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List: 2023 Teen Reading Challenge: Featuring Food or Cooking


A photo of From the Desk of Zoe Washington

From the Desk of Zoe Washington

Avid baker Zoe Washington receives a letter on her twelfth birthday from her biological father, who is in prison for a terrible crime.

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A photo of Notes from a Young Black Chef: A Memoir

Notes from a Young Black Chef: A Memoir

In this young adult adaptation of his biography, Onwuachi tells how he was sent from the Bronx to rural Nigeria by his mother to 'learn respect.' Through food, he broke out of a dangerous downward spiral and embarked on a new beginning at the bottom of the culinary food chain before going on to train in the kitchens of some of the most acclaimed restaurants in the country and appearing as a contestant on Top Chef. His love of food and cooking was a constant, even when the road to success was riddled with potholes. Here he shares the pursuit of his passions, despite the odds.This edition does not include the recipes from the original edition. --

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A photo of With the Fire on High

With the Fire on High

Teen mother Emoni Santiago struggles with the challenges of finishing high school and her dream of working as a chef.

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A photo of Bloom

Bloom

Baked with love! Now that high school is over, Ari is dying to move to the big city with his ultra-hip band--if he can just persuade his dad to let him quit his job at their struggling family bakery. Though he loved working there as a kid, Ari cannot fathom a life wasting away over rising dough and hot ovens. But while interviewing candidates for his replacement, Ari meets Hector, an easygoing guy who loves baking as much as Ari wants to escape it. As they become closer over batches of bread, love is ready to bloom...that is, if Ari doesn't ruin everything.

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A photo of Somewhere Between Bitter and Sweet

Somewhere Between Bitter and Sweet

As an aspiring pastry chef, Penelope Prado has always dreamed of opening her own pastelería next to her father's restaurant, Nacho's Tacos. But her traditional Mexican-American mom and dad have different plans. Xander Amaro Is a new hire at Nacho's. For him, the job is an opportunity for a chance at a normal life, to settle in at his abuelo's, and to find the father who left him behind. When both the restaurant and Xander's immigrant status are threatened, he will do whatever it takes to protect his new found family and himself.

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A photo of A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking

A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking

Fourteen-year-old Mona isn't like the wizards charged with defending the city. She can't control lightning or speak to water. Her familiar is a sourdough starter and her magic only works on bread. She has a comfortable life in her aunt's bakery making gingerbread men dance. But Mona's life is turned upside down when she finds a dead body on the bakery floor. An assassin is stalking the streets of Mona's city, preying on magic folk, and it appears that Mona is his next target. And in an embattled city suddenly bereft of wizards, the assassin may be the least of Mona's worries...

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A photo of A Phỏ Love Story

A Phỏ Love Story

Bảo Nguye̋n would describe himself as steady and strong: his grades are average, his social status unremarkable. He works at his parents' phỏ restaurant -- as his parents' fifth favorite employee. Linh Mai would describe herself as a firecracker: stable when unlit, but full of potential for joy and fire. She dreams of pursuing a career in art, while working practically full-time at her family's phỏ restaurant. Bao and Linh have never even had a class together -- but after a chance encounter, sparks fly. Can this relationship survive their families' feud?

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A photo of Hungry Hearts: 13 Tales of Food & Love

Hungry Hearts: 13 Tales of Food & Love

From some of your favorite bestselling and critically acclaimed authors--including Sandhya Menon, Anna-Marie McLemore, and Rin Chupeco--comes a collection of interconnected short stories that explore the intersection of family, culture, and food in the lives of thirteen teens. A shy teenager attempts to express how she really feels through the confections she makes at her family's pasteleria. A tourist from Montenegro desperately seeks a magic soup dumpling that could cure his fear of death. An aspiring chef realizes that butter and soul are the key ingredients to win a cooking competition that could win him the money to save his mother's life. Welcome to Hungry Hearts Row, where the answers to most of life's hard questions are kneaded, rolled, baked. Where a typical greeting is, "Have you had anything to eat?" Where magic and food and love are sometimes one and the same. Told in interconnected short stories, Hungry Hearts explores the many meanings food can take on beyond mere nourishment. It can symbolize love and despair, family and culture, belonging and home.

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A photo of Radha & Jai's Recipe for Romance

Radha & Jai's Recipe for Romance

Radha is on the verge of becoming one of the greatest Kathak dancers in the world until a family betrayal costs her the biggest competition of her life. She leaves her Chicago home behind to follow her stage mom to New Jersey. At the Princeton Academy of the Arts, Radha is determined to reinvent herself from scratch. Jai is captain of the Bollywood Beats dance team, ranked first in his class. He's an overachiever, but tight family funds means medical school is a pipe dream. When Radha enters his life, he realizes she's the exact ingredient he needs for a show-stopping senior year. --

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A photo of The Surprising Power of a Good Dumpling

The Surprising Power of a Good Dumpling

Anna Chiu has her hands full. When she's not looking after her brother and sister or helping out at her father's restaurant, she's taking care of her mother, whose debilitating mental illness keeps her in bed most days. Her father's new delivery boy, Rory, is a welcome distraction and even though she knows that things aren't right at home, she's starting to feel like she could be a normal teen.

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A photo of Where There's a Whisk

Where There's a Whisk

Life is what you bake it. Peyton Sinclaire wants nothing more than to escape her life as a diner waitress in her small, North Florida town and attend culinary school. Top Teen Chef, Food TV's new show that pairs reality TV drama with a fast-paced culinary competition, is her ticket out of her boring future. It's a once-in-a-lifetime chance to make her dreams come true and Peyton is determined to prove to herself, and the world, that where you're born does not determine where you can go. However, once on the show, Peyton quickly discovers that there is more to the competition than just a well-seasoned dish. As things start to heat up on and off the set, Peyton will have to prove to the judges that she deserves to win while trying to untangle what is real and what is scripted drama, and decide what she is willing to risk to win before her dreams end up on the chopping block.

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A photo of Heartless

Heartless

In this prequel to Alice in Wonderland, Cath would rather open a bakery and marry for love than accept a proposal from the King of Hearts, especially after meeting the handsome and mysterious court jester.

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A photo of Café con Lychee

Café con Lychee

Theo Mori and Gabriel Moreno have always been at odds. Their parents own rival businesses--an Asian American café and a Puerto Rican bakery--and Gabi's lack of coordination has cost their soccer team too many games to count. Stuck in the closet and scared to pursue his own dreams, Gabi sees his parents' shop as his future. Stuck under the weight of his parents' expectations, Theo's best shot at leaving Vermont means first ensuring his parents' livelihood is secure. So when a new fusion café threatens both shops, Theo and Gabi realize an unfortunate truth--they can only achieve their goals by working together to cook up an underground bakery operation and win back their customers. But can they put aside their differences long enough to save their parents' shops or will the new feelings between them boil over?

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A photo of The Complete Cookbook for Teen Chefs: 70+ Teen-Tested and Teen-Approved Recipes to Cook, Eat, and Share

The Complete Cookbook for Teen Chefs: 70+ Teen-Tested and Teen-Approved Recipes to Cook, Eat, and Share

For the first time ever, America's Test Kitchen Kids is bringing their rigorous testing, kitchen knowhow, and hands-on learning to teenagers in the kitchen. Fiercely independent and searching for culinary adventure, teen chefs are ready for exciting, global recipes made to share with friends and family--with the support of fundamental kitchen techniques and approachable instruction.

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A photo of Batter Royale

Batter Royale

In this fun graphic novel, a talented young chef is selected to participate in a baking reality show and finds herself mixed up in spicy competition, bitter rivalry, and sweet romance.

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A photo of I Love You So Mochi

I Love You So Mochi

Kimi Nakamura loves nothing more than transforming the outfits of her friends into expressions of their "Ultimate Selves" but her mother thinks it is a waste of time. After a huge fight, Kimi makes the decision to accept her grandparents' invitation to Kyoto where she is surrounded by her heritage, which is simultaneously foreign and familiar, and the environment helps her understand her mother better than ever before.

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A photo of Melt With You

Melt With You

"Two teen girls, former best friends and one-time lovers, go on a summer road trip in an ice cream truck"--

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A photo of Food Stars: 15 Women Stirring Up the Food Industry

Food Stars: 15 Women Stirring Up the Food Industry

Fifteen . . . women have made great strides in the field of food, whether it's coming up with meals for astronauts to eat in space, operating a 20-acre farm, hosting a food podcast, or fighting for food rights.

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A photo of Food-Related Stories

Food-Related Stories

"Chef and activist Gaby Melian shares her personal journey with food--from growing up in Argentina to her time as a street vendor and later as Bon Appetit's test kitchen manager. Melian explores how we can develop a relationship with food that's personal, healthy, and thoughtful"--

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A photo of It's Kind of a Cheesy Love Story

It's Kind of a Cheesy Love Story

Sixteen-year-old Beck rediscovers herself while working with a group of misfits at the local pizza parlor where she was born.

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A photo of The Summer of Jordi Perez (and the Best Burger in Los Angeles)

The Summer of Jordi Perez (and the Best Burger in Los Angeles)

Seventeen, fashion-obsessed, and gay, Abby Ives has always been content playing the sidekick in other people's lives. While her friends and sister have plunged headfirst into the world of dating and romances, Abby's been happy to focus on her plus-size style blog and her dreams of taking the fashion industry by storm. When she lands a great internship at her favorite boutique, she's thrilled to take the first step toward her dream career. Then she falls for her fellow intern, Jordi Perez. Hard. And now she's competing against the girl she's kissing to win the coveted paid job at the end of the internship. But really, nothing this summer is going as planned. She also unwittingly becomes friends with Jax, a lacrosse-playing bro-type who wants her help finding the best burger in Los Angeles, and she's struggling to prove to her mother--the city's celebrity health nut--that she's perfectly content with who she is. Just as Abby starts to feel like she's no longer the sidekick in her own life, Jordi's photography surprisingly puts her in the spotlight. Instead of feeling like she's landed a starring role, Abby feels betrayed. Can Abby find a way to reconcile her positive yet private sense of self with the image others have of her?

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A photo of Delicious in Dungeon

Delicious in Dungeon

When young adventurer Laios and his company are attacked and soundly thrashed by a dragon deep in a dungeon, the party loses all its money and provisions...and a member! They're eager to go back and save her, but there is just one problem: If they set out with no food or coin to speak of, they're sure to starve on the way! But Laios comes up with a brilliant idea: "Let's eat the monsters!" Slimes, basilisks, and even dragons...none are safe from the appetites of these dungeon-crawling gourmands!

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A photo of Kitchen Princess

Kitchen Princess

Najika left the rural orphanage she knows as home to attend Seika Academy in Tokyo in the hopes of finding a boy who touched her heart years earlier. Nobody in her class thinks she should be there except two brothers, Daichi and Sora, who recognize Najika's magical talent for cooking.

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A photo of Cook Korean!: A Comic Book with Recipes

Cook Korean!: A Comic Book with Recipes

A charming introduction to the basics of Korean cooking in graphic novel form, with 64 recipes, ingredient profiles, and more, presented through light-hearted comics. Playful and instructive, Cook Korean! is the intersection of cookbook and graphic novel in one easy-to-use package dedicated to this increasingly popular Asian cuisine. Illustrator Robin Ha presents colorful, humorous comics that fully illustrate all the steps and ingredients necessary for all 64 recipes in a clear, concise presentation (with no more than 2 pages per recipe on average). Recipes featured include Easy Kimchi (Makkimchi), Spicy Bok Choy (Cheonggyeongche Muchim), and Seaweed Rice Roll (Kimbap), among many other dishes. Each chapter includes personal anecdotes and cultural insights from Ha, providing an intimate entry point for those looking to try their hand at this cuisine. Perfect for beginners and seasoned cooks alike, Cook Korean! is accessible, fun, and inviting.

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A photo of Meal

Meal

Yarrow is a young chef determined to make her mark on the cutting edge of cookery with her insect-based creations. Though her enthusiasm is infectious, it rubs some of her fellow cooks the wrong way, especially Chanda Flores, Yarrow's personal hero and executive chef of an exciting new restaurant. Her people have been eating bugs for centuries, and she's deeply suspicious of this newbie's attempt to turn her traditions into the next foodie trend. While Chanda and her scrappy team of talented devotees struggle to open on time, Yarrow must win over Chanda -- and Milani, the neighbor she's been crushing on for weeks -- or lose this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to achieve her dreams.

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A photo of Be More Vegan: The Young Person's Guide to Going (a Bit More) Plant-Based

Be More Vegan: The Young Person's Guide to Going (a Bit More) Plant-Based

We all want to be a bit more vegan... and this book shows you how. Whether you're ready to commit to a fully plant-based lifestyle or you'd just like to add a few meat-free dishes to your weekly meal plan, this is the ideal guide. It explains the reasons behind going vegan, including environmental, health and animal welfare benefits, in clear and simple language that helps young people make up their own minds. It answers all the nagging questions about nutrition and ethics, as well as giving bang-up-to-date information about the best vegan ingredients, substitutions and food hacks. Best of all, it contains over 50 mouthwatering recipes for every situation, from lunchbox staples to midweek meals, and moreish snacks to amazing cakes and desserts. There's so much to love about the vegan life, so get Be More Vegan and start making a difference in the most delicious way possible!

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