Yum! Mmmm! Que Rico! Americas' Sproutings by Pat Mora and Illustrator Rafael Lopez

Yum! Mmmm! Que Rico! Americas' Sproutings is an assemblage of Haiku poems about vegetables and fruits native to the Americas. As the reader turns the pages, they will find two pages where one is dedicated to a description of the food and the other is to the poem. The informative description contains all sorts of information regarding the fruits and vegetables, including name origin, geographic origin, the Native Americans that utilized them, cuisines, and many other fascinating details. Foods described and pictured include blueberries, chocolate, corn, cranberries, peanuts, pecans, pineapples, potatoes, papaya, prickly pears, tomatoes, and vanilla. However, as far as a book on poems, it is "more interesting as social science," although "visually gorgeous." ("Haiku celebrating the," 2007)

Critical analysis

Despite being a book on haiku poems, Yum! Mmmm! Que Rico! Americas' Sproutings is also an informative book. It contains around a dozen haiku poems and descriptions that will fascinate and entertain children between the ages of 6 and 10. The poems are written with words that are designed to induce hunger, like chewy and juicy. Likewise, in the informative section, the book describes how the various foods are culturally significant to Latino and Native American cultures like the Pueblo Indians and Aztecs, including how the foods are used in cooking, food, medicines, ceremonies, and arts.

Rafael Lopez's illustrations are bright and enticing as the fruits the poems describe. The combinations of dark and bright colors of red, blue, purple, green, yellows, browns, and black are masterfully combined. Similarly, color and illustration are combined with all sorts of exaggerated characters and scenes. For instance, the father with a big smile while eating a chile and spitting out fire is reminiscent of a fire-breathing dragon. The characters' physical characteristics illustrate various skin tones, clothes, and hairstyles representing Latino, white, and Native American ethnicities and cultures.

The strength of this poem and information book is that it entertains and teaches. Its weakness is that the poems do not provide a lot of cultural significance other than naming a few culturally significant foods. Readers may enjoy Book Fiesta!: Celebrate Children's Day/Book Day by Pat Mora and illustrator Rafael Lopez a book written to celebrate Children's Day. It has a somewhat similar celebratory and historical-style to Yum! Mmmm! Que Rico! Americas' Sproutings.

Reference

"Haiku celebrating the". (2007, October 1). Yum! Mmmm! ¡Qué Rico! Americas' Sproutings . Kirkus Reviews. Retrieved June 22, 2022, from https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/pat-mora/yum-mmmm-que-rico/

Mora, P. (2007). Yum! ¡mmmm! ¡Qué Rico!: Americas' Sproutings. (R. Lopez, Illust.) Lee & Low Books Inc.