In GROUP LIVING AND OTHER RECIPES, author, entrepreneur and life explorer Lola Milholland shares her experience in connecting with and contemplating collective sharing --- at home, overseas, in business and with family.

Born in the 1990s, Milholland was introduced to nonconformity from her earliest childhood. Her mother was a daring, independent soul whose heritage sprang from the Philippines, and her father (not her mother’s husband) was a filmmaker whose constant joking often carried profound mysteries. Milholland lived with her parents and older brother, Zak, in Portland, Oregon, in the Holman House, where a plethora of visitors would come and go --- including exhange students, offbeat artists and dedicated drifters. In fact, a group of Tibetan monks required her to sleep on the living room couch.

"Readers of GROUP LIVING AND OTHER RECIPES will enthusiastically utilize Lola Milholland’s food acumen while learning more about group caring and sharing by accessing her exhilarating and often profound memory bank."

The tie that bound the family was food. Milholland’s parents enjoyed cooking, eating and sometimes inventing their own versions of exotic, often Asian-based delicacies, and she has developed her own. Recipes pepper the book, which are symbols of the adventures that she would come to seek as she matured. Schooled in the Japanese language from childhood, Milholland traveled to Japan in her early 20s, observing that there are even more ways that people may exist --- and eat --- together. She gradually mastered the art of cooking, as well as a philosophy based on this skill.

All recipes offered here come with Milholland’s proviso that the ingredients are “adaptable, so feel free to play.” This attitude infuses her work throughout; even though she presents an extensive history of her own communal experiments, she makes no claim to have written a guidebook. She clearly would expect her audience to read the rules for any proposed food or philosophy, and then follow or break them, according to one’s own perceptions and desires.

Now a food-business owner focused on providing healthful meals for schoolchildren, Milholland has lived through the surprises and changes that inevitably accompany living among an ever-mutating cohort. She still occupies the Holman House --- along with Zak and their companions, who consist of artists, friends and lovers --- in a manner that she sees as simply “practical.” In the group environment, tasks can be shared (though never dictated), leaving all participants with time to pursue individual goals.

Recipes include such fascinating delicacies as Crispy Broken-Rice Salad and her Filipino grandmother’s contribution, Franny’s Chicken Adobo. This deep dive across cultures and personalities contains snippets of significant history, such as the effects of the Mount Saint Helena eruption on those in Oregon, a disturbing view of U.S. nuclear weapon stockpiles, and a panorama of worldwide communal colonies.

Readers of GROUP LIVING AND OTHER RECIPES will enthusiastically utilize Lola Milholland’s food acumen while learning more about group caring and sharing by accessing her exhilarating and often profound memory bank.