Jess Smith is the founder of the popular food blog InquiringChef.com, which she started in 2010 after moving to Thailand with her husband. She explored Thai cuisine, took cooking classes, and documented her experiences on the blog. Over time, her passion for cooking grew, leading her to focus on quick, easy meals for families. Today, Inquiring Chef receives over 5 million page views annually and supports a small team. She shares new recipes weekly through email, her blog, and social media, helping home cooks simplify mealtime without sacrificing flavor.
Smith is now an author. Her debut cookbook, Start with a Vegetable, published this year reimagines meal planning by putting vegetables at the center of the plate.
“Start with a Vegetable was the result of a natural transition in the way I started thinking about preparing dinner for my family. At the end of a busy day, I often didn't have the energy to think about dinner in parts by preparing a separate protein, vegetable, and starch,” says Smith. “I realized that if I put a vegetable at the center of the dish, the rest was easy to fill in.”
The book features 100 flexible recipes proving vegetables aren’t just a side—they’re key to simple, satisfying meals.
As chief recipe developer for the Cook Smarts meal-planning app, Smith worked closely with families struggling to get dinner on the table. She noticed a common challenge: people wanted to eat more vegetables but didn’t know how to build meals around them.
“As I started planning and testing recipes for the book, I just loved how easy it made dinnertime feel. Are there carrots in the fridge? Here are a bunch of ways to turn them into dinner. Nearly all of the 100 recipes are complete meals and include easy swaps to make them vegetarian. The book is truly flexitarian, with vegetable-forward recipes for all types of eaters.”
Unlike most cookbooks, Start with a Vegetable is organized by ingredient. Each chapter focuses on a different vegetable, offering multiple ways to turn it into a meal.
“The concept is resonating with many readers who tell me they love that the chapters are organized by vegetable, making it easy to use whatever they have on hand.”
Smith went through a rigorous testing process, starting with over 300 ideas before narrowing them down to 100.
“I always have running lists of recipe ideas. I started sorting recipes into categories, making sure there was variety for each vegetable. I wanted different cooking methods and types of dishes, so each chapter might have a soup, a salad, a roasted dish, a stove-top dish, and a sandwich or pasta.”
After perfecting the recipes in her own kitchen, she passed them to a trusted friend, an everyday home cook, to ensure they worked under real-world conditions.
“I want to know how these recipes worked for a home cook who was shopping at regular grocery stores and trying to make dinner for a family on a weeknight. She sends me feedback on any ingredients that are hard to find, anything that is unclear in the recipe, and tracks how long it takes her to make it with real-life interruptions.”
To further refine the book, Smith enlisted 30 volunteer home cooks through Instagram and her email list to test the recipes.
“My goal was to ensure that the recipes in this book are reliable, easy, and adaptable. I wanted this to be a cookbook for real home cooks. I'm so grateful to that team of volunteers for helping to ensure that it is.”
Building on her passion for teaching home cooks, Smith extended her expertise beyond the blog and cookbook by launching Inquiring Chef Academy. In 2024, she introduced this in-person cooking school for Kansas City children ages 5 to 13. The week-long summer camp is returning this year in Brookside in June, July, and August.
“We still have a few spaces left—details can be found on the ‘Camp’ tab of my website.”
To order a copy of the cookbook or register for cooking school, visit inquiringchef.com.
Article by Allison Swan
Photography by Janie Jones
Originally published in Johnson County City Lifestyle