Showing posts with label Cooking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cooking. Show all posts

Thursday, July 18, 2013

Rowing {Four} Days

We have been "rowing" The Carrot Seed, by Ruth Krauss, for four days now. This morning I thought it would be fun to get Vada started with an orange sensory bubble bath. Everything in the tub besides "Baby" and Vada was some shade of orange. We even had a carrot, which went perfectly with our  theme for the week.





After playing in the bath and then getting ready for the day Vada and I sat down with Vada's oldest sister, Jasmine and shared what we've completed so far in Vada's Carrot Seed Lapbook/Journal.


All of the Carrot Seed Lapbook printable were downloaded from Homeschool Share.


Below, Jasmine and Vada are looking at pictures of the seed that were "planted" in a mason jar back when we celebrated and learned about Earth Day for a whole week (part two). 


The seed eventually outgrew the jar and is now growing in our garden!


Next, we talked about what a plant and all living things needs to survive. We did this while coloring these labeled carrots.


Together, Vada and I cut two of the carrots out and then I finished by doing the remaining two on my own. Afterward, Vada used a glue stick for the very first time. I think that she really liked it! I did too! It was a lot less messy!!! 



I had a page empty and ready for Vada to paste her carrots into her lapbook/journal once she was done putting glue onto them. 


Then I had Vada work on multitasking. I wanted her to hold the "fruit" or "vegetable" in one hand while trying to cut it with the other. This was semi difficult for her to do, depending on the actual piece that she had. Sometimes, she would just pull it apart by hand if it were too hard to actually slice and I let her because she always tried to slice it with the "knife" first. During this activity I always named each fruit or vegetable and labeled it for her as either a fruit or a vegetable. This activity will play into tomorrows activities.





After we went through every piece of "slicing fruit" I had Vada put each piece back together and then back into the bag. Once they were all picked up we moved onto one of Vada's all time favorites, Counting Cans. 


We went through each can once, except the carrots. Per Vada's request, we had to count the carrots again. Which I thought was pretty neat!



Another activity that we did today that will also play into tomorrow's activities is this Vegetable matching and labeling game. Each vegetable card had a match and after putting all of the originals onto the board I would hand a match to Vada and ask her to find the match. I always told her the name of the vegetable and that it was in fact a vegetable that she had. I often pointed to the vegetable that she needed to match with but I just wanted her to get the concept. This was the first time that we have done this and over all I think that she did very well, especially since this clearly more was difficult for her than some of our other activities from today.




After matching all of the photo's together I got the name labels out and read them and then I would ask Vada to "show me" or "point to" that specific vegetable. If she couldn't, I would show her and then ask her again to point to it, then I would put the label in the correct spot.


I downloaded these awesome cards from Homeschool Creations


Now I know that it is summer and here its in the mid ninety's but that didn't stop us from making today lunch, nor did it stop us from enjoying it either and with Vada and Jasmine's help, the homemade, straight from the garden, carrot soup tasted delicious!



JAsmine and Vada began sauteing the onions, celery and carrots in butter that was seasoned with vegetable bouillon, Natures Seasons and a black truffle sea salt. 





After about twenty minutes of simmering, I added extra water and it was ready to eat!


It. Was. SO. GOOD!!!


We all had seconds, even Jasmine and that really says something!



Tuesday, August 7, 2012

Baking Bacon

Who else knows this bacon trick?


Place aluminum foil over a cookie sheet. Preheat your oven to 450 degrees. Lay raw bacon strips onto the foil and bake (yes, bake) your bacon for around twenty minutes, making sure to flip each piece at least once during the cooking process.


Baking your bacon still cooks it in their own grease yet it takes out the well known huge grease mess and all of the hot fat splatters and possible burns! 


This is the easiest way to cook bacon that I have ever seen or heard of and it doesn't change the texture or the taste! Whats best, besides all of it really, is the clean up. You let the pan cool off so that the grease hardens and then take off the foil and your washing time has easily been cut into half!!

This was my husbands sandwich, he likes mustard as well as mayo on his BLT's.

The first time that I ever heard of this was last month at my in-laws. At first I thought that the bacon would turn out gross, not that it mattered one way or the other to me -I don't eat meat, but I was wrong. The bacon had crunch to it and it stayed flat verses curling up like pan fried bacon can often do. That's why tonight when I told the girls that we were having BLT's for dinner and they asked to help, I had something for both of the older girls to do. Jasmine cut all of the veggies and did the toast and Kiliegh placed all of the bacon on the cookie sheets for me. It was fantastically easy all of the way around! 



 I didn't hear a single complaint about the bacon tonight, just lots of crunch filled chews!


Saturday, August 27, 2011

Salt Water Bliss or Miss

I have a fond memory of a student consular at one of the residential placements that I was in. She was a sweet girl who often did fun things for and with us girls. One of my favorite memories of her was when she brought in homemade salt water taffy for all of us to try. She had pulled it herself and it was delicious! Once she tried to make it with a few of us girls. I think it was too humid and the taffy didn't turn out right but we all ate it anyway. It's a fun memory and I have thought about doing making the candy with my girls on many occasions. So, when I flipping through my cookbook in search of something new for dinner and saw the recipe, I couldn't help but smile, get out the ingredients and grab the girls.


Remembering how fun attempting this recipe was when I was younger I thought that the girls would enjoy it as well. When I told them what we were going to make they were instantly interested. Sugar and candy.., what kid wouldn't be?


The concoction had to boil for around forty-five minutes so the girls quickly lost their excitement in the process and on more than one occasion.


However, the girls were always close to the kitchen and every so often they would peek in just to make sure that they hadn't missed out on anything.

Once the syrup had boiled to it's set temperature I poured it out and let it cool. Then, I slopped a gooey blob into Jasmine and Kiliegh's hands and they began to pull...


Vada watched with interest...


The best part of making taffy, besides eating it, is the hands on process of pulling it.


Looking back through the pictures I cant help but wonder how much fingernail polish may have chipped off into the candy and I am glad that we didn't give any of it away.


After a great deal of pulling and a lot of muscle work, I cut the ropes of candy into bite sized pieces...


... and then finally, the moment they waited around two hours for... their first taste of the candy that they made.


Truthfully, I think that we over cooked it and it went into the garbage the next day but at least we have this memory together.