Photos by Chris Wodjak Photography

The 36 Eggs Project

When we were kids, we always wondered what that pound cake in Anne of Windy Poplars tasted like. A recipe that called for 36 eggs! We were dying to know. Not to mention Doc Spencer’s meat pie, Bruce Bogtrotter’s chocolate cake, Mr. Tumnus’s tea, Heidi’s grandfather’s bread with cheese…. We spent our childhoods a teeny bit sad that we’d never get to try these fictitious dishes.

And then we grew up and became librarians, and suddenly, everything was possible.

We Wrote a Book!

Check out The Little Women Cookbook: Novel Takes on Classic Recipes from Meg, Jo, Beth, Amy, and Friends, coming out Fall 2019!

The Authors

Miko Osada

Miko is a librarian for kids and teens, in a suburb just east of San Diego. She lives with her wife and three cats, Figgy, Piggy, and Squeazle. She loves food but enjoys eating more than cooking. Miko is a proud member of Slytherin House, and the March sister she relates to most is Amy.

Favorite books: Little Women by Louisa May Alcott; Summer Sisters by Judy Blume; A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett; Matilda by Roald Dahl; Anastasia series by Lois Lowry; Anne books by L. M. Montgomery; and There’s a Boy in the Girls’ Bathroom and Holes by Louis Sachar.

She loves to read: fairy tales and retellings, hopeful endings, fluffy realistic romance (but not romance novels), books set in the Victorian era, true crime, descriptions of food, and stories featuring: characters who are beautiful and dignified, people you don’t like at the beginning whom you like at the end, strangers becoming family, and orphans.

She loves to eat: high-quality short-grain white rice, hot dogs, xiao long bao, eggs in almost any form, milk chocolate, shui zhu yu, and medovik.

Jenne Bergstrom

Jenne was raised by two summer camp directors but spent all her time reading instead of being outdoors. She went to a tiny one-room schoolhouse in a charming mountain town, but always dreamed of living in a glamorous big city. Nowadays, she lives in a tiny tiny house in glamorous(?) San Diego, CA and runs a library in another charming mountain town.

Favorite kids’ books: The Snarkout Boys and the Avocado of Death by Daniel Pinkwater, The BFG and Danny the Champion of the World by Roald Dahl, Betsy-Tacy books by Maud Hart Lovelace (but only the ones starting in high school), Victorian Cakes by Caroline B. King, MacDonald Hall series by Gordon Korman, and most of Miko’s picks as well.

Favorite adult books: The Children’s Book by A.S. Byatt, Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson, The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison, True Grit by Charles Portis, and anything by Judith Krantz.

She loves to read about: how people did everyday things in other times and places; descriptions of fancy outfits and/or rituals and ceremonies; people working together to accomplish something; aftermaths of disasters; boarding schools (especially if magical); slow-burn romance; found families; makeovers and renovations; footnotes/diagrams/equations/codes/maps or other hidden workings of things; people with very proscribed lifestyles (nuns, astronauts, royalty); someone succeeding through clever means.

She loves to eat: Chocolate chip cookies, artichokes, hiyashi-chuka (cold summer ramen), adjaruli khachapuri (Georgian cheese boat!), mashed potatoes, tahdig (Persian crispy rice crust), sundubu-jjigae (Korean tofu stew), alphabet noodles, and all of the dumplings of all the cuisines.