GARDEN SAFARI: VEGETABLE SOUP

Garden Safari: Vegetable Soup
Authors: Eluka Moore, Larry Puzniak and Marianne Welsh

Illustrated by: Kristen Gau

Close your eyes and take in the amazing aromas of the incredible ingredients that have been added to some simples stock to make vegetable soup created by some very special kids. Join the adventure, grab your own basket of vegetables and follow along as the Kitchen Club Kids invite you on this special mission. Calling all kids that love a good mission and adventure to come outside to this garden tilled with fresh vegetable to cook. Check out the amazing illustrations helping the project and the garden come alive. Take your basket, theirs being red, and let’s go on this Garden Safari along with the Kitchen Club Kids and check out what they decided to start with: First and foremost they needed a pot. A big one! How about two yellow onions that will be properly diced followed by cubing some blue potatoes and placing them in the pot with the onions? The fourth ingredient is one of my favorites: CELERY! Green and bright and crisp! This story is told in rhyme making it fun for kids and adults to read and enjoy. The illustrations make the vegetables come alive and you can smell their great fragrances just by looking at them and watching these kids prepare them for the soup. Next, let’s get some more color as we add orange carrots any rabbits favorite food. Crunchy and fun to eat and chew! I love carrots. What would vegetable soup be without some red, plump and ripe tomatoes? How about 6? So, we are up to step number 7, which is the most important and will help the soup come together what would be the broth and the golden chicken. Can you smell the amazing aromas as the ingredients are mixed by one of our Kitchen Club kids and the plot begins to thicken? Just like a mystery or thriller where you have to figure out the ending for yourself, finding out what steps 8, 9 and 10 are you will have to learn for yourself. Did they accomplish their goal? Is the soup delicious and tasty? What will they create next time? Keep counting and keep cooking in rhyme until next time! This book is great for anyone that want to learn how to make vegetable soup, work as a team and understand how to prepare and cut vegetables the right way. For this non-cook who never goes near a stove this was quite enlightening and just might get to try it out. The authors allow readers to recap the story in sequence form when list the steps from one to ten in picture form as the end of the poem. This allows even non-readers to understand the sequence of how to make soup. So, many lessons are learned: counting up to ten, sequencing, preparing vegetables in a safe way and working as a team to complete a task. The authors even printed out the Recipe for adults to have when making this soup with their child or even a Girl Scout or brownie troop. They even added other ingredients that might make the soup better. So, start cooking with a parent or older kids you can create your own Kitchen Club Group and recipes. This is a great series and I hope the authors will consider sending me more books to read and review. Colorful pictures and a story told in rhyme making it fun to read. This is one book my six year old niece wants to read and take to school to share with her teacher and her class. Garden Safari: Right outside your very door!
Fran Lewis: reviewer