Medford couple Gloria Barone Rosanio and Jim Rosanio recently released their newest book, “Eat to Roar!” and held a community release party to celebrate. In their book, that includes recipes from Gloria’s lifelong friend, Karina Pearse-LaMalfa, kids learn about food allergies from Dina the Dinosaur Connoisseur and her kitchen sidekick Saber-Tooth Kitty.
“There are so many people living with chronic illness in our country and around the world, and a good deal of that stems from our food choices, obesity and malnourishment,” said Gloria, who authors the books alongside Jim, who is the illustrator. “We wanted to help instill a love of simple cooking and healthy food at an early age, so that perhaps children will find the healthy choice to also be the fun and tasty choice, and will carry that into adulthood.”
What makes this book especially unique is all of Dina’s friends have issues with different foods. While the main character loves to host dinosaur dinner parties, she must be mindful that some of her friends are allergic to milk, peanuts or gluten while others just don’t like meat. Thus, she finds ways to include all of her friends by making the necessary accommodations.
“The book uses a lovable character, Dina the Dinosaur Connoisseur, to help provide recipes that are plant-based and allergy-aware,” Gloria said. “The message is twofold: to encourage children and families to cook together, and to explore all the tasty and healthy recipes that are plant-based and use substitutes for the foods children can’t eat. Because most dinosaurs ate vegetation and not meat, yet grew to be huge, we thought the idea of ‘Eat to Roar’ would be a great way to engage children in healthy food without being preachy about it.”
Dina’s dining dilemmas were discussed at a release party at the Pinelands Branch Library, located at 39 Allen Ave., on Saturday, Nov. 19 from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Here, holiday arts and crafts were featured, there was dinosaur entertainment, fun facts about dinosaurs and how they ate, and recipes and healthy snacks from the “Eat to Roar” cookbook. Attendees also had the opportunity to meet the Rosanios.
Although “Eat to Roar” is hot off the press, the couple has been crafting children’s books together since 2010 when they published the book, “Flip Flop Flo, the Know-It-All.” The idea for this first story stemmed from their daughter, Kaitlyn, and the time years ago when she would refuse to take off her flip flops until an incident on the playground taught her flip flops are for summer, not for school.
Today, Kaitlyn is 29 years old and has two daughters of her own, ages 5 and 8-months. Gloria now consults with her daughter about the interests of her granddaughter, Payton, and together they bounce story ideas off the 5-year-old.
“She is our own private focus group,” Gloria said.
After the release of “Flip Flop Flo, the Know-It-All,” the Rosanios decided to begin their own book services and publishing company, giving rise to Medford-based Payton Press. Six years after their first release and the founding of their publishing company, the Rosanios published their second book, “Pedro’s Hungry Ride,” in 2016, about a boy on a bike in search of a healthy snack, and who also wishes to find out the story of how his town came together to plant a community garden.
Through all of their works, the Rosanios get a thrill out of seeing their books come to life through the illustrations. In the case of “Eat to Roar,” they additionally hope their work will help make people aware of the joy of cooking with children and in being introduced to tasty and healthy recipes. “Eat to Roar” is now available on Amazon and can be purchased here.
Payton Press also plans to host a second book release party and has been invited by a school in North Jersey to do so during an upcoming weekend. It also plans to hold other events in Medford in the future. For more information, visit www.paytonpress.net and follow Payton Press on Instagram and Twitter.
