American children’s books | Cotsen Children’s Library

Little Jack Horner caught in the act by Jessie Wilcox Smith

In honor of little Jack Horner, here is a menu for a holiday dessert buffet concocted from children’s cookbooks in the Cotsen collection. The recipes, as prepared by some of the best-loved characters in children’s literature, have been edited for length, but were not tested in Cotsen’s curatorial or outreach kitchen.

From Easy Steps in Cooking, or Mary Frances among the Kitchen People, written and illustrated by Jane Eayre Frye. Oakland, CA: Smithsonian Co., c1912. (Cotsen 40860)

CHRISTMAS DESSERT BUFFET

Pepparkakor

Inspired by Astrid Lindgren’s Pippi Longstocking

From Astrid Lindgren, Kaenner du Pippi Langstrump? Illustrated by Ingrid Nyman. Stockholm: Raben & Sjoegren, 1947. (Cotsen 52735)

3 1/2 C. flour; 2 tsp. ginger; 2 tsp. cinnamon; 2 tsp. cloves; 1 tsp. baking soda; 1/2 tsp. salt; 1/2 C. dark corn syrup; 1 tsp. grated orange zest; 1 C. butter; 1 C. sugar, 1 large egg, lightly beaten; pearl sugar

Whisk together dry ingredients in a bowl. In a small saucepan, warm the butter and sugar, stirring until melted. Cool to room temperature, then whisk in the egg. Pour over flour mixture and stir until blended. Form dough into ball, wrap tightly with two layers of plastic wrap and chill overnight. Preheat over to 375 degrees With a lightly floured rolling pin, roll out dough on a lightly floured kitchen floor to 1/4 inch thickness. Using a star cutter, cut dough into cookies. Put stars on baking sheets covered with parchment paper and sprinkle with pearl sugar. Bake until edges begin to brown, about 7-8 minutes. Cool on baking sheets for 5 minutes, then transfer to wire racks.

Thanks to Epicurious for this recipe.

*****

Blackberry and Apple Meringue

Arabella Boxer, The Wind in the Willows Country Cookbook (1983). (Cotsen 15424)

From Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows. Illustrated by E. H. Shepard. London: Methuen, 1970. (Cotsen 32085)

1 large cooking apple; 50 g. (2 oz) granulated sugar; 450 g. (1 lb. blackberries); juice of one lemon; 2 egg whites; 75 g. (3 oz) superfine sugar

Heat the oven to 150 degrees C (300 degrees F or Gas Mark 2) Peel and core the apple and cut into thinnish slices. Put the apples in a pan with 2 T water and the granulated sugar. Cook gently, covered, for 4 minutes, then add the berries, return to the simmer and cook for 1 minute. Remove from the heat and add the lemon juice. Tip into a pie dish. Beat the egg whites until stiff, fold in the superfine sugar, and pile over the fruit, covering the dish entirely. Bake for 30 minutes, then cool for about 30 minutes before serving with cream.

*****

Hidden Window Dessert

Carolyn Keene, The Hidden Window Mystery. New York: Grosset & Dunlap, c1958. (Cotsen)

1 package EACH of cherry, orange, lemon, and lime gelatin; 1 C. pineapple juice; 1/4 C. sugar; 1 1/2 Tbsp. melted butter; 12 graham crackers, crushed; 4 C. whipped cream or other whipped topping

In a saucepan, boil enough water to make 1 cup. This means you must start with a little more than a cup. Dissolve the cherry gelatin in this. Stir well. Add 1/2 cup cold water and pour gelatin into a ice tray with no divider. Do the same with the orange and lime gelatin separately. (Use the same pan, but rinse it each time.) In the same pan again. boil the pinapple juice with sugar. Dissolve the lemon gelatin in this. Add 1/2 cup cold water. Let set in a large mixing bowl to the syrupy stage. Fold in the whipped cream. When firm, cut the cherry, orange, and lime gelatins into cubes. Fold them into the lemon gelatin mixture. Grease a springform pan. Stir melted butter into the crushed graham crumbs and spread on the bottom on the pan. Pour in the mixture. Chill 12 hours. You’ll have many colored windows in each slice of cake!

Mrs. Tiggy’s Tipsy Pudding

Margaret Lane, The Beatrix Potter Country Cookery Book (1983, c1981).

Beatrix Potter’s prickly little washer woman from The Tale of Mrs. Tiggy Winkle.

1 large spongecake; 125 ml. (1/4 pint) sweet sherry; juice of an orange; 75 g. (3 oz) superfine sugar; 250 ml. (1/2 pint) double cream; raisins; 100 g. (4 oz flaked almonds)

Cut a hollow on the underside of the cake, keeping the bit for later. Fill the hollow with the sherry and orange juice; pour the remaining wine and juice over the top. Refrigerate overnight, spooning the mixture over the cake from time to time. In the morning, replace the bit of cake in the hollow. Split the almonds into narrow bits and brown lightly in the oven. Stick them all over the cake. Use the raisins for nose and eyes. Whip the cream stiff and fold in the sugar. Pile in peaky dollops all around the cake and serve.

*****

Treacle toffee from Hagrid

Christmas at Hogwarts as imagined by Mary de Grandpre.

75 g. (3 oz) Golden Syrup; 75 gg (3 oz) black treacle or molasses; 150 g. (6 oz) brown sugar; 75 g. (3 oz) butter; 1/4 tsp. cream of tartar

Line a 6 x 8 inch baking pan with non-stick parchment. Measure all ingredients into a deep, heavy-bottomed saucepan. Place over medium heat and stir occasionally until the butter is melted and sugar dissolved. When the mixture is smooth and nicely combined, bring to a rolling boil. When the mixture reaches 140 degrees C/ 285 degrees F on the candy thermometer (analog or digital), pour carefully into the pan. For even pieces, wait until the toffee is cool enough to hand, but leaves a slight impression if poked with a finger (15- 20 minutes). Cut into the toffee deeply enough to leaves lines and when it has cooled completely, break along the lines. For toffee that will break your teeth, let it cool completely, then break into pits with a hammer or rolling pin. Store in an airtight container with parchment in between layers.

With thanks to BBC Food

*****

Boston Cooler

Nika Hazelton, Raggedy Ann and Andy’s Cookbook (c1973). (Cotsen 28282).

Endpapers for Johnny Gruelle, Raggedy Ann in Cookie Land. Joliet, Wisconsin: P. F. Volland & Co., c1931. (Cotsen)

12 oz. can root beer; 4 small scoops vanilla ice cream

Pour the root beer into two glasses. Carefully put two scoops ice cream in each glass. Serve with a long spoon and a straw.

And happy holidays to all!

For readers needing a stronger sugar rush, read junk food in picture books…

The hero of Jan Le Witt’s The Vegetabull. London: Collins, 1956. (Cotsen 14993)

Vegetables, those inanimate edible objects, are the stars of fewer stories for children than creatures with legs, antennae, feathers or fur. Here are some interesting vege-tales In honor of the Thanksgiving holiday, in which the gigantic specimens did not meet their ends in creamy gratins and buttery purees…

Aunty Root’s luxuriant trailing leaves make a nice contrast to the elaborate border of carrot greens. Max Froehlich, “Die Ruebentante,” on page 285 in Heim der Jugend, edited by Adolf Cronbach and H. H. Ewers. Berlin: Siegfried Cronbach, 1905. (Cotsen 12147)

“Die Ruebentante” –or Aunty Root–was the creation of Max Froelich, who seems to be unknown except for the work he published in Heim der Jugend: Ein Jahrbuch fuer Kinder und Eltern (1905). In this cautionary tale, a stout lady turnip of a certain age goes for a walk on a moonlit night, trips over over two potatoes in the dark and tumbles down into the mud, unaware of the moon grinning in the heavens. “Don’t wear your slippers outside” is the blindingly obvious moral of this ridiculous story.

The next vegehero is of such majestic proportions as to inspire shock and awe. Vladimir Radunsky’s The Mighty Asparagus (2004) was honored with a New York Times Best Illustrated Book for that year even though a child might ask a parent why the asparagus makes the little king so nervous or how come the queen likes the big stalk so much? Perhaps the judges thought the nudge-nudge, wink, winks would be over the children’s heads and not spoil the adult reader’s pleasure in the text. Likewise the good-natured liberties taken with the paintings of Piero della Francesca, Andrea Mantegna, Perugino, and several other Renaissance artists … Here is the fold-out plate showing the full grandeur of the asparagus.

The fold-out plate folded (panels 1 and 4). Vladimir Radunsky, The Mighty Asparagus. New York: Silver Whistle/ Harcourt, 2004. (Promised gift)

Panels 2 and 3.

Panel 4.

Panels 5 and 6, in which the musicians sing the ballad of the asparagus.

The Mighty Asparagus is, of course, a fractured version of the venerable folk tale of the turnip and Brian Alderson’s telling illustrated by Fritz Wegner is one of the most enjoyable of the many versions. A poor farmer finds himself the proud cultivator of the most prodigious, round, unblemished specimen ever seen in those parts. Such a “right champion turnip” can only be fit for a king, so once the farmer and his family manage to pull it out of the ground and heave it onto a wagon, off they go to the castle. The king is so impressed with this “most champion turnip” that he fills the farmer’s cart full of gold.

Page [15] in Brian Alderson, The Tale of the Turnip. Illustrated by Fritz Wegner. Cambridge: Candlewick Press, 1999. Inscribed by the author to Lloyd E. Cotsen. (Cotsen 53048)

Now when the rich squire gets wind of his neighbor’s good luck, he is so consumed with jealousy that he must take the finest horse in his stable, who is worth more than a thousand turnips, and present it to the king, confident of receiving an even bigger and better reward. The squire gets his money’s worth in turnips all right, as the new owner of the right champion vegetable.

With badgers in bright Russian folklorist costumes, Jan Brett gives her picture book of “The Turnip” a new twist. By eliminating the greedy resentful neighbor, she focuses instead on the communal effort of pulling the turnip out of the frozen field. The successful conclusion of this Herculean labor is celebrated with singing and dancing.

Cover design for Jan Brett, The Turnip. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 2015. (Cotsen)

Taking a hint from Helen Bannerman’s Little Black Sambo, Mother Badger grabs her griddle and gets down to making a mountain of turnip pancakes to warm everyone up. It seems unlikely that a savory Chinese or Korean turnip pancake was on the menu, so I like to imagine that she whipped up a kind of latkes, made from half grated potato and half grated turnip, which would taste equally good with butter and syrup or sour cream and smoked fish. If you are still feeling hungry after Thursday’s overindulgence, there are recipes for either kind of turnip pancake on the Internet.

The holiday season is officially declared open!

Cotsen Children’s Library

Princeton University

Category Archives: American children’s books

Vegetables in Picture Books from Mighty Asparagus Spears to Monstrous Turnips