In "The Dish," author Andrew Friedman—who’s been reporting and broadcasting about chefs and kitchen culture for nearly 25 years—stitches together all these threads by profiling the key restaurant and farm employees whose lives and work culminate in a single dish at an independent Chicago restaurant. Told in real-time during dinner service, the book tracks one-dish (a deceptively simple composition of aged strip loin, tomato, and sorrel) at Wherewithall restaurant from the moment it’s ordered by the guests at a table to when it’s completed and presented to them. During the intervening hour, as elements of the dish are prepared, cooked, and brought together on the plate, we meet the people who made the dish possible.