Episode 23: What is your favorite food? with Rajani LaRocca
Welcome! Here is episode 23: What is your favorite food? Author Rajani LaRocca answers this kid question.
TRANSCRIPT:
Grace Lin: Hello, I'm Grace Lin, children's book author and illustrator of many books, including the middle-grade novel Where the Mountain Meets the Moon, and the picture book A Big Mooncake for Little Star. Today I'm here with Rajani LaRocca, author of Midsummer's Mayhem and the Seven Golden Rings, illustrated by Archana Sreenivasan ... let me do that one again, Archana Sreenivasan. Hi Rajani.
Rajani LaRocca: Hi.
Grace Lin: Okay are you ready for today's question?
Rajani LaRocca: Absolutely.
Grace Lin: Okay. Today's question is from a girl named Sarah, and she asks.
Sarah: What is your favorite food?
Grace Lin: What is your favorite food?
Rajani LaRocca: That is a great question. If I had to decide between sweet and salty, it would definitely be sweet, and my favorite sweet food is chocolate chip cookies.
Grace Lin: Really?
Rajani LaRocca: Yeah, I really ... I can't resist them anywhere I go, and I'm very specific about what kind of ... like I like chocolate chip cookies that are chewy, some people like them crunchy, but I'm a chewy person, and it needs to have enough salt in the dough, so that the sweetness of the chocolate chips really stands out.
Rajani LaRocca: Now in my book Midsummer's Mayhem I have a lot of sweet treats, particularly baked treats, and the main character Mimi really loves cupcakes, and those are her favorite treats.
Grace Lin: That's what I though you were going to say.
Rajani LaRocca: Yes, I love cupcakes too, and I especially love how you can combine all kinds of flavors with cupcakes, because they're a little bit more complicated than cookies, but if I had to just choose one it would be chocolate chip cookies.
Grace Lin: So you put your love of sweets into your character?
Rajani LaRocca: Yes. Absolutely, but Mimi is way more inventive with her sweets than I was when I was a kid.
Grace Lin: What's her most inventive sweet?
Rajani LaRocca: So she makes lemon lavender cupcakes for her best friend's birthday, and they're pretty amazing, yeah.
Grace Lin: Now I'm getting hungry.
Rajani LaRocca: Me too. That's how I felt the whole time I was writing the book.
Grace Lin: That's really funny because I get asked this question a lot too, especially because I have a book called Dumpling Days, and in that book the main character, who is based on myself, is obsessed with dumplings because they go Taiwan for a family trip, and every day she just wants to eat the dumplings in Taiwan, and I have to admit that I have a huge sweet tooth too, and dumplings are my favorite savory food, so if I had to ... like sweet and savory, I would definitely choose dumplings as my favorite savory food, especially the soup dumplings, but I like ice cream more.
Rajani LaRocca: I hear you. I love ice cream too.
Grace Lin: And I think ice cream and cupcakes might be my favorite food, because of that sweet tooth I have.
Rajani LaRocca: Oh yay. Yes I love ice cream and cupcakes, I actually love dumplings too, but I don't think I've eaten as many good ones as you have.
Grace Lin: Well, there's an art to it. Well thank you so much Sarah for your great question, it's making me really hungry and I think now we have to go eat lunch.
Rajani LaRocca: Thanks Grace.
Grace Lin: Thanks.
Today’s BOOK REVIEW comes from Alona! She’s telling us about The Major Eights: the Battle of the Bands by Melody Reed.
The book I would like to talk about is The Major Eights: the Battle of the Bands by Melody Reed. This book is about a group of people who pretend to sing and pretend to play instruments. Then they realize there is a contest for real singers, and they enter it and try to win. I like this book because I like music, and it's really fun.
Thanks Alona!
More about today’s authors:
Rajani LaRocca was born in India, raised in Kentucky, and now lives in the Boston area with her wonderful family and impossibly cute dog. A graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Medical School, she spends her time writing novels and picture books, practicing medicine, and baking too many sweet treats. Her middle grade debut, Midsummer’s Mayhem (Yellow Jacket/Little Bee Books), an Indian-American mashup of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and competitive baking, was called a “delectable treat” in its starred Kirkus review. It was an Indies Introduce selection, an Indie Next pick, and was selected for the Kirkus Best Middle Grade Books of 2019 list, A Mighty Girl’s Best Books of 2019, and a Nerdy Book Award. Her debut picture book, Seven Golden Rings: A Tale of Music and Math (Lee & Low, 2020) is set in ancient India and introduces the basics of binary numbers. She is also the author of the forthcoming novel Much Ado About Baseball (Yellow Jacket/Little Bee Books, 2021) and picture books Bracelets For Brothers (Charlesbridge, 2021), The Secret Code Inside You (Little Bee Books, 2021), I’ll Go and Come Back (Candlewick, 2022), and Where Three Oceans Meet (Abrams, 2022). Learn more about her at www.RajaniLaRocca.com and on Twitter and Instagram @rajanilarocca.
Grace Lin, a NY Times bestselling author/ illustrator, won the Newbery Honor for Where the Mountain Meets the Moon and her picture book, A Big Mooncake for Little Star, was awarded the Caldecott Honor. Grace is an occasional commentator for New England Public Radio , a video essayist for PBS NewsHour (here & here), and the speaker of the popular TEDx talk, The Windows and Mirrors of Your Child’s Bookshelf. She is the co-host of the podcast Book Friends Forever, a kidlit podcast about friendship and publishing (geared for adults). Find her facebook, instagram , twitter ( @pacylin) or sign up for her author newsletter HERE.
Special thanks to the High Five Books & Art Always Bookstore, Ms. Carleton’s 2nd grade class at Jackson Street School for their help with our kid questions and reviews. Also, special thanks Porter Square Books for helping to facilitate today's interview.
