SLJ Talks to Jane Yolen about Fairy Tale Feasts

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Laura B. Weiss -- School Library Journal, 8/16/2006

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.

Photo credit: Jason Stemple

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.