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Mollie Katzen

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Pretend Soup and Other Real Recipes: A Cookbook for Preschoolers and Up Hardcover – March 1, 1994

by Mollie Katzen (Author), Ann Henderson (Author)

4.6 379 ratings

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Celebrating 25 years of vegetarian recipes and called "the gold standard for chidren's cookbooks" by the New York Times, Pretend Soup, by celebrated Moosewood chef Mollie Katzen, offers children and families easy recipes for healthy, fun, and delicious food.

Mollie Katzen, renowned author of The Moosewood Cookbook, and educator Ann Henderson bring the grown-up world of real cooking to a child’s level. Children as young as three years old and as old as eight become head chef while an adult serves as guide and helper. Extensively classroom- and home-tested, these recipes are designed to inspire an early appreciation for creative, wholesome food. Whimsical watercolor critters and pictorial versions of each recipe will help the young cook understand and delight in the process. Just consider all that can be explored in the kitchen: counting, reading readiness, science awareness, self-confidence, patience, and, importantly, food literacy. Pizza, after all, does not come “from a telephone.”

You and your child can have great fun finding this out!

Reading age

2 - 6 years, from customers
Print length

96 pages
Language

English
Grade level

Preschool - 2
Dimensions

8.31 x 0.48 x 10.25 inches
Publisher

Tricycle Press
Publication date

March 1, 1994
ISBN-10

1883672066
ISBN-13

978-1883672065
See all details

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Honest Pretzels: And 64 Other Amazing Recipes for Cooks Ages 8 & Up

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From the Publisher

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Pretend Soup has rapidly become the children's cookbook classic, and no home or daycare center should be without a copy. Mollie Katzen, author of the Moosewood Cookbook, and educator Ann Henderson have created a masterpiece formatted for grown-ups--with written instructions, suggestions, and caveats--and for kids--with illustrated, easy-to-follow pictures. The recipes are both tasty and healthy, and the quotes from kids are very funny (Matthew: "This is so good, I can't even say a word.") While safety is stressed and tips and warnings are included, Katzen and Henderson always stress the fun in food preparation. "Spills are what sponges are for. So keep plenty of sponges around, and a good time will be had by all!"

From School Library Journal

PreSchool-Grade 3-The theme of this fine cookbook is that cooking is a many-splendored thing. The book's purpose is "to enable very young children to cook as independently as possible under the gentle guidance of an adult partner." Each of the 17 recipes appears twice, once in words and once in full-color pictures. The child is the focus here: attention is paid to physical ability, comfortable work levels, and variety of tactile experience. A long list of skills and attitudes children can gain from cooking supports the idea that the process is more important than the product. Quotes reflect the young cooks' keen observation and joyful participation. Parents' Nursery School's Kids Are Natural Cooks (Houghton, 1974) also uses natural foods and has the same intent as this title. That book is arranged by season and contains more recipes; Pretend Soup focuses more on the processes. Anyone who works or plays with young children would benefit by having both.
Carolyn Jenks, First Parish Unitarian Church, Portland, ME
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Katzen (of Moosewood Cookbook fame) teamed up with educator Henderson to produce this cookbook directed to very young children. It includes wonderful input from kids who've found their way into the kitchen: "I thought it was going to be gross, but it turned out good!" "I smell some pizza, dudes!" But the real joy is in the shared experience the book promotes. Each recipe begins with instructions to grown-ups, who function mainly as kitchen helpers and safety monitors. Kids can really do most of the work themselves by referring to simple, carefully sequenced sketches designed especially for them. As far as the recipes are concerned, kids and parents will be in for a nice surprise, for there's not a hot dog or chicken finger in evidence. Instead, we're talking real food--popovers, homemade lemon-lime soda pop, noodle soup, and quesadillas--delivered in recipes nicely scaled down for children to manage easily. Stephanie Zvirin

Review

"Mollie Katzen’s cookbooks for preschoolers, Pretend Soup and Salad People, are works of child-friendly genius. . ."
--Slate.com

“Play Points: 5 (out of 5). A delectable starter!”
--Nick Jr. Magazine

“This is the best book to date on cooking with preschoolers.”
--Scholastic Parent & Child

“A winner!”
--School Library Journal

“You can toss a coin whether to give this charming cookbook, for preschoolers and up, to your favorite kid or to a food-loving adult who deals with children.”
--San Francisco Chronicle

From the Publisher

160,000 copies in print!

About the Author

ANN HENDERSON is a credentialed early childhood education specialist and is co-director of the Child Education Center in Berkeley, California.

MOLLIE KATZEN is a cookbook author and artist who has profoundly shaped the way America eats. Mollie is a consultant and cocreator of Harvard's groundbreaking Food Literacy Project. She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

SALAD PEOPLE

The Critics Rave:
We’re gonna make people out of food! --jack
I’m gonna make my sister. --theo
Maybe I should make a carrot zipper. --simone
Strawberry hair! --serafina

To the Grown-ups:
Children will get deeply involved with this concept, which is all about creating a miniature person out of cheese, fruit, vegetables, and perhaps even pasta. In addition to being a cross between an art project and a great snack or lunch, this recipe presents a wonderful opportunity to introduce new foods--or at least new food combinations--to young children.
There is no right or wrong way to make a Salad Person. In fact, if your child doesn’t feel like making something representational, it’s fine to make a food design instead. In either case, let your youngster guide the experience as inspiration occurs.

Cooking Hints and Safety Tips

Children can help with some of the preparations, such as slicing strawberries and bananas, grating carrots, or spreading peanut butter into celery. They also enjoy helping place all the various components in small bowls and setting everything up.

The Salad Person’s face can be made with cottage cheese or yogurt. Children of color might prefer to use coffee or chocolate yogurt so the Salad Person can look like family.

You can firm up any flavor of yogurt by placing it in a paper-lined cone coffee filter over a bowl for a few hours--or even overnight. The whey will drip out of the yogurt, leaving behind a firmer curd, often referred to as “yogurt cheese.” Keep in mind that you’ll end up with only about 60 percent of the original volume.

The amounts are quite flexible, so just estimate the quantities.
Children’s Tools: Cutting boards and child-appropriate knives (if the children are going to help with the cutting); spoons for scooping; a plate and fork for each person

Salad People Recipe
Cored pear halves, peel optional (fresh and ripe, or canned and drained)
Cottage cheese or very firm yogurt
Strips of cheese (cut wide and thin, to be limbs)
Sliced bananas (cut into vertical spears as well as rounds)
Cantaloupe or honeydew
(cut into 4-inch slices)
Celery sticks (plain or stuffed
with nut butter)
Shredded carrots
(in long strands, if possible)
Sliced strawberries

1) Place a pear half in the center of each plate, flat side down.

2) Arrange a round scoop of cottage cheese or very firm yogurt above the narrow top of the pear, so that the cheese or yogurt looks like a head and the pear looks like a torso.

3) Create arms and legs from strips of cheese, banana spears, melon slices, or celery sticks (stuffed or plain).

4) Create hair, facial features, hands, feet, buttons, zippers, hats, and so forth from any combination of the remaining ingredients.

5) Name it and eat!

yield: Flexible! Just put out a lot of food. Store the leftovers for next time, which will likely be soon.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Tricycle Press; First Edition (later printing) (March 1, 1994)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 96 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1883672066
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1883672065
Reading age ‏ : ‎ 2 - 6 years, from customers
Grade level ‏ : ‎ Preschool - 2
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.21 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 8.31 x 0.48 x 10.25 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #25,867 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #14 in Children's Diet & Nutrition Books (Books)
- #36 in Children's Cookbooks
- #109 in Children's Reference Books (Books)

Customer Reviews:
4.6 379 ratings

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Mollie Katzen

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Mollie Katzen is a cookbook author and illustrator/designer, best known for her best-selling classics, Moosewood Cookbook (a 2007 inductee into the James Beard Cookbook Hall of Fame) and The Enchanted Broccoli Forest. Her nine other titles include a trilogy for children (Pretend Soup, Honest Pretzels, and Salad People) dubbed “the gold standard of children’s cookbooks” by the New York Times. Mollie has worked as a creative consultant for plant-based recipes and menus, most notably with Harvard University Dining Services, where she has served as a consultant on vegetarian cooking since 2003. She is a popular public speaker, specializing in culinary-medical conferences (in addition to other venues), helping to educate medical professionals on the links between food choices and health and prevention. Mollie’s newest book is The Heart of the Plate: Vegetarian Recipes for a New Generation (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, September 2013).

http://www.molliekatzen.com

Customer reviews

4.6 out of 5

379 global ratings

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K. M. Warr

My four-year-old thinks she's a chef

Reviewed in the United States on March 13, 2013

Verified Purchase

I've had both this book and Salad People since my daughter was about 6 months old (I'm an avid cookbook collector and hoped she'd want to join in as she got older). She's been helping me in the kitchen since she was old enough to stand and dump things into a bowl (I even bought her a plastic lettuce knife so she can chop vegetables for me). I didn't actually present these cookbooks to her, though, I just put them on my cookbook shelves and let her discover them on her own.

Last week, she started leafing through them. I got home from work one day and Pretend Soup was open to the popover recipe. We talked about them, and she asked if she could make them. I said of course, and we made them for breakfast Saturday morning. they were so easy and a big hit!

I love the way this book is laid out. At the beginning of each recipe, there's a page or two of text for the adults about how the recipe should go. Then, the following two pages have numbered step by step illustrations of how the recipe should be put together. This makes it both easy and educational - kids learn sequencing (step one comes before step two, etc), counting, measuring, etc. They aren't actual photographs, but the pictures, while simple, are detailed enough that for the most part, my daughter can tell what they are. There are also words at the bottom of each step for clarification.

We've tried three recipes so far - popovers, green spaghetti, and pretend soup. We didn't have the right fruit for the pretend soup (it calls for bananas and raspberries), so we talked about how a cook can substitute ingredients if you don't like something or don't have it in the kitchen. We ended up substituting blueberries and sliced strawberries, and it was perfect!

She can't wait to make more - every day she asks if she can make this recipe or that one. I told her by the time she's five, she'll probably have dinner waiting for us on the table when I get home every night!

10 people found this helpful

Helpful

S. McGinnis

Cooking with the grandkids

Reviewed in the United States on June 24, 2023

Verified Purchase

I gave Pretend Soup to my grandkids (ages 3 and 5) when I came to visit for a few days. They loved the picture recipes, and they really enjoyed cooking together. We made quesadillas, popovers, carrot coins, and, of course, pretend soup. I noticed that some of the recipes had a bit more sugar than I like, but we just adjusted the recipe and it came out fine. I liked the tips for making things easier for smaller children, for example when cutting veggies or cracking eggs. The book was such a hit that I sent one to a friend’s daughter a few days ago.

Helpful

gypsy-spirit mother

hands-down a "must" for little cooks

Reviewed in the United States on January 27, 2012

Verified Purchase

My daughter, who is not quite 6 yet, loves to help and cook in the kitchen. She asked for her own cooking instruments for Christmas and that's what Santa brought her. She loves rushing in to put on her apron, pull out her ladybug silicon spatula, rubber spoon, matryoshka doll measuring cups (from a MoMa collaborative available at JC Penney's), and colored measuring spoons. All she needed was a good cookbook.

I thought this would be a daunting task since the ones I had picked up to look at at Williams-Sonoma were not simple enough for her. My friend told me about this series of cookbooks for children so I checked out "Salad People" from the library and bought this one, "Pretend Soup". We haven't cooked from them yet so I can't compare how the recipes from the two books are similar or different.

but, I can tell you that I sat down with my daughter to show her the book and she is over the moon. She loves the drawings of each step with simplified instructions (like "1 cup" and it shows pouring milk into the bowl, etc.) She is so excited.

And, more importantly, all of the recipes in this book are things that she will eat. We're not over-the-top health nuts in our home but I am very careful to expose my children to a wide variety of ingredients and ethnic foods. Maybe my children won't be a fan of using zucchini for the pizza faces, but that's an easy substitution. The bulk of everything is very appealing to them and healthy. Yes, I will have to help with much of it and there are parts where the instructions call for a dough that mom or dad made before hand, but I think that's reasonable. If I want my child to learn to cook, then I will have to be setting that example first.

We love it and I love the diet and recipes in the cookbook. I love how easy it is for her to follow. And I love that it sets a clear layout for how we will be interacting when we cook together (I make the dough, she pats it out and puts toppings on, etc.)

24 people found this helpful

Helpful

Jenny

advertised as new but got a used book. book content is great.

Reviewed in the United States on June 28, 2023

Verified Purchase

The cookbook itself is wonderful. I was disappointed to receive a used book, because the description said it was new. It has a children's sticker on the front, marks from a pen, and marks on the back of the book as wekk.

Reviewed in the United States on February 20, 2024

Verified Purchase

I am so excited about this book. I am giving it to a soon to be 1st time grandfather who is a retired teacher, loves to cook and collects cookbooks.it can’t get much better than that! I can’t wait to see his reaction.

Helpful

Kay Shepherd

Great for pre-readers!

Reviewed in the United States on January 24, 2009

Verified Purchase

I got Pretend Soup and Salad People and More Real Recipes: A New Cookbook for Preschoolers and Up for my four-year-old niece for Christmas, along with a child's pink apron and chef's hat. They were a hit! She really likes to help in the kitchen and I looked at a lot of childrens' cooking books before deciding on these. Other books required the child to be a reader already or had lots of recipes for desserts and sweets and such. These books seemed to have healthier recipes in them than some of the others on the market.

The layout for these books is this: each recipe is four pages long. The first two pages are for the adult involved to read. The second two pages are simply drawn step-by-step visual instructions for the child to follow. Mollie Katzen does the artwork in these books and it's very charming.

M. Katzen has another book for children, Honest Pretzels: And 64 Other Amazing Recipes for Cooks Ages 8 & Up , which I think is for a little older crowd...I look forward to getting that one for my niece when she's ready for it.

6 people found this helpful

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Top reviews from other countries

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ACL

Great book for cooking with kids

Reviewed in Canada on August 1, 2019

Verified Purchase

The best parts of this book are the drawings that act as your child's recipe. Instead of reading a list of steps the drawings show your child how to make the recipe, from cracking eggs to stirring the flour.

COMBES

un peu déçue

Reviewed in France on August 26, 2016

Verified Purchase

Ce n'est pas si abordable que ça, je pensais que les illustrations permettraient de simplifier les choses, mais ça reste un livre sympa.

Translate review to English

Mrs H Simpson

This book has been fantastic for my 3 year old

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 18, 2015

Verified Purchase

This book has been fantastic for my 3 year old. He loves following the pictures. He is clear when it's a grown up job and it's very much us helping him. The pride he has when he's finished and we all eat his food is the best to see. He also has started calling himself chef. Brilliant book - highly recommend it.

MamaFan

Very easy read my 6 years old boy can follow the ...

Reviewed in Canada on July 6, 2016

Verified Purchase

Very easy read my 6 years old boy can follow the instructions and make some snacks and drink with his friend, with just a bit of our assistance.

Debra

Very good

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 2, 2016

Verified Purchase

Bought as gift - great for mums wanting to involve their kids

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