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Rice
Bee or Wasp? Butterfly or Moth? Cheetah or Leopard? Readers will learn to distinguish common animals while learning about their appearances, habitats, and behaviors with this fun, interactive series! Each book also includes picture labels, reading tips for teachers and parents, a table of contents, an index, and a picture glossary.
- GenresNonfiction
24 pages, Hardcover
Published November 1, 2019
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
August 11, 2020
Rice, rice baby! Join this starch observer – we’ll call him Bryce - as he leads the reader on a global (and tasty) journey of rice production and consumption.
Rice is one of the world’s most popular food staples with more than half of the globe’s population including rice as part of their main meal every day. This hearty grain “has fed more people over a longer period of time than any other crop” (6) – and it has a special place in the history of Crowley, Louisiana where life continues to be “rice and easy.” China and India grow about half the world’s rice supply, which is not surprising given that rice originated in Asia about 10,000 years ago. Our grainy tour guide explains that rice’s historic journey took the crop from China to Korea, to Japan, India, Indonesia, and the Philippines before finding its way to Africa, Europe, South America, and the United States. Rice has set foot on nearly every continent where it has been transformed into a unique cultural delicacy at each stop. In China, “a rice dumpling called zongzi is traditionally eaten during the Dragon Boat Festival…held each spring,” (11) while in Africa, they enjoy a rice bread cake called mkate wa sinia. But rice has not just found a place on our plates, oh no. The Diola people of Senegal see rice as a sacred object, Koreans once used rice as a form of currency, and sticky rice was even used to build the Great Wall of China!
There are a few hundred different kinds of rice that are grown today because there are so many different places where rice is farmed. But all of these kinds of rice fall into one of three categories: long grain, medium grain, and short grain. Long grain rice is good for side dishes and you can find short grain rice in a lot of sushi. If you want to make some perfect white rice, Bryce has a recipe for that on page 18. In fact, this book includes several recipes for some of the traditional and more surprising rice dishes that can be found around the world, such as champorado (Filipino chocolate rice pudding), Africa’s mkate wa sinia, and nasi goren (a traditional Indonesian stir fry).
Filled with countless tidbits on how each region has embraced rice and illustrated with brilliant color photographs, this book is a visually stunning introduction to such a common culinary ingredient. Readers of all ages will come away having learned something new. There is a glossary to offer readers richer definitions of complex or foreign terms that could not be defined in the text and some helpful hints for the curious little chefs out there who want to try their hand at some of the book’s recipes. While there is no bibliography or suggested reading list, the book does state there is so much more to explore “beyond the grain.” Clearly every country and continent detailed here has a rich and delicious history just waiting to be discovered by the hungry young reader. Other books in this series produced by World Book invite readers to take a bite out of chocolate, corn, garlic, and potatoes.
IL: MG BL: 6.0 AR Pts: 1.0 AR Quiz: RP
Rice is one of the world’s most popular food staples with more than half of the globe’s population including rice as part of their main meal every day. This hearty grain “has fed more people over a longer period of time than any other crop” (6) – and it has a special place in the history of Crowley, Louisiana where life continues to be “rice and easy.” China and India grow about half the world’s rice supply, which is not surprising given that rice originated in Asia about 10,000 years ago. Our grainy tour guide explains that rice’s historic journey took the crop from China to Korea, to Japan, India, Indonesia, and the Philippines before finding its way to Africa, Europe, South America, and the United States. Rice has set foot on nearly every continent where it has been transformed into a unique cultural delicacy at each stop. In China, “a rice dumpling called zongzi is traditionally eaten during the Dragon Boat Festival…held each spring,” (11) while in Africa, they enjoy a rice bread cake called mkate wa sinia. But rice has not just found a place on our plates, oh no. The Diola people of Senegal see rice as a sacred object, Koreans once used rice as a form of currency, and sticky rice was even used to build the Great Wall of China!
There are a few hundred different kinds of rice that are grown today because there are so many different places where rice is farmed. But all of these kinds of rice fall into one of three categories: long grain, medium grain, and short grain. Long grain rice is good for side dishes and you can find short grain rice in a lot of sushi. If you want to make some perfect white rice, Bryce has a recipe for that on page 18. In fact, this book includes several recipes for some of the traditional and more surprising rice dishes that can be found around the world, such as champorado (Filipino chocolate rice pudding), Africa’s mkate wa sinia, and nasi goren (a traditional Indonesian stir fry).
Filled with countless tidbits on how each region has embraced rice and illustrated with brilliant color photographs, this book is a visually stunning introduction to such a common culinary ingredient. Readers of all ages will come away having learned something new. There is a glossary to offer readers richer definitions of complex or foreign terms that could not be defined in the text and some helpful hints for the curious little chefs out there who want to try their hand at some of the book’s recipes. While there is no bibliography or suggested reading list, the book does state there is so much more to explore “beyond the grain.” Clearly every country and continent detailed here has a rich and delicious history just waiting to be discovered by the hungry young reader. Other books in this series produced by World Book invite readers to take a bite out of chocolate, corn, garlic, and potatoes.
IL: MG BL: 6.0 AR Pts: 1.0 AR Quiz: RP
Displaying 1 of 1 review