The fabulous Fannie Farmer Kitchen scientist and America's cook

Head into the kitchen with fabulous, but maybe not famous, Fannie Farmer, who gets the picture-book biography treatment in this well-researched, lightly told, and evocatively illustrated recounting of her story. From her early years wary of "dashes" and "pinches" and "goodly amounts" of butter to her bout with polio that put her life on a different track, this biography of Farmer provides the basic outlines of her life but primarily focuses it through the lens of the changes she brought about in cooking, rather than on her every experience. As we follow her to Boston Cooking School, the vintage-style illustrations help transport the reader through time. This is an excellent introduction to a woman who's probably unknown to most but whose work has impacted all, but the real star of this show is the extensive, detailed back matter: an endnote with further information on topics covered in the book, suggested reads and watch lists, and a multipage time line. This is a strong addition to library and school shelves with possible curricular tie-ins.

A Bostonian revolutionizes the recipe world. Fannie Farmer (1857-1915) grew up helping in the kitchen, as most girls did at the time. She learned to love cooking, and when polio left her with a limp that prevented her from attending college, she devoted herself fully to cooking. She developed methods based on precision measurements--a groundbreaking concept at a time when most recipes called for "a suspicion of nutmeg" or "as many yolks as may be necessary." She became a teacher and later principal at the Boston Cooking School and wrote a cookbook (still in print years later). Deborah Hopkinson's Fannie in the Kitchen (2004), illustrated by Nancy Carpenter, focused on Farmer's life before cooking school; Smith, by contrast, spends more time on her subsequent professional life. The prose is peppered with rich cooking imagery and includes two workable, though not simple, recipes--for popovers and angel food cake. Reagan's engaging watercolor and digital illustrations convey a sense of Fannie's world; quotations from her writings are interspersed. Most people shown present white, like Fannie, but there are Black faces among her cooking school classmates, students, audiences, and customers for her books. In the backmatter, Smith carefully notes that some scenes about Fannie's early life are based on speculation, due to lack of available information. Delectable! (more about Fannie Farmer, resources, timeline, bibliography, photos, picture credits) (Picture-book biography. 7-10) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.