children’s nonfiction

[tasty review] Welcome to Our Table by Laura Mucha, Ed Smith, and Harriet Lynas

~ jama ~ 7 Comments

I couldn’t help but smile upon first seeing the sunny yellow cover with 16 happy kids at the table sharing dishes from their native countries. What an irresistible invitation to join them for a mouthwatering feast!

Even before you open the book, the message is clear: international, diverse, community, inclusive, fun and delicious. When you start reading, it’s so easy to relate: We are different, but we all love food! 

Welcome to Our Table: A Celebration of What Children Eat All Around the World (Nosy Crow, 2023) is an epic smorgasbord featuring hundreds of dishes and ingredients, both familiar and exotic, temptingly flavored with fascinating tidbits about how certain foods are grown and prepared.

Written by poet-author Laura Mucha and her chef-food writer husband Ed Smith, the 64-page compendium is served up with Harriet Lynas’s cheery, drool-worthy digital illustrations, sure to whet the appetite and arouse curiosity.

The mouthwatering menu contains 33 “courses” or topics, most featured on inventively designed, reader friendly double page spreads along with several single page spreads + sidebars. Friendly kids of multiple ethnicities are shown eating, serving, or interacting with various types of foods (interesting asides are conveyed via occasional speech bubbles).

After a brief introduction, Mucha and Smith set the table with descriptions of common eating utensils. Besides forks, knives, spoons and chopsticks, more than 1/4 of the world eats mainly with their hands. In India, Pakistan, Bhutan and Bangladesh, fingers are the way to go! And in places like South Korea, Italy or Nigeria, hands are preferred only for certain dishes (lettuce wraps, pizza, pounded yams).

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nine cool things on a tuesday

~ jama ~ 9 Comments

1. Happy February! What sweet treat do you fancy today? It may be cold and wintry outside, but Stella Park’s adorable animal pictures will warm you right up. 🙂

Based in Seoul, South Korea, Stella studied media design at Dongduk Women’s University, and then worked as a children’s art teacher before becoming a full-time freelance illustrator.

Her medium of choice is colored pencils. The slower pace of hand rather than digital drawing allows her more time to reflect and enjoy the process. She’s confident in her ability to draw subjects close to her heart and finds much fulfillment doing so. She loves sharing happiness and positivity through her art via soft fuzzy textures and heartwarming details.

Earlier in her freelance career she was mainly inspired by daily life and memorable scenes from her travels. Recently, however, she’s been depicting animal characters in cozy domestic scenes — mainly dogs and cats baking, shopping, sharing meals and playing together. She’s already published a couple of books in Korea, and I hope her work finds its way into the U.S. children’s picture book market sometime soon. Isn’t her artistic sensibility perfect for it? 🙂

For lots more, visit Stella’s Website and Instagram.

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[sweet review] On the Corner of Chocolate Avenue by Tziporah Cohen and Steven Salerno

~ jama ~ 17 Comments

“One is only happy in proportion as he makes others feel happy.” ~ Milton Hershey

Go ahead: break off a piece of Hershey bar and savor its rich chocolaty goodness as it slowly melts in your mouth. Mmmmmm! Did you know those rectangular sections are called ‘pips’? 🙂

Hershey’s chocolate defined my childhood.

When I was growing up, I simply had to have a Hershey’s Milk Chocolate bar whenever I went to the movies or had extra money from my allowance. So much happiness for just a nickel!

We poured Hershey’s syrup into cold milk and over vanilla ice cream, and I’ll always remember the first time I made and devoured my first S’more at Campfire Girls day camp. Marry me, please. And best of all, every Christmas, Grandma Yang would give a five pound box of Hershey’s Kisses to each of her eleven children and their families. The holidays wouldn’t have been the same without those sweet kisses.

You can see why I was excited to see this brand new picture book biography, On the Corner of Chocolate Avenue: How Milton Hershey Brought Milk Chocolate to America by Tziporah Cohen and Steven Salerno (Clarion Books, 2022). Though a longtime Hershey’s fan, I actually knew very little about the life of America’s Chocolate King.

Through hard work and perseverance, a poor boy from Derry Township, Pennsylvania – one who probably never tasted chocolate as a child – grew up to create a chocolate empire as a pioneering confectioner, resilient businessman, and dedicated philanthropist. 

Hershey’s achievements in mass production and bulk export helped to popularize chocolate around the world, making it accessible and affordable for the average consumer.

As the story opens, we see 8-year-old Milton gazing longingly at the sweets displayed in a shop window. Chocolate is a treat solely for the wealthy, and Milton was from a poor family. Since they moved around a lot, he attended six schools in seven years, barely learning how to read.

At age 14, he left school to help support his family. After a brief stint as a printer’s apprentice, he worked at Royer’s Ice Cream Parlor and Garden, where he learned the basics of candy making (ice cream, taffy, lollipops, marshmallows). Seeing candy’s power to make people happy, he decided it would be wonderful to build his own candy business.

Several years later, he borrowed money from his family to open the Spring Garden Confectionery Works in Philadelphia. Unfortunately, this business, as well as two others he started in Chicago and New York, failed.

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[spicy review] We Love Pizza by Elenia Beretta

~ jama ~ 28 Comments

Put on your bib, it’s pizza time!

Did you know there’s a brand new picture book celebrating our favorite cheesy, crusty, spicy, tomato-luscious food? Bet you’d love to wrap your lips around a warm, ooey gooey slice right this minute. 🙂

Elenia Beretta’s We Love Pizza: Everything you want to know about your number one food (Little Gestalten, 2021) opens with this savory poem:

THE WORLD'S FAVORITE FOOD

The world is full of people,
And people have to eat,
And if they had to choose a dish,
There’s one that’s hard to beat.

You make it and you bake it,
Or you buy it in a shop.
It can be soft or crunchy,
And have lots of things on top.

It’s simple but delicious --
That’s how it’s earned its fame.
Have you now guessed what it is?
Yes, PIZZA is its name!

This delectable introduction to the dish for pizza lovers of all ages is packed with fascinating tidbits sure to surprise and delight.

Where did pizza originate and how did it come to America? What are the different sizes and shapes of pizza? What exactly is a pizzeria and who are some of the people associated with it? How do you make your own pizza, and best of all, what kinds of toppings do people all over the world prefer?

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nine cool things on a tuesday

~ jama ~ 18 Comments
Joan with her self portrait

l. In celebration of Women’s History Month, here are a few portraits by the one and only Joan Baez, who turned 80 in January. I didn’t realize she was such an accomplished painter till I began following her on FB last year — initially for the music videos she posted as the pandemic raged on. It was wonderful seeing her singing in her kitchen!

Malala Yousafzai

Then she began sharing pieces from her first solo exhibition, “Mischief Makers,” featuring “risk-taking visionaries who have brought about social change through nonviolent action.”

Her debut album in 1960 was basically my introduction to folk music and activism. I shouldn’t be surprised, but I always marvel at multi-talented creatives who thrive on a cross fertilization of genres.

Stacey Abrams
Alice Walker
Coretta Scott King

In addition to Joan, musicians I admire who also paint include Bob Dylan, Paul McCartney, Tony Bennett, Joni Mitchell, David Bowie, Patti Smith, Grace Slick, Ronnie Wood, Ringo Starr, Cat Stevens, Miles Davis, and John Mellencamp.

Kamala Harris

See more Mischief Makers as well as portraits of Friends and Icons at Joan Baez Art. I like all the little backstories for each painting. You can also purchase prints or catalogs there.

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