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Beautiful Books: Queers at the Table
Featuring 38 contributors Queers at the Table (Arsenal Pulp Press) is a full-colour anthology of essays, comics, and recipes that reveals the dynamic and transformative relationship between queerness and food.
Anthologies, by their nature, offer readers a veritable buffet of content organized by genre or theme. Queers at the Table is made even more tempting because the book’s contents—from hearty prose on the history of queer contributions to the culinary arts to inviting comics about the role of food in queer courtship and community—are presented in vibrant, full colour throughout.
Read on for a conversation between book designer Jazmin Welch (who designed Queers at the Table) and anthology co-editors Megan J. Elias and Alex D. Ketchum about how this abundant feast of a book came to be.
Created in community, by community, for community
ALEX D. KETCHUM: We hosted the hybrid Queer Food Conference in April 2024 at Boston University. We had the idea for the Queers at the Table anthology prior to the event and were able to solicit specific contributions for the anthology from the conference presenters that represented the conference themes.
The cartoonists were selected based on folks whose work we really admire and by partnering with Prism Comics, the LGBTQ+ comics organization, who also helped connect us with other artists. We wanted to make sure that we represented the diversity of the topic of queer food and the diversity of the LGBTQ+ community.
MEGAN J. ELIAS: Cohesion comes from the theme, and Queers at the Table really delights in diversity, even in terms of how the recipes use measurements.
JAZMIN WELCH: It’s my job as the designer to allow each work by the contributors to sing on their own. Colour is used as a vibrant addition to the work and as a wayfinding device, but I didn’t want the design to distract or get in the way of the content. The design is a cohesive container to hold all of the wonderful unique variation in the work.
The Cover Story
ALEX: When book designer Jazmin Welch asked if we had someone in mind for the cover, my first thought was BLUE! They are a contributor to the anthology, who has experience doing book covers. I am such a fan of their work.
MEGAN: Blue Delliquanti was the first person I thought of, too, because the people they draw are so diverse and appealing. Since Queers at the Table is a little community, Blue seemed like the perfect artist to represent that.
JAZ: Blue is such a professional and creative talent. We all hopped on a call to chat through some ideas centring around people breaking bread together over a communal table, and Blue knocked it out of the park, delivering a vibrant, joyful community-focused cover.
Colour as Compass
ALEX: We did specifically ask in early conversations about the book’s interior design that the book be colourful and make people feel invited in. Jaz was able to translate the vibe/emotion so beautifully.
MEGAN: It was important to us that the book be multicoloured and really bright to represent its internal diversity and power. Jaz knew exactly how to make that happen.
JAZ: The colours for the interior of Queers at the Table were chosen after we finalized the cover with Blue since I wanted to make sure they were in line with the cover’s palette. The large colour-blocked pages introducing us to each thematically organized section allow us to pause and enter into a new space. Colour is a wayfinding device throughout, connecting each recipe to the theme it corresponds with. Even the prose pages use bright colour and bold type to introduce each essay, but we ensured that the text design of the essays themselves still live on the page with confidence and authority. We wanted to ensure that the serious and academic nature of some of the pieces were not lost to the vibrant design.
Queer Food, Illustrated
JAZ: It was a brilliant choice to go completely illustrative [versus using photographs] with the recipes. The unique style of each of the featured illustrators really compliments the diversity of recipes and topics included.
ALEX: I have to give credit to one of our agents, Rob Firing, for the idea. When we were first pitching the anthology to our agents Brenna English Loeb and Rob Firing, Rob suggested that the cartoonists we were working with might also illustrate the recipes. I was really excited because I am a fan of Samin Nosrat’s cookbook with illustrations and have quite a few comic recipe books.
MEGAN: Illustration is so important in the world of cookbooks, but I also resist the perfectionism that a lot of food photography encourages. Using illustration rather than photography allows us to emphasize the role of individual interpretation in culinary arts, which in itself is a challenge to norms.
Queers at the Table
Chef’s Picks, aka favourite design elements / ingredients
ALEX: I love that the colours for the recipes correspond with the essays and comics that share the same theme.
MEGAN: All of the comics and illustrations are wonderful. I could say that I love the cover most because it is the image that will draw readers into the book and it is so purposefully inviting as an image. It seems to say, “Come as you are to the table!”
JAZ: In addition to the cover, I love the section intro pages. Making the words “We’re Here, We’re Queer” so big felt powerful and important. I wanted these pages to take up space and allow the reader to settle into a new topic.
MEGAN: I also hope people notice the size of the book—we wanted it to fit comfortably in a reader’s hands, not to overwhelm.
A Sweet Experience
JAZ: I loved working on Queers at the Table. The collaborative way the book was conceptualized and realized—from editorial curation through the cover and interior design process—corresponds beautifully to the subject matter.
ALEX: The process of creating Queers at the Table was collaborative from start to finish. It’s wonderful to work with Arsenal Pulp Press. Megan and I wanted this anthology to make people feel good when they hold it, and through the work of Jaz, the team at Arsenal, and our lovely contributors, we achieved that.
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Megan J. Elias (they/she) is director of the Food Studies Program at Boston University and an associate professor. They are the author of five books about food history, including Food on the Page: Cookbooks and American Culture (University of Pennsylvania Press). Megan teaches courses in food history and food and gender and lives in Brooklyn, New York.
Photo of Megan by Petra Johnson.
Alex D. Ketchum (she/her) is an associate professor at the Institute for Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies of McGill University. She is the author of several books, including Ingredients for Revolution: A History of American Feminist Restaurants, Cafes, and Coffeehouses (Concordia University Press). She lives in Montreal, Quebec.
Photo of Alex by Pierre Faniel.
Jazmin Welch (she/her) is the book designer at Arsenal Pulp Press. She focuses on creating compelling and page-turning designs that stand out on bookshelves, resonate with readers, and respect each author’s unique point of view. Jaz is a book lover, dog mom, and big fan of the great outdoors.
Photo of Jazmin by Taylor McKay Smith.
Find a copy of Queers at the Table here on All Lit Up, or from your local bookseller.
Thanks to Alex, Megan, and Jazmin for their insightful conversation, and to Arsenal Pulp Press for providing the graphics.
