The Summer I Ate the Rich

Moulite, Marika and Maritza Moulite. The Summer I Ate the Rich. 2025. 400p. ISBN 9780374390532.

Brielle Petitfour has a serious talent for cooking, but with her mom's ongoing illness and mounting bills, her dream of becoming a chef feels impossible. Plus, as a Haitian zombie, created through voodoo, she sometimes finds it hard to relate to human emotions. And the smell of blood sharpen all of her instincts. Her mother left Haiti before Brielle was born, and her father died of an overdose. Her mother, who is poor physical health, works as the health attendant for the man who founded the pharmaceutical company that manufactured the drug that killed her husband.

When this old man is accidentally run over by his Preston, his grandson, while on a walk in front of his estate, Brielle knows things are about to go from bad to worse. Her mother loses her job. At the same time, Brielle receives text messages meant for Preston's father requesting a donation of $10 million. Brielle replies that not only will he donate $10 million, he will double the funds!

Quickly caught, Brielle is offered a choice. She can do an internship at the pharmaceutical company, or Preston's father will file charges. Concurrently while doing her internship, Brielle pursues her cooking interests and starts her own business of catering. The wealthy families who hire her are obsessed with the unique and delicious flavors in her dishes, always trying to figure out her secret ingredients. What they don't know is that Brielle's secret ingredient is human flesh, specifically from the rich dead of the community.

As Brielle connects with Preston, her web of lies start catching up with her. The Summer I Ate the Rich is a twisted and thought-provoking story that takes inspiration from Haitian zombie legends to look at the messed-up social and economic inequalities in our world. Just like the rich people in the book who devour Brielle's food without knowing what it really is, this story will make the reader think about who has power and who gets taken advantage of, leading to a disturbing question: What are we really consuming?

What Einstein Told His Cook: Kitchen Science Explained

Wolke, Robert L. What Einstein Told His Cook: Kitchen Science Explained. 2002. 320p. ISBN 9780393011838.

Food is delicious, and most of us enjoy eating it. Some of us even enjoy preparing it. But what kind of science goes into food and making food? Why does lasagna create burn marks in aluminum foil when you put it in the fridge overnight? What's the difference between regular salt and kosher salt? How is Virginia ham prepared? How does a microwave oven work? What's the purpose of the bottom drawer in a refrigerator? Why are the American measurement system so complicated? All of these questions and more are answered in this wonderful set of explanations at the intersection of science and cooking. 

Well written in a humorous and entertaining manner, fans of cooking will appreciate the thoroughness of the author and the way he distills complex scientific principles into understandable chunks as he explains what is occurring in your kitchen. If you ever wondered whether a sidewalk could indeed cook an egg, what type of material made the best skillet, whether water with a pinch of salt boils faster than regular water, or if mushrooms are indeed the natural sponge they are made out to be, read this book and find out!

If you enjoyed this book, take a look at Are You Afraid? The Science Behind Scary Stuff!

Salty, Bitter, Sweet

Cuevas, Mayra. Salty, Bitter, Sweet. 2020. 320p. ISBN 9780310769774.

Born of a Cuban-American father and a French mother, Isabella Fields has focused her entire life on cooking. An amazing cook and baker in her own right, Isabelle has won the right to participate in a summer competition designed to select next year's apprentice to world-renowned Chef Pascal Grattard. At seventeen, Isabella is traveling to France to spend the summer with her father, who divorced her mother last year following a torrid love affair with another French woman, and who is now expecting a baby. On top of grieving for the loss of her family, she's also mourning the death of her beloved grandmother, her father's mother. An exile from Cuba, her abuela taught her everything she knows about cooking and instilled in her a passion for the delicious.

In France, she's one of 13 competitors. She makes fast friend with the two other girls, but the guys studiously avoid all three of them. Chef Croissant supervises the competition, and Isabella is quick to run afoul of the myriad rules that govern the kitchen's operations. At her dad, she meets her pregnant stepmother's former stepchild, a hot Spaniard with a lovable albino bulldog. She finds him annoying and full of himself, but that doesn't seem to prevent her from falling for him. 

With eveyrthing that happening with her and around her, can Isabella focus long enough to earn the prestigious internship she has always wanted? Filled with memorable characters and a well-developed stories, readers who enjoy romance and cooking are about to be served a wonderful story about being true to oneself and question one's own desires and motives. Fans of books like Once and For All and P.S. I Love You will love Isabella and her trials and tribulations