This book presents a bilingual introduction to five Spanish-speaking countries and one commonwealth: Mexico, Cuba, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, and Puerto Rico. Each chapter combines simple, tantalizing recipes with general and cultural information, suggestions for additional learning opportunities, vocabulary, a short fiction reading list, and Internet resources.

The Latino population is the fast-growing minority in this country, and educational resources for and about Hispanics remain scarce. The purpose of this bilingual work is two-fold: to introduce young Americans to...