Kids and a Mom in the Kitchen #51: Mama Panya's Pancakes

Time for Kids and a Mom in the Kitchen

(A weekly linky where you can share your special time in the kitchen, such a great place for learning. You can also link up Kid-Friendly Recipes)

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The linky is at the bottom.

We have been learning about Africa for the past few weeks creating works of art found in the book by MaryAnn F. Kohl and Jean Potter called "Global Art" that I am reviewing for the TOS Review Crew. When I started reviewing it I knew I wanted to make at least one recipe with the girls from the cultures we would be learning about. There have been many foods mentioned in the books we have been reading, but no recipes. I was thrilled when I found a recipe in the book "Mama Panya's Pancakes" by Mary and Rich Chamberlin.

You will need:

1 1/4 cups flour

2 cups cold water

 1 1/3 cups vegetable oil

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp cardamom (or nutmeg, which is what we used)

1/2 tsp red chili pepper flakes, crushed (we did not use these as I don't have them anymore. I gave them to my son because I can't stand spicy things.)

The instructions are quite simple. You just mix all the ingredients together. The book said to use a fork, we used our whisk. At first I thought I had done something wrong as the batter was so thin. I actually Googled Mama Panya's Pancakes recipe and found someone had made these and shared them on her blog. I was relieved to discover that the batter was meant to be thin, or at least it was for her too. She said it was thinner than crepe batter, which I have never made, so this was news to me. 

The children all took turns stirring it. 

We preheated a nonstick pan at medium setting. The book said to use a medium to low setting. No oil is needed. We were a little skeptical at first, but with all the oil in the recipe, there really was no need for additional oil. 

We then poured 1/4 cup of batter into the center of the pan. We were supposed to tilt the pan to spread the batter to the size of a grapefruit. It was so thin, there was no need to tilt the pan. Which makes me think it shouldn't have been so thin. 

We cooked them until we saw tiny bubbles in the pancake, then we flipped them over. 

There was so much oil we needed to pour it out after a couple of pancakes. 

The instructions say that "when the second side begins to pop up from the heat, the pancake is ready." The problem was, the center was never done and the edges were too crisp. I tried a higher heat, I tried a lower heat, but I could not get these to fully cook in the center. The one pancake I left on longer was over done and too crisp to eat.

 It was suggested that we could fill these with just about anything. Two suggestions were jam and tuna fish. As we were doing Breakfast for Dinner we made eggs to go inside.

Unfortunately, they were so crisp we could not roll them up to eat them as suggested. They look more like egg tacos. I have to say, this was not a well-received recipe. The children ate their eggs, but they didn't eat the "pancakes." We ended up making bagels for something to eat. Hubby and I could only eat a little, as they were so greasy. I had doubled the batch as the book said the recipe would make 6 pancakes. I am not sure how many we would have made with our double batch, but it was much more than 12. 

I am going to look for further reviews. I just feel maybe there was a typo in the recipe or something. If you try this recipe, please share how they turn out for you. Maybe I was doing something wrong after all.

Do you have your children help you in the kitchen?  What lessons do they learn? Do you have any kid friendly recipes to share?

I'd love to see your posts, whether you have done something this week or some time in the past. Just link up below. This is a weekly linky.

I am linking up to:

 

Melt in Your Mouth Monday
Try a New Recipe Tuesday at Home to Four Kiddos
The Gathering Spot at Mamal Diane
Tempt My Tummy at Blessed with Grace
Friday Food Frenzy at Close to Home
Fantastic Thursday at Five Little Chefs

And here is my Kids and a Mom in the Kitchen linky

School Time With My Father's World : Unit 6- Tt Turtle

Unit 6- Tt Turtle

Words to Remember: I don't quit! I persevere! 

(Here is another school time post that I didn't post when we were done with the unit. We have been finished with Tt:Turtle for a few weeks now as we have been working on Unit 7-Uu:Us. But I wanted to share what we did for T, so here you go)

We are back on track with our My Father's World lessons after all the holiday stuff and a week of snowmen activities. And this lesson couldn't have come at a better time. There have been days when I have been so overwhelmed that I just want to give up. Then those words to remember pop into my head and I repeat them over and over and over to myself.
I have gotten us into a bit of a different schedule and am trying my darnedest to stick to it. When the girls finish their breakfast and their after breakfast chores are done they are able to take turns alternating between the WiiFit Plus (their physical education time, right?) and coloring a topic related coloring sheet.

For the past 2 weeks we have been focusing on the letter Tt and the topic was Turtle. The girls had lots of turtle coloring pages to color during their after breakfast coloring time.

On the WiiFit Plus they enjoy the Tight Rope,

and the Obstacle Course. This past week Amelia finally completed the beginner course all by herself; she was soooo happy. And what really touched my heart was that her sister was genuinely thrilled for her. 

When I am done cleaning up from breakfast I get our lesson ready. I then nurse the baby while we do our "circle" time, which consists of prayer, the Pledge of Allegiance, the Pledge to the Bible, the B-I-B-L-E song, and our calendar/weather time. We then move onto our letter.

On day 1 Tabitha shows the word cards, sounding them out (or Amelia can try sounding them out) and Hannah finds the matching picture card to put on our poster.

On day 2 I show the word cards and have the girls take the picture cards off the poster.

On day 3 I write the word on the chalkboard and have the girls put the picture cards on the poster. They can try to guess which word I am writing as I go.

On day 4 we play a game with the picture cards. I lay out 3-6 of the cards and have them close their eyes while I take away a card, they have to figure out which card is missing. Even Hannah has been getting some of them.

On day 5 Hannah picks a card and Tabitha and Amelia take turns trying to write the word on the chalkboard by sounding it out. Hannah then puts the picture card on the poster. They also take turns erasing the word by using a wet paper towel to trace over the letters.

Usually on Monday we have a muffin tin. Well, for our Turtle lesson I couldn't quite fit what I wanted to do in a muffin tin. So I made them this Tortoise and the Hare meal on a plate.

I am not sure how I came across this website, http://twistynoodle.com/ (it was probably when searching for turtle images to color), but I thought it was a great site. They have pictures to print out and they have some words underneath to trace. The great thing about it is that you can customize it and change the words. So I changed "Turtle" to have the girls write their words to remember, I don't quite, I persevere.

As Hannah already had colored a turtle picture, I didn't want to give her another one right this moment, so I gave her some big Ts to trace.

Then we started our paper plate turtles. We made these a couple of years ago when we did the letter T. We probably would have made them again anyway, but being the craft for My Father's World they were sort of a definite. 

The girls each painted the bottom of 2 paper plates green.  These are the turtle's carapace and plastron.

And Harold sat at the table snacking

When they were dry (on a different day) I had them cut out legs, head and a tail. Then I stapled them together and they glued some shapes on the shell.

We discussed how a God gave a turtle a great defense mechanism where they are able to scrunch up into their shell and hide. I had the girls draw some different animals and insects on the board, then we said whether the turtle would eat it or hide from it.

The turtles had to watch The Tortoise and the Hare episode of Super Why! with the girls.

We also painted Toilet Paper tubes as a part of the Flowering Baby lesson for Hannah that week. These toilet paper tubes would become candlesticks for Jack Be Nimble. You can check out my review of Flowering Baby, LLC here.

And Harold was again eating a snack. At least it keeps him happy.

Here they are jumping over the candlesticks after they were complete.

In honor of our letter T, I made Tater Tot Casserole (it was my new recipe for Chicken Broccoli Tater Tot Casserole).

In addition to the Flowering Baby curriculum, Hannah has been busy learning her colors,

and working on matching letter magnets.

And Harold has been busy building 2-block towers.

We also read some fun books with our T Unit:

(And the girls acted out The Tortoise and the Hare repeatedly as a part of SongSchool Spanish. You can see this newest Schoolhouse Review Crew Review here.)

(A story of a slow-moving tortoise who tries to find someone to play with him.)

(A story of a pet box turtle who digs his way out of his backyard pen and imagines he is having adventures in Africa and India as he moves across the backyard.)

Description from Amazon, "This book is a delightful story about a new family of painted turtles. From the safety of the nest where the baby turtles hatch to the security of the pond where they search for food and witness the changing seasons, this beautifully illustrated book is ideal for introducing young children to the wonders of nature. "

I am linking to:

And a couple of new linkies: