[splashy review + giveaway] How the Sea Came To Be by Jennifer Berne and Amanda Hall

September 15, 2023September 14, 2023 ~ jama ~ 22 Comments

Oh, the oceans they shimmer with such wondrous lives!
Our mysterious, beautiful sea
where so long, long ago, in the far distant past,
the first glimmers of life came to be.

Imagine a leisurely stroll along the beach, waves crashing on the shore, the ebb and flow calming, hypnotic, rejuvenating. Looking out at the horizon, you marvel at the crystalline water’s sweeping expanse, in awe of its magic and mystery.

Is there a nearby tide pool to explore? Will you be lucky enough to spot a starfish, baby octopus, hermit crab or sea urchin? What about colorful sea anemones, pesky barnacles, limpets, mussels or snails? This fascinating ecosystem teeming with marine life is but a microcosm of the world’s vast, ancient oceans — oceans where life on earth began billions of years ago.

With dynamic lyrical verse and breathtakingly beautiful art, Jennifer Berne and Amanda Hall tell the greatest evolutionary tale ever told in their magnificent new picture book, How the Sea Came To Be: And All the Creatures In It (Eerdmans BFYR, 2023). Their captivating account unfolds in three parts: The Birth of the Sea, The Birth of Life, and All That the Sea Came To Be . . . From Then to Now.

They first take us back some 4.5 billion years, when our very young planet was a fiery, volatile entity with molten lava exploding from within, comets and asteroids crashing down from the sky. The sizzling and simmering, bubbling and burbling continued for millions of years until the Earth finally began to ever-so-slowly cool.

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[lickalicious review] The Sweetest Scoop: Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream Revolution by Lisa Robinson and Stacy Innerst

September 12, 2023September 11, 2023 ~ jama ~ 31 Comments

At this very moment I am ~~eating~~ devouring a bowlful of Ben & Jerry’s Chocolate Fudge Brownie. There’s nothing like rich and creamy chocolate ice cream lovingly loaded with chewy brownie chunks to send you over the top. So decadent, maybe even a little sinful. Marry me, please.

I still remember when Cherry Garcia (another of my favorites) first came on the market in 1987. Not only was it darn good ice cream, it was named after a cool musician. Since then, I’ve enjoyed many a pint, and continue to be impressed by Ben & Jerry’s wacky innovative flavors, progressive core values and ongoing social activism. How wonderful that America’s most popular ice cream company is thoroughly committed to making the world a better place!

Since I didn’t know much about how Ben & Jerry’s actually got started, I was hungry to read The Sweetest Scoop: Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream Revolution by Lisa Robinson and Stacy Innerst (Abrams BFYR, 2022). This fun and inspiring story of teamwork, determination, and experimentation is a delicious testament to living the American Dream and makes me want to taste every single Ben & Jerry’s flavor. 🙂

It all began in 1963 when Ben Cohen met Jerry Greenfield in a Merrick, Long Island junior high school. Though Ben liked art and Jerry was into science, they enjoyed hanging out, found lots to do together, and shared a big love of eating — especially ice cream. One summer Ben even drove an ice cream truck while Jerry helped scoop the ice cream.

After high school they attended different colleges. Ben dropped out after sophomore year to become a potter, while Jerry went on to graduate, only to be rejected by all the medical schools he applied to. Down but certainly not out, they touched bases again in NYC and decided to go into business together. No question it would involve food.

They scrapped their initial idea of making and delivering bagels after learning bagel-making equipment was too expensive. Luckily, making ice cream was cheaper. Burlington, Vermont seemed like a good location since it was a college town without any ice cream shops, and everyone knows students love ice cream. 🙂

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a trio of King Charles III picture books

April 25, 2023April 24, 2023 ~ jama ~ 4 Comments

Don your sparkly tiaras and ermine robes! Today we’re celebrating the upcoming coronation of King Charles III with three recently published picture books about the green-planet-loving, lunch-skipping, kilt-wearing, cheesy baked eggs aficionado Charles Philip Arthur George.

Our “sovereign sandwich” consists of one meaty nonfiction title nestled between two light hearted tales, sure to satisfy kids’ curiosity about just who this man is and why his coronation is such an important moment in history.

While you’re reading about these kingly books, help yourself to a plum (Charles’s favorite fruit), and egg soldiers (he eats a boiled egg every single day). Enjoy!

1. THE KING’S PANTS by Nicholas Allan (Andersen Press, 2023).

You know how kids giggle whenever the word ‘underwear’ or ‘underpants’ appears in a book? Well, British kids are similarly set off at the mere mention of ‘pants,’ since for them pants = underpants.

And there are a LOT of them in Nicholas Allan’s hilarious, irreverent yarn. The King, it seems, is quite a natty dresser. Not only does he own many crowns, he has drawers full of pants. One would, of course, need a pair of pants for every occasion: Everyday, Weekend, Coronation (he simply could NOT be crowned without those).

Well, one time when he goes on a trip, Cedric, the Keeper of the Pants, puts the King’s pants in a sack which gets mixed up with the Royal Mail sack. Chaos reigns when the following day the King’s subjects receive pants in their letter boxes instead of mail. Quelle surprise!

Undercover police were sent to uncover the underwear. Sniffer dogs were used to track them down!

After all the pants are recovered and laundered, the King decrees that many more pants should be made for him to avoid any future accidents. Among the additions: Peace and War pants, International, Posh Royal, Meeting the People. He even has Space Pants fitted with emergency air bags, and Organic Pants which are edible in emergencies. When he goes to Windsor or Balmoral, he wears his Castle Boxer Shorts (the working drawbridge in front is very useful).

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[review + recipe] Chef Edna: Queen of Southern Cooking, Edna Lewis by Melvina Noel and Cozbi A. Cabrera

April 18, 2023April 15, 2023 ~ jama ~ 9 Comments

“One of the greatest pleasures of my life has been that I have never stopped learning about good cooking and good food.” ~ Edna Lewis

Picture this:

A group of African American family members and friends gathered outdoors around a long, white-clothed table covered with “warm fried chicken, thin slices of boiled Virginia ham, green beans cooked in pork stock, turnip greens picked that morning, potato salad with a boiled dressing, pickles, preserves, and yeast bread.”

For dessert? Mincemeat, lemon meringue and fried apple pies, along with coconut and black walnut cakes. Don’t forget the watermelon and cantaloupe, the freshly ground coffee to be drunk out of bowls.

*Miss Lewis, Culinary Ambassador and Grande Doyen of Southern Cooking.*

This is the kind of homemade, homegrown food beloved chef and cookbook author Edna Lewis grew up with. Her advocacy of this simple style of cooking using only the freshest in-season ingredients anticipated the natural foods, slow food, and farm-to-table movements, essentially changing the way average Americans viewed Southern cuisine.

*Beautiful painting of young Edna under the dust jacket!*

In Chef Edna: Queen of Southern Cooking, Edna Lewis (Cameron Kids, 2032), Melvina Noel and Cozbi A. Cabrera trace Edna’s life from her childhood on a Virginia farm, to her early days as a working single, then finally to her prominence as a restaurant co-owner and chef-de-cuisine in NYC.

Essentially, what Edna first learned about cooking and everything associated with it – family, friends, love, community, cultural heritage – established her identity and defined her life’s work, as she remained committed to preserving traditional Southern foodways while showcasing the seminal role African Americans played in the origins of this regional cuisine.

It all began on a farm in Freetown, Virginia, an African American community founded by Edna’s grandfather and two other freed slaves. From an early age, Edna participated in all aspects of farm life: milking cows, chasing chickens, picking wild greens and gathering berries. Edna especially loved cooking with her mother, Mama Daisy.

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nine cool things on a tuesday

February 7, 2023August 22, 2025 ~ jama ~ 12 Comments

1. Happy February! We’re celebrating the month of love with some of Lee White’s Valentine’s Day prints and cards.

You may be familiar with Lee’s work as a children’s book illustrator (Kate, Who Tamed the Wind; The Maine Coon’s Haiku, I Lived on Butterfly Hill). He’s also done commercial projects for clients such as Disney, Verizon, National Geographic and Marks & Spencer, and teaches painting via The Society of Visual Storytelling, an online art school for artists of all skill levels.