Last year, beloved children's author-illustrator Tomie dePaola was searching for ideas for a new book about Christmas, his favorite holiday.
As he pondered various themes, dePaola remembered one of his most cherished cookbooks, "Celebrating Italy" by Carol Field. In the book, Field organizes her recipes around the many feasts and festivals that are part of Italian culture.
"Each festival has its own foods connected with it, and Field tells these wonderful stories about each celebration," dePaola said in a recent telephone interview from his New Hampshire home.
In the Calabria region of Italy, for example, there's a legend that on the feast of the Epiphany, rivers and fountains run with wine and olive oil, dePaola noted.
"The idea that everything can turn into some kind of food – that always stuck with me. I just love the idea; it's such a funny idea," he said.
Recalling that legend last year, dePaola, 77, said that "a light bulb went off in my head." He decided to focus his new book on the eight feasts – including Christmas – that are celebrated by Italians between the beginning of December and Epiphany. The new book would, of course, star his most popular characters, the Italian witch named Strega Nona and her bumbling helper, Big Anthony.
The result is "Strega Nona's Gift" (Penguin, $17.99, ages 3-7), a wonderfully different take on the holiday season that features dePaola's distinctive illustrations, filled with brilliant color and good cheer. In addition to an entertaining story, "Strega Nona's Gift" offers readers a blueprint for celebrating some lesser-known feasts during the holiday season.
Set in a village in Calabria, the book opens at the beginning of December, when Strega Nona, Big Anthony and other townspeople are preparing for the upcoming holiday celebrations. All goes well during the various celebrations through Christmas and New Year's.
Then comes Jan. 5, the Eve of Epifania, Epiphany Eve, when, legend has it, animals can talk. So owners take special care to feed their animals well this night, and Strega Nona prepares special dishes for her rabbit, peacock, dove and goat.
Strega Nona asks Big Anthony to serve the special meal of turnips and chickpeas to the goat. But Big Anthony wants the special dish himself, so he eats it instead and gives the goat a plate of hay and oats. This infuriates the goat, who eats Big Anthony's blanket in revenge.
Because he's cold without his blanket, Big Anthony can't sleep at night and so misses the special dream that Strega Nona sends to all villagers, a dream in which everything turns to food. Bedposts become sausages, the bed sheets change into sheets of lasagna and the walls turn into ricotta and mozzarella.
The next day, Jan. 6, is Epiphany, the final feast of the season. The villagers gather at Strega Nona's for cake, and Big Anthony's piece has the lucky fava bean in it, making him the "king" of the feast. When Strega Nona asks "King" Anthony what he'd like as his gift, he asks for a new blanket for himself and another special meal for the goat so he can make amends and start off the New Year right.
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