It’s Time for Hot Pot: A Bilingual Book in English and Mandarin with Traditional Characters, Zhuyin, and Pinyin

PreS-Gr 2–With 11 full-color spreads, this board book describes the components of a hot pot meal—a traditional meal eaten in many families throughout Asia, both at home and at restaurants. In realistic drawings and spare vocabulary, each spread covers an element of setting up the hot pot and the ingredients and ends with an overhead shot of a typical meal. The ingredients and tools may not be common in some households, and thus, serves as good introduction. Kids who are familiar with them will delight in seeing their culture represented. The page for cooking supplies introduces chopsticks, ceramic spoons, ladles, and more. For the pages dedicated to the ingredients for hot pot, some are anthropomorphized—an upset napa cabbage and a smiling bok choy. There are pages dedicated to root vegetables, mushrooms, bean curd, vegetables, meat, shellfish, frozen food, noodles, and sauces. The book works for families who regularly eat hot pot and also as an introduction for others to this meal.