Cookbooks to Tempt Kids into the Kitchen

Do you have a child that wants to help in the kitchen or wants to try cooking on their own? Perhaps you just want to learn some more kid friendly dishes or are hoping to get some help from your children in the kitchen? The library has a wide variety of cookbooks in the children’s section. There are books that focus on ethnic food, special diets, celebrity chefs, and even some more unexpected themes. Check some out to help inspire or teach your children about cooking, and just might make cooking less of a chore and much more fun for you as well.

Noodlemania!: 50 Playful Pasta Recipes by Melissa Barlow, photographs by Zac Williams and illustrations by Alison Oliver.
The American-style recipes range from the everyday to the elegant, and the six chapters are divided according to the class of pasta needed for the recipes. Most ingredients are readily available, and the recipes are simple to make, given the adult supervision. Barlow adds twists to dishes to indeed make them playful (making robots out of macaroni and pretzels, etc.).

ChopChop: The Kids’ Guide to Cooking Real Food with your Family by Sally Sampson, photographs by Carl Tremblay.Simple, healthy, delicious dishes for children and parents to make together.

A Princess Cookbook: Simple Recipes for Kids by Sarah L. Schuette.
Provides instructions and close-up step photos for making a variety of simple snacks and drinks with a princess theme

A Pirate Cookbook: Simple Recipes for Kids by Sarah L. Schuette.
Provides instructions and close-up photos for making a variety of simple snacks and drinks with a pirate theme

One World Kids Cookbook: Easy, Healthy, and Affordable Family Meals by Sean Mendez. This healthy eating cookbook is aimed at encouraging young people to think about what they eat through emphasizing the importance of a balanced diet. It contains kitchen tips and suggests vegetarian substitutes to the meat recipes. One World Kids Cookbook aims to instill a passion for good, wholesome, healthy food as well as a passion for life. Includes fabulous dishes from around the world, from jollof rice to fajitas.

Salad People and More Real Recipes: A New Cookbook for Preschoolers & Up by Mollie Katzen.  Introduces children as young as three the basics of cooking.

Want even more ideas? Our variety of cookbooks is staggering. Here a few more notable samples of the culinary fare offered up on the library shelves: Chinese Food by Wendy Blaxland, The Young Chef’s Italian Cookbook by Rosalba Gioffre, The Kids’ Holiday Baking Book: 150 Favorite Dessert Recipes from Around the World by Rosemary Black, Cooking the Swiss Way by Helga Hughes with photographs by Robert L. and Diane Wolfe, Cool Raw Food Recipes: Delicious & Fun Foods without Cooking by Nancy Tuminelly, The Multicultural Cookbook for Students by Lois Sinaiko Webb and Lindsay Grace Roten, Paula Deen’s Cookbook for the Lunch-Box Set by Paula Deen with Martha Nesbit, illustrated by Susan Mitchell, Emeril’s There’s a Chef in my World!: Recipes that Take you Places by Emeril Lagasse and illustrated by Charles Yuen with photographs by Quentin Bacon, Grandpa’s Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs Cookbook written by Judi Barrett and drawn by Ron Barrett, Cool Nut-Free Recipes: Delicious & Fun Foods without Nuts by Nancy Tuminelly, Cooking Rocks!: Rachael Ray 30-Minute Meals for Kids by Rachael Ray and illustrated by Chris Kalb, Vegetarian Food by Susannah Blake, and Kids Cook 1-2-3: Recipes for Young Chefs Using Only 3 Ingredients by Rozanne Gold and illustrated by Sara Pinto.

Top 10 Library Downloads of 2013 : E-Books

Libraries are about more than physical books these days. More and more people are discovering the free downloadable books their library has to offer. Cheshire Library has over 4000 e-book titles and over 1500 audiobook titles in our collection. Here are some of the most popular downloads from our online e-book collection:

eBOOKS – Adult Fiction

1.   Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn
2.   Inferno, by Dan Brown
3.   Fifty Shades of Grey, by E L James
4.   The Heist, by Janet Evanovich
5.   Fifty Shades Freed, by E L James
6.   Fifty Shades Darker, by E L James
7.  A Game of Thrones, by George R.R. Martin
8.   The English Girl, by Daniel Silva
9.   The Racketeer, by John Grisham
10. Defending Jacob, by William Landay

         

 

eBOOKS- Adult Nonfiction

1.    Orange Is the New Black, by Piper Kerman
2.    Zealot, by Reza Aslan
3.    Lean In, by Sheryl Sandberg
4.    Wild, by Cheryl Strayed
5.    Unbroken, by Laura Hillenbrand
6.    Quiet, by Susan Cain
7.    Dad is Fat, by Jim Gaffigan
8.    The Power of Habit, by Charles Duhigg
9.    The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot
10. Behind the Beautiful Forevers, by Katherine Boo

Female Role Models in Young Adult Fiction

Raising a teenager is hard, but if you think back to actually being a teenager, it was even harder. There are so many influences in your life it can be hard to know who to trust, what to do, and how you are supposed to be feeling. As you might have guessed, I spent many of those years reading books about other teenagers and adults in order to discover if I was ‘normal’ and if the feelings and doubts I had made me weird. Finding books that can reassure girls and young women that they are powerful, they can be strong, and that there is nothing wrong with diverging from what society expects can be hard. Convincing those same girls that it is better than just alright to follow their hearts and trust in themselves is terribly difficult, but sometimes a book with a heroine that does just that can be a good start. Here are some books for the thirteen and older crowd that feature strong, positive, female role models.

The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale
On her way to marry a prince she’s never met, Princess Anidori is betrayed by her guards and her lady-in-waiting and must become a goose girl to survive until she can reveal her true identity and reclaim the crown that is rightfully hers. The Books of Bayern series continues with the sequel, Enna Burning and Hale’s Princess Academy series is also worth a read.

The Wee Free Men by Terry Pratchett
A young witch-to-be named Tiffany teams up with the Wee Free Men, a clan of six-inch-high blue men, to rescue her baby brother and ward off a sinister invasion from Fairyland. The Tiffany Aching series continues with A Hat Full of SkyWintersmith and I Shall Wear Midnight.

A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
Meg Murry and her friends become involved with unearthly strangers and a search for Meg’s father, who has disappeared while engaged in secret work for the government.
Meg’s adventures continue in the sequel, A Wind in the Door  and for a graphic novel version of this classic novel, check out A Wrinkle in Time: The Graphic Novel.

Flygirl by Sherri L. Smith
During World War II, a light-skinned African American girl “passes” for white in order to join the Women Airforce Service Pilots.

Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry
Lame and suddenly orphaned, Kira is mysteriously removed from her squalid village to live in the palatial Council Edifice, where she is expected to use her gifts as a weaver to do the bidding of the all-powerful Guardians.

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
Living with a foster family in Germany during World War II, a young girl struggles to survive her day-to-day trials through stealing anything she can get her hands on, but when she discovers the beauty of literature, she realizes that she has been blessed with a gift that must be shared with others, including the Jewish man hiding in the basement.

Lyddie by Katherine Paterson
Impoverished Vermont farm girl Lyddie Worthen is determined to gain her independence by becoming a factory worker in Lowell, Massachusetts, in the 1840s.

If you have a tween that is not quite ready to hit the young adult section or a teen willing to cross over into the juvenile fiction area, then some of these books might hit the spot; Inside Out and Back Again by Thanhha Lai, Weedflower by Cynthia Kadohata, One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams-Garcia, Out of My Mind by Sharon M. Draper, The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate by Jacqueline Kelly, Becoming Naomi Leon by Pam Muñoz Ryan, Number the Stars by Lois Lowry, The Game of Silence by  Louise Erdrich, The Breadwinner by Deborah Ellis, The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne Valente ; with illustrations by Ana Juan, Our Only May Amelia by Jennifer L. Holm, Esperanza Rising by Pam Muñoz Ryan, or The Green Glass Sea by Ellen Klages.

And as always, I am sure to have missed some fabulous books that offer female role models for teens and tweens. I know I let a few of my favorite authors out in the interest of space and a varied list.  If I missed your favorite, or one you would like to recommend to others, please let us know in the comments so fellow readers can add it to their lists.

Six Picks: Movies That Are As Good As The Book (Or Better!)

movieThe following movies have been deemed to be as good or better than the book they were based on.  What do you think?

the shiningThe Shining – the movie

The Shining – the book

silenceSilence of the Lambs – the movie

The Silence of the Lambs – the book

godfatherThe Godfather – the movie

The Godfather – the book

fightFight Club – the movie

Fight Club – the book

childrenChildren of Men – the movie

Children of Men – the book

bloodThere Will Be Blood – the movie

Based on the book Oil! by Upton Sinclair

Louise Reads: The Good House by Ann Leary

I happily dove into into The Good House. I’ve been a fan of Ann Leary (wife of comedian/actor Denis Leary) since her 2004 memoir, An Innocent, a Broad.  Her 2009 fiction debut, Outtakes From a Marriage, was equally enjoyable., and her blog, with peeks into her life with her family and menagerie of animals  in rural Connecticut, is a lot of fun to read. I am happy to report The Good House did not disappoint.

Leary’s second novel is told from the point of view of Hildy Good: 60-year-old realtor extraordinaire, alcoholic-in-denial, and lifelong resident of the quaint seaside town of Wendover, MA. Having lived more than half of my life on Massachusetts’ North Shore (where fictional Wendover is located), I was pleasantly surprised by how authentic the author’s portrayal of the area felt, the town is almost another character in the story.  As Wendover’s most successful businesswoman, Hildy knows how to work a room, bend the truth, and keep a secret. And there are secrets aplenty in Wendover. Soon, those secrets have Hildy drinking again (albeit alone, at home), and things spiral out of control from there.

As the novel progresses the story takes a dark turn, yet this book made me laugh out loud several times. Hildy’s voice has a dry wit that softens the sometimes difficult subject matter. Despite the fact that she gets less and less reliable as the novel progresses, Hildy can be quite a bit of fun (at first) when she’s off the wagon.  When she enlists a lonely newcomer in town as a covert drinking buddy, however, it sets off a series of events with dire consequences.

The Good House is a fantastic read, especially if you are partial to character-driven novels. The character portrayals in the book are so vivid you truly feel like you know this small town and its quirky but relatable inhabitants. Hildy is a fascinating, flawed character, and an interesting choice as narrator.  If you are an audiobook listener, I highly recommend the audio version read by Mary Beth Hurt – she was perfection as the voice of Hildy. On a related note, it’s been announced that The Good House is being adapted for the screen with Meryl Streep and Robert DeNiro set to star.  Not too shabby!

A recent review by The Examiner said of The Good House, “…humor meets harsh reality in this irreverent look at a non-recovering alcoholic navigating the murky waters of small-town Massachusetts. The Good House is a paragon of New England Fiction.” I would have to agree, it was wicked good – it gets 4 ½ out of 5 stars from me.