France & Germany

For France, we had a picnic with friends in the backyard, complete with baguettes, butter, grapes, cheese, apples, chocolate and sparkling cider. We had crepes several times during the 2 weeks we spent in France. We loved them so much we now eat them regularly for lunch. We made croque monsieur for supper one night and quiche with chocolate mousse another night. The kids loved France. They would like to move there.

But again, my pics disappeared into the netherworld.

We loved the German food as well. We made chicken paprikash (Hungarian, I know) with spaetzle, but that's a normal menu item for us. So to go "all out" and have real German food, we made jaegershnitzel. It was amazing. But crazy time-consuming. And not waistline friendly. As my kids would say, "It is a sometimes food, not an all-the-time food."

Norway

For Norway, we celebrated St Lucia's day. We made peperkakor cookies and the girls dressed in St. Lucia costumes (yes, as a matter of fact, those are pillowcases with holes cut for the arms).


We had a feast of dilled fish, potato dumplings and lefse. The lefse and fish were awesome.





The dumplings were like grey, slimy balls of nasty. Avoid at all costs!

Brazil

My friend Melanie and her kids came over for our G-rated Brazilian Carnivale. We made brigadeiro, arroz branco, bohnilo de quiejo and frango assado from this site. They were pretty good. The chicken was a little gooey. I like my wings crispy, so I would use much less liquid next time. But the candies were a hit. The kids colored pictures and made Carnivale masks and flutes.

But somehow I los the pictures.

Since I spent a summer in Venezuela in high school, we also took a day trip there and made empanadas.

Mexico

So, I'm a little behind here. After studying the good ol' US of A, we moved on to Mexico (in September). We made tamales, dulce de leche bars and a pinata. My sister and her boys joined us for our "fiesta grande".

First, the pinata:
Tip #1 - Mix cinnamon into your paper maiche. It will smell less like a bowl of sick.



Tip #2 - Brooms help for painting.


Tip #3 - Consider how you will hang the pinata before it is painted and dry. We used ribbon.




The kids had a blast smacking the tar out of it.

The tamales were great. Got the recipe here: www.crockpot365.blogspot.com. The kids were really interested in making them. Until about the 3rd one. Then they ran off. They turned out really good. You will need to rotate them at some point. The ones on the bottom of our pot burned.










We made dulce de leche in the crockpot too (cans of sweetened condensed milk, covered with water, cooked on low for 8 hrs.) We spread the dulce de leche on a cinnamon graham cracker crust. Mmm.



The kids made "rope art" and tissue paper flower decorations.
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All American Root Beer Cookies

So, our last two weeks were spent in the good ol' USA. Most of the suggested foods were either things we eat on a regular basis or Native American dishes we ate last year when we studied them. So, since Mommy was also courting full on PMS, we made cookies. Root Beer cookies. Mmm. They were VERY rich.



The kids liked them okay, but I realized I would eat them all. So I gave them to our sweet Korean neighbors.

We made them again with peppermint extract instead of root beer extract. And we added Andes mint chips. And didn't frost them. And they rocked. I think this will be our new chocolate chip cookie recipe. The only problem is that they cook VERY fast. So you really have to watch them.

Yesterday we left the States (virtually) for Mexico. I promised the kids we would make tamales and a pinata. Intercession is welcome.

He's got the whole world....

on a cake!






The kids and I are embarking on a trip around the world this year. The kids all have faux passports and as we travel we will add stickers to the passports for each country. One of our first projects was to make a map of the world - on a cake. We made a wonderful chocolate mint cookie cake. I discovered that freehanding a map of the world is harder than you would think. I wasn't intending to be so egocentric and have North America so large, but I started on the left and went right. So Asia got squished. And then eaten. Nate insisted that we use sprinkles for the major mountain ranges to it would be a physical map.

Recipe:

2 boxes chocolate cake mix
2 eggs
1 cup oil
1/4 cup water

Mix together. It will be quite thick.

Add 1 bag Andes mint chips.

Pat into a large greased jelly roll pan.

Bake at 350 for 15 minutes.

Cool and ice as desired.