Just So Stories

Penguin Australia

March 2025

• ISBN: 9781761346941
• Imprint: Puffin
• $19.99

I have my own happy memories of cooking with not just my Mummy but also my Fairy Godmother, Aunty Shirl, and my own Gran. Then when my grandies came along, it was my turn to cook with them.

My eldest grandson was mad keen on Gabriel Gate’s cooking show and one memorable cooking adventure, inspired by GG, we were making our own hot cross buns. They were very successful but the flour coating everything, including the child -and still being found drifting in my kitchen cabinets months later was memorable.

Harry and Gran’s cake-baking so reminded me of that funny episode, now about 25 years ago! [eeeek!!!]. Accompanied by Sara Acton’s always delightful and expressive illos, Fiona McIntosh has crafted a funny and sweet narrative about a pretty simple activity, that simply bursts with love, joy and hilarity.

Gran juggles eggs deftly – except for that one……..and there’s an unholy explosion of flour and cocoa [I bet she’ll be finding it in her kitchen cabinets for months as well]. She mislays her specs, which Harry discovers on top of her head [seriously, it could be me! anyone I know will tell you my glasses are more often on top of my head than anywhere else!].

Reaching the packet of icing sugar down from the high shelf is almost a real disaster for the cat. But the happy pair have such fun making the batter, and licking the bowl and then eating the results, it’s just utterly heart-warming from start to finish.

And the real bonus is – the recipe for the chocolate cake they make is included on the back endpapers. Betterer and betterer!! I’d love to have kiddos guessing at the different cakes Harry thinks of as he’s deciding which they should make [I wonder how many of them know a Battenburg??} and don’t you just wish we could still ‘do’ food in the classroom so they could taste-test all those different ones pictured?

I absolutely love this one [and not just because it has a ‘Gran’, which is me!]. Your kiddos will love it as well and I’m giving it a toothsome 5 🎂🎂🎂🎂🎂 rating.