Farewell to Berkeley’s under-the-radar Frugal Foodies

For the past five and a half years, J Moses Ceaser has opened his home every Tuesday night to old friends and complete strangers with the sole purpose of getting people in the kitchen cooking a vegetarian meal from scratch for a fraction of the cost of eating out — while creating community on the side. That’s the concept behind Frugal Foodies. Ceaser has held theme nights, vegan dinners, and cooked cuisine from around the globe. He has also hosted guest chefs such as Bryant Terry, and run Iron Chef competitions out of his 960-square foot, open-plan artist warehouse apartment inside a former margarine packing plant in west Berkeley. All this for just eight bucks. Inspired by a similar meet-up in Montreal, Ceaser planned his own weekly dinner parties with a few guiding principles: No measuring cups or electric devices, and — on some weeks like the one I attended — no recipes, no cooking with someone you came with. And, while attendees most certainly must clean up, they should never, ever, put anything away. Got that? I stopped by this week to make dinner, admire the professional photographer‘s documentary portraits, commune with a dozen fellow cooks over cutting boards, and talk […]