Apples and Honey for a Sweet New Year!

Nothing beats the sweetness of Rosh Hashanah, or Jewish New Year.   Apples and honey offer hopes of a sweet new year, and also give us great focal points for the week's curriculum.

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A couple of simple activity trays get us in the mood for our apple picking adventures at Gidzich Ranch!

Sorting "apples" (wax paper balls covered in masking tape) by color  into bushels (dixie cups covered in masking tape with masking tape handles)

Stick the apples to the tree, then pick them off with the tweezers

This is why we have been continuously introducing new works...the children eat it up!

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It wouldn't be Rosh Hashanah if we weren't satisfying the sweet tooth with some honey cake.  With a few adaptations, we used this recipe and it turned out delish.

L'Shanah Tova!

Red White and Blue July Pie

Making...

Eating...

How we did it:

• Preheat oven to 425 degrees
• Make a pie crust and cut into squares
• Place squares into lightly oiled muffin tins
• Scoop red and blue fruits (we used defrosted bags of frozen strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries) into muffin tins, but don't over fill
• Top with some powdered sugar
• Bake for 30ish minutes, checking ever five minutes after 25 minutes.
• When fruit turns dark and pie crust is golden-ish, take them out
• You can eat immediately if you top with ice cream (I pushed the ice cream scoops right into the fruit and suggested the kids to "eat the ice cream first so the fruit can cool down"). Needless to say, this was not a problem.

We started this activity as the children awoke from their naps, and the snack was ready by afternoon snack. Total elapsed time, roughly 1:15. I did the pie crust while they were napping so it could take a little longer if you do that part with the children.

Let Them Drink Juice!

It's only 100% juice here at Beansprouts...and that juice comes straight from the source!

Last week, our juice was orange-carrot-celery-apple-persimmon.

10 out of 12 children loved it!

Surprisingly, the children didn't like me using the term "pooping" to describe how the juicer released the pulp.  I thought it would be funny...but I guess they were disturbed that I was using this crude bodily function terminology to describe something we were about to consume.

I want to add a close-up so you can see the nice color of the juice (and more importantly, why you will see why I call it "pooping the pulp"!).

Bottoms up!

*Stephanie*

We're linking up with...
The Play Academy @ The Nurture Store

Gingerbread Houses

Here is a photo tour through my favorite activity of the week--gingerbread houses!  My next favorite thing--reliving it as I look through the photos to see which I want to include in this blog post! 

Graham Crackers for Snack

Today the kids made their own graham crackers for snack!  It was fun for them to roll out the dough, poke the dough with a fork to make holes (so the crackers would stay flat and not puff up), and then use the pastry roller to cut out cracker shapes.  Pizza cutters might have worked better because the guard on the pastry roller kept getting caught in the dough.  Some kids cut their graham crackers into four, some into ten tiny little crackers, but all enjoyed the process.  Cookie cutters work, too! And they store surprisingly well.

If you are a teacher or parent looking for a fun (and forgiving) cooking project to do with your kids, this one is for you : )  Me and the first couple of kids to arrive made the dough, and everyone else did the rolling, poking, and cutting.

p.s. Leslie made Banana-Cashew Balls in the afternoon.  This no-bake, cookie-dough-esque treat was a big hit with the kids (and, ahem, me).

Cinnamon-y Graham Crackers
Adapted from this recipe
Yields equivalent to about 12-14 of the store-bought graham crackers

Dry:
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
1/4 cup sugar or 1/3 cup sucanat or dehydrated cane juice
1/2 teaspon baking soda
scant 1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt

Wet:
1/4 cup oil
2 tablespoons molasses, rice syrup, honey, or maple syrup (molasses works best)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 cup water or non-dairy milk (we used almond milk)

Preheat oven to 350 and line a baking sheet with parchment (or spray with nonstick spray).

Mix dry ingredients with a whisk.  Make a well in the center and add wet ingredients, giving it a quick whisk and then stirring it into the dry mixture with a wooden spoon.  Knead with your hands as needed to create a dough that holds.  Add a bit of water or milk if the dough is too dry (not too much!).

On a floured surface or between two sheets of wax paper, roll the dough out to about 1/8 inch thick.  Cut the crackers into the shapes you want (this can be perfect rectangles or, as the photos below suggest, very imprecise...it doesn't matter much.  Pierce the dough with a fork a few times so the crackers don't puff up when baked.

Trasnfer the crackers to the prepared baking sheet and bake for 11-12 minutes.  They should be darkish around the edges.  When it's time to take them out of the oven, you will smell the done-ness when you open the oven door.  They will harden as they cool.

Do you know the Muffin Man?

Yesterday we made muffins!  Now that the children are bringing their own lunch to school, we thought we would spice up the snack menu a bit.  This means trying to limit servings of over-processed crackers and cereals and doing more homemade and wholesome foods.  Over time, we hope that snacks become a time where children participate more in the preparation of their food, and where we can offer new and exciting treats.  Looking at the snack menu this week, one can see how the snack menu has already evolved drastically!  Goodbye monotony, hello...


...muffins!

How is it possible to do baking projects like this with twelve children, you ask?  Don't they go crazy in their chairs just watching the teacher do all the work?

Well, first of all, they all know that eventually they will get a turn doing something, even if that something is simple pouring in the vanilla or measuring out the baking powder (they are excited even by getting to scoop out baking powder and leveling it off on the leveler that comes in the container!).  That is usually motivation enough to sit and watch.  Sometimes when we're done mixing they get to taste the ingredients.  Because most of our projects are vegan (they don't contain animal ingredients of any sort), they can even taste things like cookie dough and cake batter without the risk of ugly things like salmonella.  (Well I guess that's not entirely true now, is it, in light of recent spinach, peanut butter, and celery recalls?)

Another thing that keeps kids focused: it's an optional activity.  If and when the sitting down gets to be too much, they can leave the project and go play.  More often than not, they all want to stick around.  What's more motivating than food, anyway?

We also have different ways of making these projects manageable for ourselves.  I often tell our student teachers that if they want to do a cooking project they should do it with a very small group of kids.

Another way that I keep kids engaged is that if it's a very wiggly group that day, I give them all something to hold as they wait for their turn.  A wooden spoon, utensil, the bottle of vanilla (depending on the kid, of course), or another mixing bowl.  Somehow having a prop to hold keeps them more centered.

Leslie had a brilliant way of making the project manageable for herself yesterday.  When she brought out the tray with ingredients, all of the dry ingredients were in separate bowls, pre-measured.  This way the children could scoop from one bowl to the other without a concern for accurate measuring.  She knew that whatever was there would eventually be sifted into the dry ingredients.

[drumroll please]  And now, the recipe.  Notice it contains no refined sugar.  Did they scarf down the muffins anyway?  Yes!

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Cinnamon Swirl Muffins
Adapted from FatFree Vegan Kitchen

1 cup all purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
2 tablespoons ground flax seeds*
1/3 plus 1/2 cup nondairy milk**
2/3 cup orange juice
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup agave nectar

Preheat the oven to 350.  Prepare  silicon muffin liners or grease a muffin tin.  We also used paper liners and they worked fine.  Whisk together dry ingredients in a large bowl.  Mix wet ingredients in a small bowl.  Pour wet into dry and stir just until thoroughly moistened.  Scoop batter into muffin cups and stick them in the oven.

Bake for 17-22 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean.

*You can probably substitute the flax seed meal with an actual egg or two.  Add the egg to the wet ingredients and adjust liquids accordingly.
**You can substitute 1/3 cup of the milk with dairy or nondairy yogurt, which is what the original recipe calls for.

Yields 12 regular-sized muffins, or more if you make them smaller.
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Thanks, Leslie, for doing our first baking project of the new year!

Here are some more muffin recipes from Te's family...they bake them in tiny silicon baking cups and then send the whole muffin (baking cup and all) into Te's lunch.  These baking cups come in many different shapes and sizes and can be found here and other retailers.

Applesauce Oat Bran Muffins from eat me, delicious
Chocolate Chip Granola Bites from another lunch

*Stephanie*