Fortune Cookies for Everyone! (Smithsonian): The Surprising Story of the Tasty Treat We Love to Eat - Hardcover

by Mia Wenjen (Author), Colleen Kong-Savage (Illustrator)

​● A Junior Library Guild Gold Selection
● A 2026 Notable Social Studies Trade Books Award Winner
● California Reading Association Gold Award Winner

An investigative picture book which cracks the cookie open to discover what is known about the origins of everyone's favorite crunchy after-dinner treat - a collaboration with the Smithsonian Institution
Grandma Miyako hosts her grandchildren for a takeout meal. Of course, at the end of the meal, she hands out the fortune cookies and begins to share the story of this popular treat with the attentive children as they munch on them. She claims to know the true inventor of the fortune cookie, but the history is not entirely clear. Using "fortunes" as headings, each section of the book delivers an episode in the unusual history of the fortune cookie and lays out the great debate about where and when they were first made. California was certainly the location, but in which city was the original baker located? This picture book looks inside these crunchy, biscuity treats to reveal the cultural origins and locations of the creators. Along the way, we discover some surprising history regarding this delicious edible delight, including a rivalry between bakers that remains somewhat unresolved today. Fortune Cookies for All is a compelling mystery featuring US history--the good, the bad, and the ugly--in a single bite. But most of all, it celebrates immigrants and their pursuit of the American dream.

Author Biography

Mia Wenjen blogs about parenting, children's books, and education at PragmaticMom.com and is the cocreator of Read Your World, celebrating Multicultural Children's Book Day, a nonprofit celebrating diversity in children's books. She is the author of several illustrated nonfiction children's books, including We Sing From the Heart: How The Slants Took Their Fight for Free Speech to the Supreme Court and The Traveling Taco, also published by Red Comet Press. Wenjen lives in Boston with her husband and three kids. Follow her at #PragmaticMom on Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, and Facebook. Colleen Kong-Savage is an Asian American graphic artist and illustrator who also creates murals. She has illustrated two picture books, including Piano Wants to Play, for which she was also the author. Having lived in places across the globe such as Japan, Malaysia, Taiwan, Philippines, and Zambia, Kong-Savage now makes her home in Queens, New York.