My newest book, Brother Giovanni's Little Reward:  How the Pretzel Was Born, has become a popular pretzel book for children, but I wanted to give some kudos to other authors and their books about this delicious salty snack in honor of #nationalpretzelday

My book is included in the top 10 results if you Google "pretzel books for children", and so are these!

Pretzel by Margret + H.A. Rey (perhaps most famous for Curious George)  about the adventures of the longest dachshund in the world, who is able to twist himself into a pretzel and saves the day for a friend.

Walter the Baker by Eric Carle - another origin story of the pretzel where a baker must use water instead of milk in his famous rolls one day.  The Duke is disgusted and threatens to banish the baker unless he can take the same dough and make a good-tasting roll that "the rising sun can shine through three times," which becomes the pretzel.  This charming story was told to Eric as a boy by his grandmother.

The Magic Pretzel, a chapter book by Daniel Pinkwater is for grades 2-4 and is about a group of 4th graders who search for the magic pretzel of Alexander the Great, the only thing known to truly cure werewolves!

There are other pretzel books, but My Daddy is a Pretzel rounds out this list for today.  It's a cute book about yoga poses that you can see here.

Enjoy!

The publisher of my most recent book, Eerdman's, featured a super article on Amanda Hall - the incredible illustrator of Brother Giovanni's Little Reward:  How the Pretzel Was Born.

Here's a taste from the article:
"For example, Brother Giovanni’s Little Reward: How the Pretzel Was Born -- my new book for Eerdmans Books for Young Readers, written by Anna Egan Smucker — takes place in medieval Europe, most likely in Italy (I thought — with a name like Giovanni!). I already had a wonderful store of memories from visiting Italy as a child. These impressions added to my imaginative mix: fabulous old churches, clanking bells, the smell of warm Cyprus trees, wonderful food, a particular memory of having the top of my six-year-old head kissed by a kind adult, just because I was a ‘bambina.’
I started to hunt out art from medieval Italy. I have always loved pre-Renaissance Italian paintings, with their early sense of perspective, decorative plants, and buildings with the front walls opened up like dolls’ houses so that you can see right in. Having enjoyed playing with scale when I worked on The Fantastic Jungles of Henri Rousseau, I responded to the fantastical sizes of things in these early Italian paintings too. I was particularly drawn to the paintings of Fra Angelico for many reasons — their clarity and detail and their joyful coloration as well as the architectural structures the artist conjured. The scenes Angelico painted were often intimate in scale, even when he was dealing with epic subject matter. Like other painters of that era, he also worked on illuminated manuscripts. I thought I could have fun using those kinds of visual devices for Brother Giovanni."

Check out the whole article here.

I had the opportunity this past weekend to read my book Brother Giovanni's Little Reward:  How the Pretzel Was Born during an Author's Forum at the West Virginia Italian Heritage Festival.  I also got to ride in the parade!  Thanks to everyone who came out for both.

I wanted to include a soft pretzel recipe in my book about the invention of the pretzel - Brother Giovanni's Little Reward.  I spent a lot of time in the kitchen - often with my grandsons Daniel and Aaron - to find the best pretzel recipe.  Give it a try using the instructions below, or better yet - get my book and learn about how the pretzel was invented!

Recipe yields 1 dozen

Prep Time:  2 hours   Baking Time: 8 - 10 minutes 

Ingredients:
 1 teaspoon white sugar
 1 packet (2 ¼ teaspoons) active dry yeast
 1 1/4 cups warm water (110 degrees F/43 degrees C)
 4 cups all-purpose flour
 2 tablespoons white sugar (¼ cup if you’d like the dough sweeter)
 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
 1/4 cup baking soda
  2 cups hot water
 sea salt for topping
 melted butter to brush on pretzels when done

Directions:

1. In a small bowl, dissolve yeast and 1 teaspoon sugar in warm water. Let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes. 

2. In a large bowl, mix together flour, sugar, and salt. Make a well in the center; add the oil and yeast mixture. Mix and form into a dough. Knead the dough until smooth, about 7 to 8 minutes. Lightly oil a large bowl; place the dough in the bowl and turn to coat with oil. Cover with a damp kitchen towel and let rise in a warm place until doubled in size, about 1 hour. 

3. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). In a large bowl, dissolve baking soda in hot water (almost boiling). 

4. When dough is risen, punch it down and turn out onto a lightly floured surface.  Divide into 12 equal pieces. Roll each piece into a rope (the diameter of your finger and 20 inches long) and twist into a pretzel shape. Once all of the dough is shaped, dip each pretzel into the baking soda solution for about 10 seconds each; then place on a non-stick or greased baking sheet. Sprinkle with sea salt.  Bake in preheated oven for 8 minutes or until browned. 

5. Brush with melted butter, or dip in melted butter and coat with cinnamon and sugar or other favorites.  Enjoy!

My friends at Eerdman's made a really cute video where they made the recipe too.  Check it out!

Hello, everyone!  My newest book, Brother Giovanni's Little Reward:  How the Pretzel Was Born is now available.  The publishing company, Eerdman's interviewed me for a blog post on their website about how I came up with the idea for the book.

I read something about how the pretzel was invented several years ago, and it was something like this: 

Most sources say the pretzel was invented around 610 A.D. by a monk in either northern Italy or southern France who twisted leftover bread dough into arms crossed in prayer.  He gave it as a little reward (pretiola in Latin) to children who learned their prayers. As the years went by, the pretiola became known in Austria and Germany as bretzel. When it crossed the ocean to America it became known as the pretzel.


To write the story I had to first create the character of the monk who was the baker. I knew he would be a fantastic baker, a sweet kindly man I named Brother Giovanni . . . eventually.  Read the full post to learn more about how I got to know Brother Gio and how the pretzel was invented to the delight of children and adults everywhere even centuries later.

You can order the book here.

Hello, all.  My new book's publication date is nearing - 8/3/15.  You can order it here.
Here's another review; this time from Publisher's Weekly.  Thanks to the team over there for a wonderful synopsis and review!

"Drawing from the semi-apocryphal origins of the pretzel, which trace the baked good to a monk in medieval Europe, Smucker (Golden Delicious) introduces Brother Giovanni, "the best baker his monastery had ever had." With the bishop scheduled to visit the monastery, the children the monks teach must learn to recite their prayers before his arrival. Giovanni tries singing, making "mean" faces, and dancing with the children, but while these attempts bring him closer to the children....they don't help them learn their prayers. Taking inspiration from the medieval setting, Hall (The Fantastic Jungles of Henri Rousseau) ornaments her bright, playful paintings with filigrees and other decorative elements. When Brother Giovanni has his eureka moment—using the shape of two arms crossed in prayer to create a snack for the ages (and a delicious reward for the children)—he is flanked by two trumpet-playing angels, and a pretzel rests above his head like the flame of the Holy Spirit. It's a winning blend of the holy and the holey. Ages 4–8. (Aug.)"

Click here for the original review.

And I’ll be celebrating the publication of my “pretzel book” this coming August!  Titled Brother Giovanni’s Little Reward: How the Pretzel Was Born, it’s my telling of the origin of one of the world’s favorite snacks.  To see some of the gorgeously exuberant 
illustrations by talented British artist Amanda Hall just go to the publisher’s website and 
take a peek.  


This is going to be such a fun book to share with children (and adults)!