Emeril's There's a Chef in My World!: Recipes That Take You Places by Emeril Lagasse, Quentin Bacon (Illustrator), Charles Yuen (Illustrator), Quentin Bacon (Photographer)

From the Publisher

Chef Emeril brings you a taste of the world! He helped younger kids take their first steps into the kitchen with Emeril's There's a Chef in My Soup! Recipes for the Kid in Everyone and then kicked it up a notch for older kids and adults, too, in Emeril's There's a Chef in My Family! Recipes to Get Everybody Cooking. Now Chef Emeril is back with a cookbook that really takes you places!

You can start your travels in your own kitchen by exploring the meals, ingredients, and cooking styles enjoyed in different countries and regions. Hey, Chef Emeril knows that we're all part of one global family, and a great way to learn about other cultures is through their food! Once you're cooking international-style, you'll be ready to hop on a plane to China, Portugal, England, Greece, or Africa, just for a start!

This cookbook is for kids of all ages and adults to use together, with 75 recipes for daily meals, special occasions, and everything in between, along with cooking tips and safety precautions. You can make a meal with dishes from one region or mix it up for a truly international feast! Plus, Chef Emeril includes "Did You Know . . ." tidbits of cultural information behind some of the recipes.

• Try breakfast English-style with Toad in the Hole — and discover what the "toad" is!
• After tasting Mexican Broiled Corn, you might never go back to plain old corn on the cob again!
• Instead of going to a Chinese restaurant, cook your own Kung Pao Chicken and find out how this popular dish may have received its name!
• BLT Hot Dogs are a perfect twist of two American classics! But just how American are hot dogs, anyway?
• And don't forget to leave room for dessert! One bite of No-Bake Caribbean Rice Pudding and you'll want to know more about the flavors of the islands!

So, get ready, pack your bags — here's your passport to a whole new world of food!

Publishers Weekly

Kids can cook up a storm with these recipe books. Emeril Lagasse again kicks it up a notch with Emeril's There's a Chef in My World! Recipes That Take You Places, illus. by Charles Yuen, photos by Quentin Bacon, this time taking aspiring cooks around the world with 75 recipes: they can whip up torrijas (Spain's answer to French toast), egg drop soup from China, baklava from Greece and many other exotic dishes. Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Children's Literature

Third in Emeril's "There's a Chef" series, which includes There's a Chef in My Soup and There's a Chef in My Family, readers will enjoy a wide variety of recipes that make the world a smaller place. Emeril brings children into the wide world of cooking with a thorough introduction, tips on being a safe cook, the nuts and bolts and pots and pans you will need, a list of "Good Things to Know" (terms and techniques that even experienced cooks will enjoy), and even the secret recipe for "Baby BAM." Recipes are clustered by meals. "Destination Breakfast" has eight entries including scones, latkes, and huevos rancheros. "Sightseeing Snacks, Salads and Starters" offers nine recipes, including spanakopita, spring rolls from scratch, and empanadas. "Globe Trotting Soup and Sandwiches" has eleven entries. And then we journey to "Main Meal Masterpieces" with ten world favorites, "A Guide to Sides" (eight) and a "Bread Map" (six), ranging from "Challah" to nahn. "Sweet Snapshots" ends the book with sixteen desserts. Emeril appears on the opening page of each recipe with photos of a landmark from the featured nation, information on the cultural origins of the recipe, a flag, and lively illustrations. Recipe ingredients and tools are at the top of the facing page with clearly enumerated directions that include handy tips on when to get adults involved in the process. The back matter includes a web site guide related to products which Emeril plugs, a list of Emeril's restaurants, and a nicely formatted index. The endpapers includes access information for The Emeril Lagasse Foundation. Emeril is to cooking as Jack Prelutsky is to poetry. This would be appropriate in high school andmiddle school, as well as upper elementary, especially as an anchor resource for world studies and cross-cultural units.

VOYA

Superstar chef and celebrity Emeril Lagasse continues his string of cookbooks for young people and their grownups, this time with international flair. The seventy-five recipes included here cover everything from breakfast to dessert and span the globe-although admittedly with few stops outside of Europe, Asia, and the Americas. Emeril points out in his introduction that these recipes are more difficult than those in his previous cookbooks for youth and that each recipe is coded with icons recommending how and when adults should lend a hand. More than twenty pages of tips and techniques will come in handy for cooks of all ages and abilities and take some of the fear out of the more complicated recipes. The recipes are clearly written, with detailed ingredient and equipment lists, and information about the countries, ingredients, and recipes are written in the bubbly tone for which the chef is known. Unfortunately the only photographs throughout the book are of Emeril and touristy scenic shots of the different countries represented. Although Yuen's illustrations are bright and colorful, they are also cartoonish, and young cooks looking to see what a dish looks like or to verify if what they are creating is going well will have nothing with which to compare. Nevertheless this book is a must-buy for public libraries where it is sure to be as much of a hit with adults as with tweens and teens.

Joyce Adams BurnerCopyright 2006Reed Business Information. - School Library Journal

Gr 4 Up
There's a celebrity chef in this cookbook, and, judging by the frequent use of heavy cream, whole milk, butter, sugar, and cream cheese, he is apparently unaware of the childhood-obesity crisis. Each spread combines simple color illustrations of food with photos of corresponding international locales and Food Network chef Emeril mugging for the camera. The first 27 pages of cooking how-to and safety tips are followed by 75 recipes that include "Moroccan Couscous" and "Orange-Scented Chocolate Gelato." Europe, North America, and Asia are well represented, with little space devoted to Africa or Central or South America. The recipes are complicated, involving techniques like using a pastry bag and handling delicate phyllo dough and much work with sharp knives and pouring hot liquids; adult supervision will be crucial. Small "safety icons" included with each recipe indicate concerns like "handling hot objects" and "use of sharp objects," but the key to identifying the icons is buried in the introductory material. The ingredients are clearly listed, and the numbered directions have sufficient detail; a bit of historical or geographical information is included with each recipe. Many of the dishes call for the use of Emeril's branded seasoning and other food items, and two appendixes list his corporate sponsors' Web sites and the locations of Emeril's Restaurants around the United States. Libraries serving the chef's devotees will find this a useful addition for its browsing appeal, but be sure its shelfmate is Matthew Locricchio's The International Cookbook for Kids (Marshall Cavendish, 2004), a more balanced, truly kid-friendly book.

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