The week, the world learned about Jonah Reider, a 21-year-old Columbia University senior who’s operating a “restaurant” (of sorts) named Pith, which he runs out of his dorm room. The idea is that it costs just $10 to $20 for five- to eight-course dinners (capped at four people) that Reider prepares in his dorm’s common kitchen.
It quickly became popular among students, and because of the influx of press, Reider says non-collegiate New Yorkers have actually made Pith overbooked. But unlike, say, Flynn McGarry, Reider says he started doing this to get away from high-end restaurant culture, and he’s not even sure he wants to make cooking his career. He realizes that, if he does, he’ll have to put in a lot more work: “I recognize how presumptuous it is to casually cook and get so much attention,” he says. Here, he explains: