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We are extra lucky today as not one but two experts have concocted a gourmet feast of their Top 10 favourite multicultural stories about food.  It seems fitting that authors Grace Lin and Jama Rattigan should each select food as their theme, since they have both written stories revolving around tasty recipes – as you will discover by looking at each of their menus.  In fact, each has put a book by the other on her menu, while unaware that the other was cooking up their own recipe, so it seems fitting that we should bring you the whole spread for you to gorge on at a single sitting – and it’s also interesting to see which books come up as double portions…

Jama Rattigan is the author of Dumpling Soup illustrated by Lilian Hsu-Flanders (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 1998);  The Woman in the Moon: A Story from Hawai’i illustrated by Carla Golembe (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 1996); and Truman’s Aunt Farm illustrated by G. Brian Karas (Sandpiper, 1996).  As well as her website (check out the recipe for Dumpling Soup), Jama also hosts the truly delectable Jama’s Alphabet Soup, a must-visit blog for anyone interested in children’s books, food, or both at the same time.

Grace Lin‘s latest book is Starry River of the Sky (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 2012), the much-awaited companion novel to Newbery Honor Where the Mountain Meets the Moon (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 2009).  She has written and illustrated many books for a wide age-range of children, including The Ugly Vegetables (Charlesbridge Publishing, 1999) and Dim Sum for Everyone (Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2001); and picture books she has illustrated include Where on Earth is my Bagel? by Frances and Ginger Park (Lee & Low Books, 2001).  You can read our 2010 interview with Grace here, and view some of her beautiful artwork in our Gallery here and here.  And do check out Grace’s website and blog, where she has a fantastic giveaway on offer in celebration of the launch of Starry River of the Sky.

Top 10 Favorite Multicultural Picture Books about Food by Jama Rattigan

Whether it’s a big platter of noodles, warm-from-the-oven flatbread, fried dumplings, or a steamy bowl of Ugly Vegetable Soup, there’s nothing tastier than a picture book about food. You eat with your eyes first, then step into the kitchens or sit at the tables of friends and family from faraway places, all of whom seem to agree that love is the best seasoning for any dish, and food tastes best when it is happily shared. These tasty tales always make me say, “More, please!”

~ Apple Pie Fourth of July by Janet S. Wong and Margaret Chodos-Irvine (Harcourt, 2002)

~ Aunty Yang’s Great Soybean Picnic by Ginnie Lo and Beth Lo (Lee & Low, 2012)

~ Bee-Bim Bop! by Linda Sue Park and Ho Baek Lee (Clarion, 2005)

~ Cora Cooks Pancit by Dorina K. Lazo Gilmore and Kristi Valiant (Shen’s Books, 2009)

~ Duck for Turkey Day by Jacqueline Jules and Kathryn Mitter (Albert Whitman, 2009)

~ Hiromi’s Hands by Lynne Barasch (Lee & Low, 2007)

~ Hot, Hot Roti for Dada-ji by F. Zia and Ken Min (Lee & Low, 2011)

~ The Have a Good Day Café by Frances Park and Ginger Park, illustrated by Katherine Potter (Lee & Low, 2005)

~ The Ugly Vegetables by Grace Lin (Charlesbridge, 1999)

~ Too Many Tamales by Gary Soto and Ed Martinez (Putnam, 1993)

 

My Top Ten Food-Themed Multicultual Books by Grace Lin

In my family instead of saying hello, we say, “Have you eaten yet?” Eating and food has always been a successful way to connect us to culture, familiar as well as exotic–perhaps because it’s so enjoyable! So these books about food can be an appetizer to another country, a comfort food of nostalgia or a delicious dessert of both. Hen hao chi!

~ Hiromi’s Hands by Lynne Barasch (Lee & Low, 2007)

~ Ganesha’s Sweet Tooth by Sanjay Patel and Emily Haynes, illustrated by Sanjay Patel (Chronicle Books, 2012)

~ Bee-Bim Bop! by Linda Sue Park,illustrated Ho Baek Lee (Clarion, 2005)

~ How My Parents Learned to Eat by Ina R. Friedman, illustrated by Allan Say (Sandpiper, 1987)

~ Apple Pie Fourth of July by Janet Wong, illustrated by Margaret Chodos-Irvine (Harcourt, 2002)

~ Everybody Cooks Rice by Norah Dooley, illustrated by Peter Thornton (Carolrhoda Books, 1992)

~ Yoko by Rosemary Wells (Hyperion, 1998)

~ Auntie Yang’s Great Soybean Picnic by Ginnie and Beth Lo (Lee & Low, 2012)

~ Peiling and the Chicken-Fried Christmas by Pauline Chen (Bloomsbury, 2007)

~ Dumpling Soup by Jama K. Rattigan, illustrated by Lillian Hsu Flanders (Little, Brown, 1998)

The Middle Country Public Library in Centereach NY, USA, currently has an exhibition entitled “The Creative Worlds of Lynne Barasch” . Ongoing until May 2010 the exhibit features several of Lynne’s books with interactive stations relating to each title. Lynne will appear at the library this Saturday, January 16th, at 1 PM for lower school age children and at 2PM for teens. Click here to read PaperTigers review of Lynne’s most recent book First Come the Zebra and here to read our review of her book Hiromi’s Hands, published in 2007 by Lee and Low Books.

What do a little girl who dreams of becoming a sushi chef and a young boy whose ambition is to be the world’s best surfer have in common? Both are the subjects of two exceptional picture books, and both have been chosen by Kiriyama Prize judges to be on the list of Notable Books for 2008.

Hiromi’s Hands by Lynne Barasch and Surfer of the Century by Ellie Crowe have still more in common. They are both true stories, they have both been published by Lee & Low Books, and each one was reviewed in the past year by Papertigers. In the tradition that Lee & Low Books have made their trademark, both books have the arresting illustrations and clarity of text that make them attractive read-alouds, yet are interesting and informative enough to appeal to older readers–including Kiriyama judges!

This year’s list of Notable Books features three memoirs that, while not specifically intended for young adults, may well appeal to adolescent readers. Stealing Buddha’s Dinner by Bich Minh Nguyen, The Thorn of Lion City by Lucy Lum, and Hapa Girl by Maylee Chai, all in different ways and in different places, tell very personal, and at times emotionally wrenching, stories of growing up and finding a place in the world.

In the more than ten years that the Kiriyama Prize has been in existence, books for young readers have appeared on the Notable Lists, which can be found on the Kiriyama web site. For readers of all ages, this is a splendid place to look when hunting for reading recommendations.

Yes, I’m two and a half years late to this thread, but tag clouds are indeed the new mullets! I  couldn’t resist enabling the tag cloud widget for WordPress. You can see the tag cloud on the left of this blog, if you scroll the page. So far I’ve tagged three entries just to goof around.

I had other things on my plate today… but it was smart to upgrade WordPress 2.3 on a Sunday after church, because it broke, and that gave me several hours to focus on this problem. Things should be o.k. now, and there’s nothing wrong with WordPress 2.3; the error was between my ears.

Before upgrading, I set up a test site (which is what you’re supposed to do) but I cut some corners (which is what you’re NOT supposed to do). Naturally, since I cut corners, I was punished. I was also punished for guessing what the problems would be (I was fixated on the idea that the Cutline theme would create issues) and not inspecting the list of known problems carefully enough.

The whole reason I waited to upgrade was to gage other folks’ experiences, and if I had paid attention beyond the “LGTM” comments (Looks Good To Me), I would have thought more about the key change to the WordPress category/taxonomy structure, which would have forced me to slow down, disable every plugin in my old installation, upgrade, and then reenable every known compatible plugin one by one. Plus I would have had the time to find substitute plugins for favorites that aren’t working correctly.

What went right: not rushing out to upgrade right away; putting up a test site and testing my theme and some plugins; following the discussion at the Cutline theme site; waiting for a day when I had spare time to address issues (and not the day before a trip, either!); staying collected enough to take a term from the database error message (wp_post2cat) and run it through Google, which lead me straight to the WordPress Codex.

What went wrong: not testing everything that needed to be tested; not doing a simple compatibility check with the very helpful lists of compatible, incompatible, and iffy plugins; focusing on my guesses, rather than relying on simple methodology; rushing to get the “cool upgrade” rather than focusing on maintaining a working blog.

It may not have seemed that I rushed, because I certainly wasn’t in the first wave of installations, but I didn’t have a need that trumped doing things right the first time.

My punishment fit the crime: I lost several hours on a nice Sunday to upgrading software. But I have been set free under the early-release program, and will write for an hour, go for a long walk/run, and then write some more.

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Do our paths cross, gentle readers (and writers)?

October 11, 11 a.m. ET: One-hour web presentation from the comfort of my office, “Death to Jargon,” for the Outagamie Waupaca Library System (no, I don’t know how to pronounce that)

October 18, 8:30-12: “Library 2.0,” Williamsburg Public Library, Virginia–this will feature Olde Tyme 2.0, New and Improved 2.0, 2.0 successes, 2.0 failures, 2.0 head-scratchers, and 2.0 “Please don’t make me fly around in Second Life in this teensy miniskirt” examples.

October 26 - November 1: Internet Librarian, Monterey, California. I fly in Friday (wearing sensible slacks and clogs, no teensy miniskirt), stay at a cheap motel friend’s house close to Fry’s electronics store in Palo Alto, wake up, geek out, drive to the Bay Area, visit friends in San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley, and Santa Cruz, eat real Asian food, stuff a duffel bag with goodies from Trader Joe’s, then drive to the conference earrrrrrrrly Monday 10/29. I don’t have any responsibilities other than to be All Ears And Eyes (and Keyboard-Tapping Fingers). Where shall I trick-or-treat?

November 4 - 7: defrag, one uber-cool conference that I foolishly agreed to speak at. Sure, I want to be on a conference agenda also featuring Esther Dyson and David Weinberger. “Hi, my name is Two Buck Chuck, and I’m here to talk about agronomy and astronomy… no wait, folksonomy and taxonomy… hey, why are you leaving the room?” My stage fright notwithstanding, if you’re interested in attending defrag but are on the fence about it, drop me a note at kgs at freerangelibrarian dot com and let me persuade you. (Also, I had a thought while out running today–I try to have one thought per day, whether I need to or not–and it was this: for faceting and library data, technology has trumped taxonomy.)

November 8-9: Jim Rettig’s ALA Presidential Implementation Task Force, ALA Headquarters, Chicago. I think we get to suggest how he spends his time and money during his year as ALA prexy.

November 12-15: NISO NCIP Meeting, Atlanta. Whee, I get to travel on the Monday of a three-day weekend! What a terrific way to honor America’s veterans (including me). I promise to drive my tripmate crazy on the drive north by singing “Danger Zone” the whole way up there. The meeting itself should be fascinating (it’s about a standard intended to help attach the hip bone to the thigh bone in library software). Then I swing around and drive home just long enough to drop off the rental car so that I can scoot to the coast that night for…

November 16, all day: PLAN Workshop, “Writing for the Web,” Panama City, Florida. A great way to wrap up several weeks of learning and travel–my favorite new best thing to teach, and the beautiful Florida coast. (A mere stone’s throw from the equally beautiful Destin outlet stores.)

December 19-23: Personal writing retreat (yes, this is a good time to be away–Sandy will be very busy; Christmastime is big business for her). After I was rejected by a famous writing center, I thought, I don’t need a writing center to have a writing retreat. A laptop, a cooler of healthy food, and a motel room on the coast will do me fine. I can then roll back into Tally like Pa coming home in that blizzard in one of the Little House on the Prairie books… look, it’s me, and I’ve brought you an orange and a clothespin doll! (My other thought was to make the writing shed happen during this time; in any event, it’s my own special Writing Advent.)

We also have a personal trip factored in here, to New York City. It’s been several years and I miss it; Sandy has been back once or twice since then, but I haven’t. Our needs are pretty simple: a trip or two to Zabar’s, riding the bus around the city, good ethnic food, a long pass through Century 21, walking down the Upper West Side, prowling all the places we could take for granted when we lived in or near New York.

Then life is pretty quiet until it’s time for ALA Midwinter, in mid-January.

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