Who Ate What?, a fun, engaging guessing game through history

I like to imagine conversations between myself and some of the elementary school aged children that I teach. Here’s one that’s running through me head right now about Who Ate What? A Historical Guessing Game for Food Lovers.

8YO kid: I don’t like to read

Me: Do you like ninjas and cave people?

Kid: Yes, highly respected elementary school teacher, I do like to look at pictures of them.

Me: You should check out Who Ate What?

Kid: That sounds like a book that would make me read something. Me no like printed paper learning.

Me: Well, it is a book, but it’s an illustrated book that looks at well known civilizations, how they lived and what they ate or drank; thus the title, Who Ate What?

Kid: What does ‘thus’ mean?

Me: Go back and read the context clue kid.

Kid: Can I borrow a tablet?

Me: No. Check out the book brother. Haven’t you ever wondered what ancient Egyptians ate?

Kid: No. Don’t you remember that I like ninjas, cave people and unicorns.

Me: You’re out of luck on that third one, so let’s turn to the four pages about them. It asks the very simple question of what cavepeople ate back in the Paleolithic Era, 200,000 years ago. We see a typical scene with a dozen or so people as they are hunting or gathering. A young girl is collecting acorns while looking at a mammoth, cattails are growing in the marsh, dates are dangling from a bush, water chestnuts are being pulled from the lake and more. It lists 15 possible foods, but only 12 of them are real.

Kid: So, how do I figure out which ones are fake?

Me: Well, some of them are simple, like Quing Emperors not eating fortune cookies or an Ethiopian Empress not drinking a frappe in the 1800s. Those are just silly. But, did you know that pirates didn’t eat fish or that ninjas didn’t eat red meat?

Kid: Ninjas had to eat fish….

Me: They did, that’s not red meat.

Kid: Why didn’t they eat red meet?

Me: You spelled ‘meet’ incorrectly, it should be ‘meat’.

Kid: I thought we were having fun, talking about ninjas, food, cavepeople and a puzzle book.

Me: That is a great way to comparison, Who Ate What? is a good, and fun puzzle book for reluctant readers who like big, illustrated pages and a bit of which-one-doesn’t-belong-here.

Kid: I remember that song from Sesame Street. Can I borrow your phone to watch it now?

Me: No.

Kid: So why didn’t ninjas eat red meat? And what’s a hunger ball?

Me: That was the formal dance that happened at the end of Mockingjay.

Kid: What?

Me: Don’t worry about it. The point is that Who Ate What? is a unique book that blends seek-and-find aspects, to historical, and outer space situations and examines what they’d eat there. Astronauts do have to eat, and have you ever wondered what do astronauts eat?

Kid: No

Me: Well, let’s just say that it leaves more doughnuts for you and me.

Kid: Don’t you mean “you and I”?

Voiceover: Who Ate What? also has four recipes at the back of the book so that you can eat exactly like an old school person. What is hardtack and how did it taste for pirates of yore? If you’re an Egyptian mummy and wake up from your wrapped slumber and want something sweet to eat then you’re in luck. Food historians have found a mummified Tiger Nut Honey Cake and were able to isolate the ingredients so that it could be made today. They can still walk like an Egyptian and not be hangry.

Kid: Can you please stop with the dad jokes?

Who Ate What? A Historical Guessing Game for Food Lovers is by Rachel Levin and illustrated by Natalia Rojas Castro and is available on Phaidon Press.

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