Tiny Moons: A Year of Eating in Shanghai
Tiny Moons is a collection of essays about food and belonging. Nina Mingya Powles journeys between Wellington, Kota Kinabalu and Shanghai, tracing the constants in her life: eating and cooking, and the dishes that have come to define her. Through childhood snacks, family feasts, Shanghai street food and student dinners, she attempts to find a way back towards her Chinese-Malaysian heritage.
‘Funny, compact and beautifully written.’ ~ New Statesman
‘This small-press gem is perfect for devouring in one sitting.’ ~ Book Riot
‘On the face of it, food is the focus. There are delicious anecdotes of eating pisang goreng (banana fritters) in Malaysia’s Kota Kinabalu, mouthwatering descriptions of shengjianbao (pan-fried pork buns) in Shanghai and endlessly relatable stories about attempting to recreate dumplings in Wellington, NZ, without quite the right ingredients. But woven into the backdrop of each dish are musings on identity set in different parts of the world. There are morsels on being a woman, on being mixed race, and on not being from one place or another.’ The Independent