SATURDAY SANCOCHO

Maria Lili gets a lesson in resourcefulness from her grandmother Mama Ana.

Every Saturday at her grandparents’ home, Maria Lili, a young girl living in Colombia, looks forward to eating a traditional stew known as sancocho. One Saturday, Papa Angelino announces that there is no money to purchase the ingredients needed for the sancocho; all they have is a dozen eggs. Undaunted, Mama Ana packs the eggs into a basket, and off she goes to the market with Maria Lili in tow. Young readers will be awed by Mama Ana’s bargaining, bartering, and haggling skills as she gathers all the essentials: plantain, cassava, carrots, corn, tomatoes, onion, garlic, cumin, cilantro, and chicken. Maria Lili even gets a spinning top to round off the acquisitions. Back at home, the family prepares the dish together and savors the meal before taking their siesta. Sunny, warm watercolor illustrations enhance the engaging text, beautifully capturing what could be any small Andean town in Colombia. Young readers will want to keep track of Maria Lili’s white dog, who is never mentioned but always visible. At the end of the book, the author has included her own family recipe for sancocho. All characters present White.

Family ties, cultural traditions, and a can-do spirit cooked into one sweet story.