Now Serving

Now Serving is a cookbook shop that doubles as an event room when an author comes through. It's on the ground floor of Far East Plaza in Chinatown, in Unit 133, and the shop's own directions put it on the Hill Street side of the plaza, across from the Ten Ren Tea Shop. The street address is 727 N Broadway.

The shelves are sorted the way a cook thinks. Books are grouped by region, from the Caribbean and the Indian subcontinent to Scandinavia, and then by craft, with bread, pastry, fermentation and barbecue each getting a section of their own. There's food writing and memoir, a run of magazines and zines, some kitchen tools, and shopworn titles on sale. The shop runs a cookbook club and sells signed and bookplate editions ahead of release dates.

The events are conversations built around a new book, usually with a second cook or food writer asking the questions, and KCRW's Evan Kleiman has hosted several. Past guests on the shop's recordings page include Claudia Roden, Dorie Greenspan, Sandor Katz and Rodney Scott. Expect a talk and a signing rather than a concert, and check the listing for the ticket link and start time, because the shop's regular hours end early.

Those hours are 12 to 5 on Sunday, 11 to 5 on Monday and Tuesday, 11 to 6 Thursday through Saturday, and by appointment only on Wednesday. For parking, the shop points to the meters on the street, the pay lots nearby, and the paid garage underneath the plaza.