Picky Picky! How To Feed Your Parents! by Ryan Miller

Matilda Macaroni wanted to try quiche. Her parents did NOT. The list of things Mr. and Mrs. Macaroni would eat was very short.

CHICKEN (only in nugget form)

BURGERS (only in a bag with ketchup, fries, and a toy)

PIZZA (only with pepperoni, delivered at the door.)

Their daily diet is dull, drab, humdrum...

BORING!

Even when Grandma brings over goulash and gumbo and jambalaya, Matilda's parents turn up their noses and run for the fridge to rustle up some leftover takeouts.

Matilda tried new foods whenever she could--sushi at a sleepover, paprikash at a playdate....

But her parents remain implacable, preferring bowls of sticky sweet cereal that make the milk purple. Matilda Macaroni realizes that if she is going to get anything approaching varied fare, she is going to have to turn the tables on her picky parents and prepare their meals herself. With Grandma at her side, she takes on cookery, covering all the basics. She peruses recipes. Tasty and nutritious vittles become her specialty.

She perfected paella and conquered croquettes.

At last ready to confront her parents with her gourmet cuisine, Matilda stealthily empties the fridge of every vestige of fast food, and promises there will not be a quiche in sight.

"Just burgers!"

Her parents are put off by the presence of mushrooms and weird green things called arugula inside the bun, but they agree to try a bite.

And they find Matilda's novelle cuisine burger is better than any McBurger in a bag, in Ryan Miller's brand-new How to Feed Your Parents (Sterling Books, 2018). Youngsters who are a bit leery of new foods will laugh at stodgy parents who are the picky eaters. Illustrator Hatem Aly's skillful comic illustrations turn the finicky diner tale upside down as the kid gets to be the expert on nutrition and meal prep, a switcheroo which will tickle funnybones and perhaps tempt stuck-in-a-rut eaters to try new foods, too. All is cool with the culinary arts in the Macaroni's kitchen, and now... if Matilda can only get her mom and dad to tidy up their room....

For another tale of tricking fussy eaters, pair this one with Dan Marvin's But I Don't Eat Ants (POW Books, 2017) (see review here.)