. 10 years in we’re (finally?) thinking about real sustainability for our work, so we can continue for another 10 years, or more! This newsletter is one way we hope to fertilize that future.
For this month, we picked one dish and drink that we especially loved from 2025, as a sample offering for everyone to enjoy. If a steaming collard-green-egg-and-cheese sandwich (Angela Flournoy, The Wilderness) doesn’t help you beat the cold these next couple weeks, we’re pretty sure a glass or two of Cougar Milk (Torrey Peters, Stag Dance) will at the very least help to soften the bite.
Thanks so much for being a part of our long literary dinner party, whether it’s been just a few days or close to a decade. See you back at the table soon,
Evan
Cougar Milk
from Stag Dance, by Torrey Peters
Stag Dance was easily one of our favorite books of last year, its title story especially taking us deep into the snowy woods of short-fiction possibility. Torrey has joined TOC twice now, first for her amazing novel Detransition, Baby, and for her reading at Ace Hotel Brooklyn we pulled a batch of goat stew out of the deep freezer for a shockingly tasty brownish muck of a meal, paired with Cougar Milk, a strong, creamy-sweet cocktail fragrant with the pine-spiced notes of the forest, very fitting for both the story and for the weather we’re bundling through now.
Recipe
1.5 oz Kings County moonshine
1 oz sweetened condensed milk
.5 oz pine liqueur
.25 oz allspice dram
Grated nutmeg, for garnish
Combine all the ingredients except for the garnish in a cocktail shaker with ice. Shake until chilled, then double-strain into a rocks glass over a big ice cube. Garnish with freshly grated nutmeg and serve.
Collards Egg & Cheese
from Angela Flournoy’s The Wilderness
Angela Flournoy returned to TOC almost 9 years after her first appearance (when she read from The Turner House) to bring us into the world of The Wilderness, a friend group novel crossing country, time, family, and class. One of the main characters, Nakia, is a chef and restaurateur who runs a restaurant it sounds like we’d love, if their signature collard green-based breakfast sandwich is any indication. We simmered up a batch of coconut collard greens (to keep it vegetarian) to a thick, rich tangle, and layered them on a brioche bun with a fried egg, cheddar cheese, and hot sauce. It was an interesting chance not just to eat like a character in a book, but to live some of their backstory as well, preparing the greens in the kitchen the day before the event. It was also so good I wouldn’t be surprised to see it on the Little Egg menu as a special sometime down the road…
Coconut-Braised Collards
1/4 cup canola oil
2 medium onion onions, sliced
4 cloves of peeled, crushed, and roughly chopped garlic
4-5 bunches collard greens, stripped from their rib and sliced crosswise into 1” ribbons
1 quart vegetable stock (to make it quick, the Better than Bouillon veggie “chicken” bouillon has a nice savory punch and just stirs together with hot water to taste)
1 12oz can coconut milk (Aroy D brand is a favorite)
1 tbsp cider vinegar
2 tsp smoked spanish paprika
2 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
2 tsp soy sauce or Tamari
1 pinch red chili flakes (to your taste; maybe some hot sauce too?)
In a large pot, saute the onions in the oil over medium-high heat, stirring regularly, until softened, about 4 minutes. Add the garlic and saute while stirring for 2 minutes. Add the collards, liquid, and remaining ingredients, stir together, and bring to a simmer. Once simmering, turn the heat to medium-low and simmer away for at least 30-40 minutes so the collards really soften and the liquid reduces to a rich coating. Adjust the seasoning (salt, spice?) and set aside to use or cool down and refrigerate (or freeze in smaller portions to use later.) Warm up before using.
For each sandwich
1 brioche bun
1 or 2 eggs
1 tbsp butter, divided
about 1/4 cup prepared collard greens
2-3 tbsp sharp cheddar cheese
Salt and pepper
Hot sauce
Toast your brioche bun in a little butter in a saute pan, at least on the cut side, or warm lightly in a small toaster oven.
In the same pan, cook your eggs as you like - over-medium (fried a little runny, but not so much that they explode out of the sandwich all over your clothes) would be our recommendation, but scrambled would work well, too. After flipping your eggs, lay your cheese on top and cover with a lid to help it melt a bit. Or, if you’re warming your bun in a toaster oven, you can put the cheese on the top bun and let it melt in the oven.
Warm your collard greens if needed. Spread them on the bottom bun, leaving any extra liquid behind in the pot so things don’t get too soggy. Place your fried eggs atop (seasoned with salt and pepper) and dash it all with some hot sauce. Add the top bun (cheesy or not) and grab some napkins. This will be — like many great friendships — messy, but delicious.