What's cooking in Flowerville? Recipes from balconies, rooftops, and gardens by Felicita Sala

 This combination of story and recipes is similar to Prestel's title from 2021, Pie for Breakfast. Sala's green and brown-toned watercolors take readers to the container gardens, yards, and rooftops of Flowerville with corresponding recipes for the produce the people are growing and the seasons. I will freely admit that I would probably never eat anything included in this book, but I do enjoy reading the recipes and admiring the pictures of fruits, vegetables and gardens.

In spring, a diverse group of adults and children gather in a community garden and a brown-skinned, barefoot child is shown harvesting asparagus, along with a recipe for asparagus quiche. Jumping forward to July, a trailer camp with bare, dry ground is shown - but lush vines of cucumbers in containers with a recipe for tzatzika. In September, we go indoors to where a curly-headed parent with scruffy chin and a Pink Floyd shirt is making pear and ricotta pancakes for their two tousle-headed children. In January an elderly white couple use the herbs and lemons from their balcony garden to make lemony bean dip. In March the year has come full circle and two children, one white, one with darker skin, visit their white-haired grandfather and make herb falafel with tahini sauce from the forest of indoors herbs, waiting for the end of the rainy season so they can go outdoors and camp.

Flowerville is show next as a sea of white and brown rooftops, with the pink of blossoming trees popping up between the houses, then a green park, covered with families picnicking and playing. Final spreads include "gardening actions" showing people from the book harvesting, watering, sharing, and recycling. There is a page of illustrations of seeds, a page of gardening tools, and a lovely spread of seasonal fruits and vegetables.

One of the garden actions includes a boy peeing into a watering can, with the caption "Peeing in your gardening can helps the soil!" which is, actually, true but I can see quite a bit of giggling over it. You have been warned.

Most of the families I know interested in gardening, in my small, Midwestern town, tend more towards canning and preserving their produce - the setting for the story is not clear, but from the lack of snow it must be a fairly temperate climate, probably France since the book was translated from the French. The recipes are also a little more involved than most would be interested in trying, and I have a hard time seeing kids getting excited about, say, "butternut squash cake."

However, I do see an audience for this that would enjoy exploring seasonal gardening, new recipes, and even if they don't actually cook, just appreciating Felicita Sala's art and the descriptions of the seasons, produce, and recipes.

Verdict: A fun, diverse addition, although not a necessary purchase.

ISBN: 9783791375182; English edition published April 2022 by Prestel; Review copy provided by publisher