A delicious love letter to the tastes and smells that a young boy associates with his journey into adulthood. Nigel's Mother was always a poor cook, and her addiction to all things canned isn't helping. Nigel, on the other hand, laps up cookbooks as if they were porn, and spends all his free time gazing longingly at the delights offered at Percy Salt's grocery shop.

A young food critic hoping to become a columnist must face her writer's block and her relationships when her free-spirited mother comes for a holiday visit, changing everything in her path.

Jonathan Gold pulls back the curtain on the perceived superficiality of Los Angeles to show viewers a genuine and vibrant world where ethnic cooking is a kaleidoscopic doorway to the mysteries of an unwieldy city and the soul of America.