Mr. Mintz's Blintzes

Leslie Kimmelman is the author of many well-regarded picture books, including Everybody Says Shalom, a Sydney Taylor Honor Book, The Little Red Hen and the Passover Matzah, and The Rabbi Slurps Spaghetti.  She is also a book editor at Sesame Workshop. She lives in New York.

The neighborhood blintz maker is injured right before the blintz holiday, Shavuot.Mr. Mintz (light-skinned, with a curly ginger mop) is a neighborly gent. He carries groceries, puts out milk for the cats, and, most importantly, is always there with a bite to eat. A "marvelous cook," Mr. Mintz gives away most of what he prepares to his neighbors.--soup for the sniffly, latkes on Hanukkah, challah for Shabbat, and gooey, tasty blintzes for the spring holiday of Shavuot. But the day before Shavuot, Mr. Mintz takes a tumble off his skateboard. He's going to be OK, but who will make the "cheesy, and apple-y . . .gooey and delicious" blintzes for the neighborhood? Why, the neighbors, of course! When Mr. Mintz returns from the hospital on crutches, his neighbors are all there to bring him hot tea, kittens,--and blintzes. Mr. Mintz's neighbors, nameless and lacking in cultural markers, have a wide variety of skin tones and facial features in the cartoon art. It's up to the reader to decide whether this gentle, community-minded tale depicts a racially diverse Jewish neighborhood, a neighborhood where people are happy to celebrate other cultures' traditions, or both. An author's note provides a two-sentence reference for the religious aspect of the holiday, but returns to the focus on food with a blintz recipe. (This book was reviewed digitally)"A cozy tale of friendship, mutual aid, neighborliness, and tasty, tasty food." --Kirkus ReviewsEvery­one in the neigh­bor­hood loves Mr. Mintz. He’s friend­ly,gen­er­ous, and help­ful; he remem­bers everyone’s birth­day, rakes leaves, andshov­els snow when need­ed; he brings home­made soup to a sick neigh­borand deliv­ers latkes on Hanukkah and chal­lah on Shab­bat. But Mr. Mintz ismost famous for his sweet and savory, gooey and deli­cious Shavuot blintzes.When he breaks his leg skate­board­ing just before the hol­i­day, his neigh­borssur­prise him by work­ing togeth­er to make the blintzes.Cute, expres­sive car­toon illus­tra­tions depicta diverse con­tem­po­rary neigh­bor­hood, with added speech bub­bles usedto enhance the text. The text men­tions that "Shavuot cel­e­brates thegiv­ing of the Torah to the Jew­ish peo­ple," and the append­ed author’s notefur­ther explains that "because the Torah is said to be nour­ish­ing,like milk, many peo­ple cel­e­brate Shavuot by eat­ing dairy foods such ascheese, ice cream, and blintzes."The strength of Mr. Mintz’s Blintzes is in how itillus­trates in a fun way the Jew­ish val­ues of chesed (kind­ness)and vis­it­ing the sick. There are sim­i­lar ver­sions of the sto­ry told aboutoth­er times of year in pic­ture books, some exam­ples being The CholentBrigade by Michael Her­man, illus­trat­ed by Sharon Harmer (Kar-Ben, 2017), ChikChak Shab­bat by Mara Rock­liff, illus­trat­ed by Kyrsten Brook­er (Can­dlewick, 2016),and The Bagel King by Andrew Larsen, illus­trat­ed by Sandy Nichols(Kids Can Press, 2018). --Michal Malen, The Jewish Book Council