Children's Books discussion

For the month of June we will be exploring "Culinary Delights" through picture books. This them can encompass food across cultures (such as My Mom Loves Me More Than Sushi), books with food protagonists (Little Pea), books about enjoying food--even in some humorous or fantastical ways (Gregory The Terrible Eater),
and books about actually cooking/baking (Crêpes by Suzette‎). We will stay away from actual cookbooks because they are not technically "picture books" but it would be great to include books that talk about yummy food and then give recipes in the back (Bring Me Some Apples and I'll Make You a Pie: A Story About Edna Lewis or How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World)

Now that you have a sense for the theme, it's time to VOTE for the FIVE BOOKS that you'd most like to read with the group in June. Please POST A COMMENT in this thread listing your top five choices from this list.

Voting ends on May 23rd. Thanks! :-)

Please choose five from this list:

My Mom Loves Me More Than Sushi

Little Pea

Gregory The Terrible Eater

Crêpes by Suzette‎

Bring Me Some Apples and I'll Make You a Pie: A Story About Edna Lewis

How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World

Food Hates You, Too and Other Poems

Full, Full, Full of Love

Little Cliff and the Porch People

Jalapeno Bagels

Fannie in the Kitchen : The Whole Story From Soup to Nuts of How Fannie Farmer Invented Recipes with Precise Measurements

A Medieval Feast

Applesauce Season

Dim Sum for Everyone!

The Baker's Dozen: A Counting Book

The Very Hungry Caterpillar

Green Eggs and Ham

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs

Stone Soup

Armadilly Chili

More Pies!

The Sugaring Off Party

Dumplings are Delicious

The Ugly Vegetables

Grandma's Gumbo

The Pancake That Ran Away: A Picture Book

The Donut Chef

The Red Lemon

An Apple Pie for Dinner

If You Give a Mouse a Cookie

If You Give a Cat a Cupcake

If You Give a Moose a Muffin

If You Give a Pig a Pancake

Socks for Supper

Bread and Jam for Frances

Spoon

Cupcake

Haluhalo Espesyal

Cora Cooks Pancit

Eddie's Kitchen and How To Make Good Things to Eat

In the Night Kitchen

Scrambled Eggs Super!

Ratatouille Too Many Cooks

Strega Nona

The Little Red Hen

Piggie Pie!

Mama Provi And The Pot Of Rice

Growing Vegetable Soup

Babies Can't Eat Kimchee!

I Will Never Not Ever Eat a Tomato

How My Parents Learned to Eat

Three Stalks of Corn

Everybody Bakes Bread

Everybody Cooks Rice

The Lighthouse Keeper's Lunch

Cranberry Christmas

Trouble at the Dinosaur Cafe

I'll add some others later, but I wanted to mention one of my favorite picture books, Full, Full, Full of Love by Trish Cooke, a preschool-age picture book about a big family meal at Granny's house. And while I'm thinking about it, I'll add Little Cliff and the Porch People by Clifton L. Taulbert with beautiful illustrations by E. B. Lewis about a whole community contributing to make very special candied sweet potatoes. I don't know how easy these books are to find, but they are both very wonderful books.

And I just remembered Jalapeno Bagels by Natasha Wing, where a child with a Jewish father and a Latina mother decides what food to take to Interational Day. Great story!

Mmm, I'm getting hungry! ;-) Thanks for the great suggestions!

I love this thread and suggestions my son has something called a book buffet coming up at school. I guess you bring a dish to match your book. We were thinking the book if you give a mouse a cookie.

Here are a few possible non-fiction selections. I have not read these, but I was doing a bit of research for this on Amazon, and these might work.

Fannie in the Kitchen : The Whole Story From Soup to Nuts of How Fannie Farmer Invented Recipes with Precise Measurements
A Medieval Feast
Applesauce Season
Dim Sum for Everyone!
The Baker's Dozen: A Counting Book
Let's Eat: What Children Eat Around the World

And, here are some fiction picture books about food. The first two are classics and I love them, but the others I have not read yet.

The Very Hungry Caterpillar (I love this book)
Green Eggs and Ham (and ditto for this)
Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs
Stone Soup
Armadilly Chili
More Pies!
The Sugaring Off Party
Dumplings are Delicious
The Ugly Vegetables
Grandma's Gumbo
The Pancake That Ran Away: A Picture Book
The Donut Chef
The Red Lemon
An Apple Pie for Dinner

Abigail wrote: "Brenda: that's a great idea! Many of the books in that series - If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, If You Give a Moose a Muffin, If You Give a Pig a Pancake, [b..."

Abigail, I realised that myself when I was doing research, and food is definitely featured in many folk and fairy tales.

I love all these book ideas. I do have many on these lists already. Especially those on Gundula's list and Brenda's.
Two that I really love are Socks for Supper and Bread and Jam for Frances
Two newer ones I have come across are Spoon and Cupcake

In searching, I also came across these titles. I haven't read either. The first is written in both English and Filipino. It does look interesting and fun with an enchanted kitchen.Haluhalo Espesyal and this one Cora Cooks Pancit also about Filipino cuisine complete with a recipe.

We love Eddie's Kitchen and How To Make Good Things to Eat about a whole family helping to prepare the food for a party. The illustrations are lovely (reminding me of a modern shirley hughes) and the story is often played out in our house - the kids are so inspired to cook when they read the story.

Another one I loved when I was a kid is In the Night Kitchen though I guess it's somewhat "controversial" now given the nudity. But, gosh, as a kid I just thought that was one of the funny parts of the book and I absolutely loved the adventure and the baking!

Kathryn wrote: "Another one I loved when I was a kid is In the Night Kitchen though I guess it's somewhat "controversial" now given the nudity. But, gosh, as a kid I just thought that was one of the ..."

I think that's a good choice, and I don't think that just because it's somewhat controversial, is any reason to consider not nominating it. Sorry, but what is the North American hang-up with all forms of nudity? In Europe, there is never that much fuss made and I've seen some perfectly lovely Astrid Lindgren film adaptations which all showed brief instances of children bathing in the nude or running around in the nude, all perfectly innocent, and completely child-friendly.

How sad! Well, I'll definitely add "In the Night Kitchen" to the nominations--although it might be one a lot of people have already read. We'll see :-) I am so excited about all of these nominations--I see a lot of books that I'm going to add to my personal "to read" list if they don't make the top five votes!

About the above mini conversation: It's ridiculous!

I've got In the Night Kitchen on my to-read shelf. Wouldn't mind being nudged.

Well, many of our family photo albums show us children naked and they are wonderful and completely innocent pictures, and anyone who would dare call these sexual or pornographic is just plain wrong and misinformed. And, if Kathryn puts In the Night Kitchen on the list, I for one will vote for it, not only because I think this controversy is so ridiculous, but mainly because I have actually never read the book (oops) and am interested.

I guess that's something which needs to be discussed. There are many picture books which feature food, but not all of them have food as the main focus.

Abigail wrote: "Is food the main focus, though? That would probably be the determining factor, for me. Which isn't to say that I think it shouldn't be read, of course."

Well, it's been years since I read it, but as I recall the little boy in "In the Night Kitchen" has this fantastic dream world of a baker's kitchen--there are measuring cups and mixing bowls and he bakes up a fabulous creation.

I think the topic of "Culinary Delights" is broad enough that hopefully we can bring in all the aspects of what the culinary arts represent. For me, a good part of that is not only the food itself but the creativity and sheer excitement that go into cooking and baking (especially as a kid, it was almost like magic putting batter in the oven and having this big fluffy cake come out!) I think that there are certainly books that feature food that may have a different theme in mind but as long as the food is a key aspect, it should work for our purposes (such as our group read this month Too Many Tamales no doubt about it the tamales are a key aspect of the story, but the theme is one about family togetherness and honesty).

Kathryn wrote: "Abigail wrote: "Is food the main focus, though? That would probably be the determining factor, for me. Which isn't to say that I think it shouldn't be read, of course."

Well, it's been years since..."

I think that's a good point, Kathryn, and the idea of a phantasy baker's kitchen should fit right in with the theme of cooking/baking.

It may be a little too familiar to most people, but what about Green Eggs and Ham?

I don't know which ones will be picked, it would be fun if they would make a 5 course meal!

Crystal wrote: "I don't know which ones will be picked, it would be fun if they would make a 5 course meal!"

Good idea if the books are among the best nominees.

Another book that occurs to me, that might not be so well known (despite it's link to a successful film) and which is most definitely all about wonderful food is Ratatouille Too Many Cooks - I found it in a remaindered book shop and couldn't believe it as it's a gorgeous book with amazing illustrations and will definitely make you hungry when you read it :-)

Lisa wrote: "Crystal wrote: "I don't know which ones will be picked, it would be fun if they would make a 5 course meal!"

Good idea if the books are among the best nominees."

Agreed! :-)

And, Zoe, I really liked the "Ratatouille" movie and am glad to know the book is good, too. Yay!

I think there are quite a few ratatouille spin off books, and I've wondered (but never got round to checking) whether this one actually came before the film - the illustrations are not directly taken from the film.

I have been reading the posts for a few weeks, but this is my first communication. I adore the book, Strega Nona, which features a magic pasta pot that overflows. I used it many times with school age children and asked what their magic pot would produce, somethings it was food and sometimes not. This title really goes with all the "magic pot" stories found in the folktales of the world. Perhaps sometime we could do "magic pot" stories. Probably Strega Nona doesn't really fit for this topic, but is truly is a great story. Also it is good for the "older children picture books".
Also Weston Woods did an animation of this title which is probably more delightful with the Italian folk music and the flowing pasta.

Hi Janet! Welcome, and thanks so much for posting :-) I loved "Strega Nona" and think it would definitely be suitable. In a critical review it even mentions that it shows the "agony and ecstasy of pasta power" Any book about PASTA POWER certainly deserves to be considered for June's theme ;-> Thanks for the suggestion!

The "Strega Nona" books are all wonderful, especially the original Strega Nona with her magic pasta pot!

Several more suggestions for the Culinary section:

I've made some edits to make it easier to view this list.

I second the nomination of Ugly Vegetables by Grace Lin

Everybody Bakes Bread and Everybody Cooks Rice both by Norah Dooley (Links are in post below by Wilhelmina

Little Red Hen - any version - there are tons of great ones although Cook-a-Doodle Doo has a whole new twist with fabulous illustrations and a yummy recipe for strawberry shortcake at the end although the shortcake is kind of heavy, not light with the usual twinkle of sugar.

I was thinking of the Strega Nona story, too. Plus de Paola also wrote Merry Christmas, Strega Nona. The story of the mess Big Anthony makes of Strega Nona's annual Christmas feast is well worth the read.

Piggie Pie! - this one's absolutely hilarious - about a witch with a desperate craving for piggie pie and her search for the pigs to cook
Mama Provi And The Pot Of Rice - a little girl is ill and her grandmother visits neighbors on every floor to provide her with sustenance from multiple cultures. It's a terrific story.
Growing Vegetable Soup
Babies Can't Eat Kimchee!
I Will Never Not Ever Eat a TomatoCook-a-Doodle-Doo!
How My Parents Learned to Eat - not really cooking but a lovely connection between cultures
Merry Christmas, Strega Nona
Three Stalks of Corn - wonderful classic story with an abuelita who comes to her granddaughter's school and teaches the kids to cook

Barbara wrote: "I don't know how all of you got your titles connected to links to the books in Goodreads but if someone will instruct me, I'd be happy to fix my post. "

Barbara, Above each blank box where we type our messages is a link that says add book/author. The default when you click it is for book but you can click over to author whenever. Once you click that, a box will appear where you can type in the title of the book(s) and the books that match will show up in a list below, each with an add book button. You can click that. Each book/author will appear after the end of the entire text message, not where your cursor is. So, to edit a message, you need to copy and paste the results. You can also go to any book's page and click on the share link in the upper right hand corner of the page and copy and paste that whole link; that will also create a book title that's a link.

Barbara, It's also not at all necessary that you do that with your current post but hopefully it's helpful information for future posts.

Everybody Bakes Bread and Everybody Cooks Rice are both excellent. (It's the "add book/author" search just above the box for your comment, Barbara.)

Wow! You guys got on this fast. Thanks.

I just love reading the titles of these books you all listed. I can't wait for next month! I will certainly be adding some of these books to my to-read.

Abigail wrote: "Janet wrote: "I have been reading the posts for a few weeks, but this is my first communication..."

Welcome to the group, Janet! Thank you for posting! Like some of the others, I think [book:Streg..."

Images! I can't even begin to figure that one out. It's possible we could ask the people who run Goodreads. One of the co-founders was a panelist at our Children's Literature Council of Southern California event last Saturday. They really know how to work this site!

Hi Barbara,

The Goodreads Feedback group (yes, I know how to make that a pretty link but it takes a bit more effort than I'm willing to do this late):

http://www.goodreads.com/group/show/1...

is a good place to post for help about such questions/instructions, but, as Abigail said above, sometimes it takes times to understand even clear instructions. Abigail was very patient with me, explaining a few times how to make a pretty link to this group, which I can do now (have on a document now as a copy & paste to make it easy & quick): Children's Books group.

By the way, Goodreads Feedback is a good group. Members help out just as often as staff.

I'm so excited for next month's reads! (Even as I am still making my way through this' month's reads and loving them!) It's so wonderful having all these great suggestions and finding books I never would have read otherwise!

:-)

Another one for the mix, as I read it for the first time last night with my daughter - The Lighthouse Keeper's Lunch - a funny story about the ends some people will go to to have a delicious lunch. Beautifully illustrated!

Cranberry Christmas by Wende Devlin and Harry Devlin is a lot of fun. There is a mystery involving a secret cranberry bread recipe that is mysteriously stolen. The recipe is given at the end for children who might want to try it. The same authors have written Cranberry Easter, Cranberry Halloween, Cranberry Valentine, Cranberry Thanksgiving, and a few others.

I'd like to nominate Trouble at the Dinosaur Cafe by Brian Moses

I loved Cranberry Thanksgiving and didn't realize there was an entire series! :-)

And I also love lighthouses, and dinosaurs, so the other noms sound great, too!

Thanks :-)

It's now time to VOTE! Please post a comment with your top five choices from the master list at the top of this thread :-)

Another dinosaur picture book with food as its theme is How Do Dinosaurs Eat Their Food?; the description sounds really fun.

Three suggestions, two of which are oldies, but goodies.
Growing Vegetable Soup; Ehlert always does imaginative illustrations.
May I Bring a Friend?and
The Funny Little Womanare award winning oldies that I think are still great for reading aloud.

Janet wrote: "Three suggestions, two of which are oldies, but goodies.
Growing Vegetable Soup; Ehlert always does imaginative illustrations.
May I Bring a Friend?and
[book:The Fun..."

Those look so interesting! I must admit I have not read any of them despite them being classics so I'm glad to see them here! :-)

I really enjoyed Growing Vegetable Soup by Lois Ehlert, and agree it would make a good selection for this month, as would most of the nominated books, all the ones I know.

Gundula wrote: "Another dinosaur picture book with food as its theme is How Do Dinosaurs Eat Their Food?; the description sounds really fun."

Ah, yes. My son had that book and LOVED it!

My choices are:

In the Night Kitchen

Stone Soup

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs

Applesauce Season

How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World

And, as a sixth choice I have Dim Sum for Everyone!

Here are my top five choices:

If You Give a Pig a Pancake
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
Stone Soup
If You Give a Mouse a Cookie
If You Give a Moose a Muffin

On the master list, several pairs of books are combined instead of listing separately:

"How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World" & "Food Hates You, Too and Other Poems"

"Little Cliff and the Porch People" & "Jalapeno Bagels"

"The Baker's Dozen: A Counting Book" & " The Very Hungry Caterpillar"

"Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs" & "Stone Soup"

"The Pancake That Ran Away: A Picture Book" & "The Donut Chef"

"Bread and Jam for Frances" & "Spoon"

"Mama Provi And The Pot Of Rice" & "Growing Vegetable Soup"

"I Will Never Not Ever Eat a Tomato" & "How My Parents Learned to Eat"