For a really nice idea wonderfully fulfilled, Yolen retells very
familiar tales in versions lively, brief and energetic: Little Red Riding
Hood, The Little Mermaid, Cinderella and a number of others. Her daughter,
Stemple, adds recipes to each tale, sometimes with tenuous connection
but always with humor. These are great recipes for French toast, carrot
soup, lemon chicken, mashed turnips that are straightforward,
relatively easy to make with adult and child working together and good to eat.
Measurements
are given in American and British amounts and possible substitutions
are noted and suggested. The colorful, whimsical illustrations hit just
the right note both in full-page versions and smaller vignettes; for
instance, "The Magic Pot of Porridge" shows a small house with a roof
tilted crazily due to porridge pressure. Notes on the stories and on the
recipes fill sidebars, and these are clear, accurate and engaging to both
young and older readers. -- Saturday, July 15 2006, Kirkus Review.
Get your teeth into a literary feast by Jane Doonan, TES Editorial
Fairy Tale Feasts: A Literary Cookbook (Tradewind Books �17.95) is a winter warmer for the soul and stomach, with cosy retell-ings of tales from Brer Rabbit to Cinderella, each with a thematic (American) recipe, inviting participation by young sous-chefs, from breakfasts involving cream and a griddle to pumpkin tartlets. The tales have source notes for adults with a more academic interest. A handsome package with family appeal and naive illustrations of somewhat startling stridency.
Times Online
Looking to get your kids cooking but don't want to
shell out big bucks for them to learn the finer points
of pasta? Try it the old-fashioned way ? cook with
them. Cookbooks aimed at children and their parents
have become a growing publishing niche. Here's a
selection of some of the latest.
Children's author Yolen teams up with her daughter in
this beautiful cookbook and storybook. Yolen retells
classic tales while Stemple offers recipes to match.
Recipes include Little Red Ridinghood's Picnic Basket,
Seaweed Stuffed Shells in honor of the Little Mermaid
and Carrot Soup with a connection to Brer Rabbit. The
book includes sidebars about the creation of the
stories and the history of the foods. - By Victoria Brett For The Associated Press. McCall Magazine, March 14, 2007
The fairy tales here are categorized by meal:
breakfasts, lunches, soups, dinners and desserts, and
each tale within each "meal" is accompanied by a
recipe. On offer for breakfast, among others, is the
tale The Magic Pot of Porridge. Following quickly is a
barebones recipe for Perfect Porridge, enough for an
individual serving but perhaps a trifle skimpy in a
domain often inhabited by hungry bears, if not hungry
children.
Illustrations for tales and recipes are full of verve
and colour, and the same can be said for the well-told
tales themselves. The recipes are not uncomplicated,
though: many require a rather daunting batterie de
cuisine (including sharp knives), several ingredients
and any number of steps. Still, the concept is an
intriguing one. Favourite tales to be read aloud and
accompanying meals cooked � deux might be Cinderella's
Pumpkin Tartlets, Snow White's Baked Apples and The
Little Mermaid's Seaweed Stuffed Shells with Tomato
Sauce -- for ordinary mortals, ingredients of the last
include jumbo pasta shells, ricotta cheese and spinach
(seaweed). - The Globe and Mail
Fairy Tale Feasts: A Literary Cookbook is a winter warmer for the
soul and stomach, with cozy retellings of tales from Brer Rabbit
to Cinderella, each with a thematic (American) recipe, inviting
participation by young sous-chefs, from breakfasts involving cream
and a griddle to pumpkin tartlets. The tales have source noted for
adults with a more adademic interest. A hadsome package with family
appeal and naive illustrations of somewhat startling stridency.
--London Sunday Times December 3. View
the article
Mother And Daughter, Who've Co-written 14 Books, Appear At UConn Fair
November 9, 2006. By CAROLE GOLDBERG, Courant Books Editor
Children�s book author Jane Yolen doesn�t much like to cook, but her daughter
Heidi E. Y. Stemple loves to spend time in the kitchen.
The two collaborated on Fairy Tale Feasts: A Literary Cookbook
for Young Readers and Eaters (Interlink, 2006), a book filled
with fairy tales and folklore from around the world, all of which
contain references to food. To accompany the tales, Stemple created
recipes to match the tale�s themes. For instance, Cinderella merits
a pumpkin tartlets recipe and Brer Rabbit, one for carrot soup.
The tales and accompanying recipes are appropriate for children
ages 7 to 12�and while kids can attempt some of the recipes on
their own, most are designed to be done with a parent. SLJ spoke
with Yolen to find out how she came up with the idea for the book,
and what it was like to write as a mother-daughter team.
SLJ Talks to Jane Yolen about Fairy Tale Feasts Staff -- 8/16/2006
This article originally appeared in SLJ's Extra Helping.
How did you come up with the idea of matching food and fairy tales?
It�s always been a family joke that there are three kinds of books
I�ve never written: one was a sports book, one was hard science,
and one was a cookbook. Then I wrote a picture book called Moonball
(S & S, 1998); it�s about baseball. Clearly, I had already done
sports. We knew I was never going to do hard science. I�m also
not a cook, but I love cookbooks. [My daughter] is a great cook
and the idea that sprang to mind was why don�t we do a cookbook?
I said, �I�ll do a cookbook with you if I don�t have to do any
cooking.� I did a lot of the tasting.
How did you pick which tales to include?
Some of the fairy tales, you knew right away, like "Cinderella,"
because of the pumpkin, and "Stone Soup" was an obvious choice.
I realized that there were areas of the world I hadn�t touched,
food I hadn�t touched. So I read a lot, looking for a food connection.
I showed Heidi what I had, and she laid it out so it made sense
as a cookbook. She showed me where there were holes. She would
say, �We need a couple of soups or another dessert.� She had the
idea to shape it as a cookbook.
Did you test the recipes?
Heidi would do a recipe somewhere around 5 to 10 times before
she let a child near it. Then, she had a child working with her.
[Her] children are 12 years apart. These are recipes that the
family cooks together. Some are meant for children to do by themselves,
some are meant more for an adult to do.
What are your favorite recipes in the book?
The two recipes that I like best are the chocolate mousse and
the carrot soup, which were originally my recipes, but which Heidi
made better. She was testing the chocolate mousse recipe so often
that her [two daughters finally] revolted and said, �No more mousse.�
What was it like working with your daughter?
I love working with my daughter. This is our 14th book together.
We�ve done picture books�we even did an adult book together. We�re
very collegial, critical but collegial. The very first book we
worked on, she was a little tentative about offering a critique.
She said, I think this needs to be redone�and the editor said,
�Yes.� Now she�s as strict with me as I am with her!
Are you planning to cook one of the recipes for dinner tonight?
I had food poising over the weekend in Las Vegas. I�m eating apple
sauce. |
