First Piranesi, now Tita Rosie’s Kitchen – I suppose 2023 will be the year of catching up on the books everyone has been raving about. I picked up Arsenic and Adobo to satisfy the “culinary cozy” entry on my Cruisin’ Thru the Cozies challenge, and ended up reading all three books. And while it’s rare for me to give a cozy mystery series a 4-star rating, Tita Rosie’s Kitchen hit the mark – the epitome of a modern cozy mystery.

From one third-culture kid to another

The Tita Rosie’s Kitchen series features Lila Macapagal of Shady Palms, a tiny suburb a few hours outside Chicago. Lila moves back to her hometown, just a few credits shy of a college degree. (Un)fortunately, her’s aunt’s restaurant is struggling, so she immediately starts to pitch in. When her high school ex is murdered in the restaurant (and she’s the main suspect), it’s up to Lila and her friends to solve the case. It’s nothing before the friend group starts their own joint venture, and the real story of Shady Palms begins.

Lila is a true third-culture kid: torn between gratitude for her immigrant family’s sacrifices, and frustration and resentment at some of their choices. She struggles to relate to their approach to life and to manage the ubiquitous gaggle of Aunties. Not only that – Lila’s entire friend group is third-culture kids, each demonstrating a different attitude. There’s Adeena, a barista lesbian who tries to be open with her family, and her more traditional brother, Amir. Then there’s Adeena’s girlfriend, Elena, who runs a greenhouse with her mother and sells natural skincare with Adeena and Lila. There’s also Jae, a potential love interest who love this family – but has still moved out of the house. As each new character was introduced, I found myself relating so hard to their stories.

Lila’s relationship to her culture’s food is also particularly noteworthy given her third-culture status. While neither she nor her cousins speak Filipino, she can still connect with her family and their traditions through food. Both Lila and Adeena serve “fusion” fare that combines the flavors of their culture (and their friends) with American staples. And like a good third-culture kid, Lila brings gifts of food on every visit to a new house. Mia P. Manansala uses food and recipes to better characterize her cast – not just as a prop or a gimmick. As a third-culture kid myself, these are the details that made Lila, Adeena, Elena, and Jae feel like real people.

Expanding the pamilya

Of course, it wouldn’t be a cozy mystery series without a community, and an expansive one at that. Cozy mysteries are all about growing and building a community, and the Tita Rosie’s Kitchen series is no exception. As Lila and her crew investigate each murder that falls on Shady Palms, they grow their circle of friends.

Importantly, they keep these friends from novel to novel. Manansala avoids introducing new characters in one entry, only to have them conveniently disappear in the next. This is a trap that many cozy mysteries fall into, and is my most common reason for putting one down. (It’s not very fun when each entry features only three new characters – the victim, the murderer, and the red herring.)

Instead, Manansala allows these characters to stick around and inhabit Shady Palms, dropping in when most appropriate. Whether they’re taste-testers for Lila’s treats or attending a family party, it’s nice to see old characters return and grow. And it adds to Lila’s character arc, as she puts down roots in the town she ran away from. Each time she welcomes a new town member into the Brew-Ha family, you get the sense that she’s growing and healing from old wounds.

In many ways, this is the epitome of the cozy fantasy. Lila’s not just an independent businesswoman, in control of her own life – she’s surrounded by supportive and loving friends and family. You can watch her put in the work to better herself and her life, and see how she gets closer to self-actualization. Lila’s not perfect – but she’s able to grow her circle of friends anyway. Some may call it wish fulfillment – others may call it character development. All I know is, it’s hugely comforting to read amidst a (still stressful) time.

Modern mystery – or adventure?

Of course, all these yummy recipes and new friends theoretically take place within the context of a mystery. And here is where the Tita Rosie’s Kitchen epitomizes modern cozy mystery in a way that I don’t love. All the fun plot details and tsismis mean that the actual mystery is far from fair play.

It’s a common pattern in modern cozy mystery series. The protagonist and her intrepid crew chase down a number of leads, only to stumble upon the murderer in the last chapter. Until that chapter, there have been few or no clues that could reasonably lead to the revelations in the climax. The mystery is an inciting incident for all the character development, but the solution itself can feel like a lateral thinking puzzle.

This series is no exception to that pattern, although Manansala does tee up some clues ahead of the final chapters. Still, each mystery is only “solved” when Lila stumbles into the answer, often while literally facing the culprit. In Arsenic and Adobo, it’s actually Adeena who figures things out, based on evidence that we (and Lila) don’t see. In Homicide and Halo-Halo, Lila basically stumbles upon the murderer, with the tension coming from escape rather than the solution. And in Blackmail and Bibingka, Lila follows her gut to find a crime in progress – but it’s unlikely she could have put the pieces together without the Villain Monologue.

Maybe it’s just because I’ve been reading Miss Marple lately, but this is hugely different from the “fair-play” approach. Miss Marple and Poirot and other traditional / Golden Age detectives understand the ins and outs of the crime so well that they can lay traps for the criminals. They independently map out the crimes and motivations – and that’s what makes them compelling sleuths. In contrast, Lila and her friends seem to stumble through investigations, digging up all the wrong info until they bother the criminal enough to end up in danger.

To be clear, this is a modern cozy mystery thing, not just Tita Rosie’s Kitchen. I’ve increasingly come to treat modern cozy mysteries not as puzzles, but as adventure novels. Instead of expecting a good puzzle, I look for a great community and a fun adventure.

The very model of a modern cozy mystery

Tita Rosie’s Kitchen, to me, epitomizes the modern cozy mystery genre. It takes some of the old classic tropes – female entrepreneur, recipes and food focus – and gives them a more inclusive spin. Not only that, it uses the tropes to better characterize the protagonists – the recipes and the community members tells us more about Lila and her crew. As a child of immigrants, I felt so seen by this series (and would love to visit Shady Palms one day).

I enjoyed Tita Rosie’s Kitchen so much – I gave every single book 4 stars, which is rare for a cozy mystery series. Perhaps more surprisingly, I could see myself returning to the series to re-read it. (This is super uncommon for me with cozy mysteries, except for my absolute favorites. Usually I just binge them for a weekend and then drop them forever.) People have been recommending this series to me for a while, and now I’m just a bit sad I didn’t pick it up sooner.

Sad enough to actually read through more postponed recommendations? Never say never. Perhaps we’ll keep up the 2023 recommendation streak…

Until next time – stay cozy, and stay curious!