France Week!

Ooh la la. This was a delicious week! Yes, I say that every week, and yes, that might have something to do with the fact we're picking our favorite food destinations. Nevertheless, France outdid itself. 

Crafts

We learned about French impressionism and how artists like Monet changed the style of art through displaying deliberate brushstrokes. We attempted this style on foil canvases with q-tip paint brushes. I got the idea on Pinterest (I don't have a specific link), and this was a huge hit. First of all, it's so easy to do and the kids LOVED it. Secondly, I was really surprised how much information Zahara learned about Monet and impressionism, and how well the art turned out. 

We ended up doing these paintings all week. To make your own, just wrap a piece of cardboard (we used old cereal boxes) in foil. Paint any scene you want using finger paints and q-tips.

For one of our snack times, we made the Eiffel Tower. I drew the tower on a plain piece of printer paper (it doesn't need to be perfect). We used dates, Pirates Booty, baby carrots, and Veggie Straws, but you can use anything. Ideally, one of the snacks should be straight to make up the sides of the tower.

Culture

Once again we turned to our favorite Nat Geo Kids videos to learn more about France. We watched this one about the Eiffel Tower. We also watched the movie Madeline, which was a fun treat since Zahara has read the Madeline books.

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We took a field trip this week too! We went to visit a French bakery near us, The Fresh Baguette, and actually had a nice lunch outside. Our county is starting to loosen restrictions around Covid, and now some restaurants are open. We are still not comfortable eating indoors yet, but are more open to the idea of eating outside at a table that is physically distanced from other tables. We wear masks unless we are eating, and make sure the waitstaff wear one too. It's not an every day event for us, but it is nice to have a little more freedom. Thankfully the numbers of new infections in our area are going down (largely due to enforced mask policies), so we are able to take on this risk. 

Food

We had a hard time narrowing down our food menu this week, as you might imagine. Here's what we ended up with, but I suspect we'll need to circle back to France sometime soon. Coq au vin, duck a l'orange, French onion soup, creme brulee, potato salad with herring, barigoule of spring vegetables, nutella-filled crepes, and macarons (Trader Joe's frozen ones are awesome!).

The coq au vin and duck a l'orange were fantastic. I don't know if I've had either of these dishes before, but I would absolutely make them again. I was surprised how much I liked the duck breast versus the legs. They were so juicy and tender.

French onion soup is one of my favorite dishes, but it's hard to find kosher because traditionally it uses beef stock and cheese. We substituted veggie stock and it still tastes rich and delicious--especially when served in Dan's homemade sourdough bread bowl!

The creme brulee turned out great, and the kids liked watching Dan brulee it with our kitchen torch. To make the crepe experience a little more French, we watched this video of a typical French creperie at work. We made sure to fold our crepe in the traditional style. 

The potato salad and the veggie dish were not great. It's nice to experiment, but these didn't really work for us. The almond croissant, quiche and chocolate eclair we had at the bakery made up for it though.

Au revoir, France! Thanks for the calories memories. Next up, USA!

See our other country week adventures here.

Ethiopia Week

This week, Ethiopia week, was our first time in Africa!

To be honest, this was a bit of a light week, content wise as I was pretty stretched at work. Nevertheless, we had fun learning about a new culture and country.

Crafts

We intended to make paper necklaces using this tutorial, and to make Ethiopian flags out of fabric and other materials. We didn't get to those crafts. Instead, Asher and I did a fun weaving activity out of construction paper. This was really simple, and it actually lasted longer than I thought it would (of course I forgot to take pictures). Weaving has been a way of life in Ethiopia for centuries, so this was a nice tribute to that tradition.

Coffee is another mainstay in Ethiopia. Today, more than 3% of the world's coffee is grown there [source]. To honor that  significant contribution, we made "art" with coffee beans. I drew a picture of an Ethiopian girl and had Asher decorate her with coffee beans that he glued on. I would say this was mildly successful. He had fun for a few minutes, though the results are...abstract.

Culture

We learned about the geography of Ethiopia through this video. We also got to watch a day in the life of Keneni, a 5th grader in Ethiopia. And, we learned about the Ethiopian Jews--such a fascinating group of people with a cool history. It was neat to see people who live such different lives than us, but still have something important in common with us.

Food

We kind of phoned it in for this week, but I regret nothing. Where we live is a hotspot of Ethiopian culture and cuisine. There are a lot of great Ethiopian restaurants near us, and after scouring online recipes for inspiration, we decided to order-in. I mean, look at this!

This vegetarian platter has a lot of our favorites, including injira (the bread) and various wots (the stews). The wots include lentils, collard greens, chick peas, cabbage, and lots of great spices. Most of the wots aren't spicy, but the red misir wot (red lentils) is. The kids loved the injira and the yellow dishes--those were the least spicy. 

It was a fun week in Ethiopia--next week we head to Thailand!

See our other country weeks here.

Italy Week!

It was only a matter of time before we made our way to Italy. It's one of our favorite countries to visit in real life, and of course the food is incredible. We could have spent all summer in Italy, but I'm afraid I would gain 20 pounds or more!

Crafts

Dan made these adorable Venetian masks with the kids using supplies we had around the house. We just cut paper plates in half and made eye holes. The kids painted the plates while Dan made little feathers out of construction paper. Once dried, add a craft stick and you're ready for the masquerade party.

A couple of other crafts this week involved making food. I love these hands-on activities. Asher in particular really enjoys cooking, so it's fun to get him involved. This week we made our own pasta, pizza, and ricotta cheese!

We got a pasta maker attachment for our KitchenAid mixer as a wedding present nearly twelve years ago, and though we rarely use it, when we do, it is so fun! You can make pasta by hand, but rolling and cutting would be really challenging. For this week, we cut our pasta into spaghetti and linguine shapes. Of course we had to make our favorite sauce of all time--Scarpetta's tomato sauce. 

For the ricotta, Dan used this recipe and then made a really delicious poached pear dessert. I didn't think I was a fan of ricotta desserts (like cannoli), but this changed my mind!

Culture

Dan and I have been to Italy a few times, both together and separately. Zahara went when she was a baby, too! The kids got to re-live a couple of our trips with a slideshow of our top memories. I'll never forget our trip as a family of three to Cinque Terre and Tuscany. And of course our honeymoon is unforgettable.

The kids also watched a couple of NatGeo videos. One on gondalas, and one on the leaning tower of Pisa.

Food

We've already talked about some of the food we ate this week. Pasta, ricotta, pizza. We had a few different options for the pizzas. Dan experimented with an anchovy and cultured olive pizza (verdict: too salty). We also went for black olive (the kids' favorite), and a white pizza with ricotta, buffalo mozzarella, thyme, and ricotta. I liked the white pizza a lot.

Dan and the kids made focaccia too, using our sourdough starter. We had that as a snack throughout the week. We also had a caprese salad, osso bucco (veal shank) with risotto, chicken marsala, and a charcuterie board. Gotta say, the charcuterie board was kind of hard to do kosher. We had some deli meat, olives, artichoke hearts, and anchovies, but we were really missing the variety of meats.

  

Italy, you were wonderful as always. We'll miss you, but I'm sure we'll be back again soon. Next stop is our first in Africa: Ethiopia!

See our other country weeks here.

South Korea Week!

While I love all the countries we have been exploring, I have to admit, South Korea was a particularly fun week. We didn't get done as much as we planned, but we had a great time.

Crafts
We had grand plans to do several crafts, but ran out of steam. We did manage to make little paper dolls that turned out so cute. Did I take a picture of the final products? Nope. But here's Asher making his.

Culture
Our neighbors are South Korean and were happy to share their knowledge and experiences with us. Their story is actually really interesting. The daughter is the same age as Zahara and they've become fast friends. Her grandparents lived in Argentina for 30 years before moving to the States. They speak only Korean and Spanish. Her dad owns a food market and has been self-quarantining in a rented apartment away from the family since March. What an incredible sacrifice.

These neighbors helped us learn how to write our names in Korean, and also taught us an interesting fact. In Korean, there is no "z" sound. It's the same sound as a "j." That's why Zahara's name is written with a J in English.

They also lent us some of their traditional clothes that they wear to celebrate the lunar new year. The kids loved touching all the rich fabrics and seeing the beautiful embroidery.

We watched this catchy video to learn about South Korea, and now the song is stuck in my head.

Zahara has been taking karate for 1.5 years now. Every class they count to ten or twenty in Korean. It's so adorable hearing all the kids shouting hana, dool, set... Even Asher has picked up on the numbers. We used that knowledge to teach my parents how to count in Korean (or at least tried to).

Of course, no South Korea week is complete without a K-Pop dance party! K-Pop, or Korean pop is a huge phenomenon that has crossed over into the American market--most famously with Psy's 2012 hit Gangnam Style. Crazy fact--that song has been viewed more than 3.6 billion times on YouTube! We had a blast dancing around in our living room after dinner one night.

Food
I know I say this every week, but I really loved the food this week! We had a few favorites and a few new-to-us dishes. I loved them all. The one that surprised me the most was the lotus root dish. I ate these like candy. We made japche noodles (sweet potato noodles); Korean beef bowls (with the yum-yum sauce); sweet and salty lotus roots; gama jorim (potato side dish); steamed red bean buns, and a yummy Korean candy.

Another stamp in our passports. Next week is Italy week!

See our other country weeks here.

Russia Week!

Another week, another country! This week we were off to Russia.

Russia was an easy choice because my in-laws are from the Former Soviet Union, speak Russian as their first language, cook delicious Russian foods regularly, and are a great source of knowledge on Russian culture. Dan and I have also been to Russia, so we were able to share a few memories and pictures from there.

Crafts
This was my week to work (remotely), so Dan was in charge of crafting. He made adorable matryoshka dolls with the kids. You may not recognize their name, but you've definitely seen these nesting wooden dolls. We have a small set, but we saw some really incredible ones in Saint Petersburg, Russia.

He also bought two packs of cheap wooden spoons to make these lacquerware replicas. As with most of these crafts, Zahara gets pretty in to them, Asher...not as much.

Culture
We read lots of books in Russian and about Russia (like Masha and the Bear). We watched the National Geographic kids video about the Russian ballet. And, we got to revisit some of our favorite memories of our Baltic Cruise in 2012 by showing the kids pictures of Saint Petersburg.

Food

Asher may not be that into the crafts, but he loves cooking. This week, we made so many of our favorites. We had borscht, blini (crepes), ikra (salmon roe), smoked sprats, kasha, pelmini (cherry and cheese dumplings), seledka pod shuboi (herring in a fur coat), sirniki (cheese pancakes), and black bread.

We cooked a lot, but we also bought food from our local Russian store (how lucky are we?). We also picked up some yummy Russian chocolates. My favorite is the squirrel one (belochka).

Do Svidaniya, Russia! Now, on to South Korea!

See our other country weeks here.

Mexico Week!

We're on a roll now with our country weeks. And good thing, because this week we learned that distance learning will continue for the remainder of the school year--another six weeks! We knew school wasn't coming back in person, but to hear the official announcement was difficult. Since we also don't know whether camps will be in session, it looks like this is our new norm for the foreseeable future. Thank goodness there are plenty of countries to explore! Next on our itinerary was Mexico!

We chose Mexico for this week because it coincided with Cinco de Mayo, a holiday celebrated in Mexico and the United States on the 5th of May. The holiday memorializes the Mexican victory in the Battle of Puebla over the French in 1862. Today, it is mostly celebrated by eating Mexican food and drinking Margaritas.

Crafts
We started our celebrations by making our own mini-pinatas using this tutorial. This was really easy and fun. And I had all the supplies on hand already--win! You need paper cups, construction paper, tissue paper, ribbon, a rubber band, and of course some candy or other treats. Here's the tutorial we used. I'll say that it was fun to make, but not super successful in getting the treats out on the first try. Still, we had fun and had some candy, so overall it was a win.

Culture
We read a lot of great books on Epic Kids (Zahara's school e-reading platform) about Mexican history and Cinco de Mayo. We also watched a fun video of kids meeting a luchador (Mexican wrestler). But my favorite part of this week was when we got to speak with my co-worker Monica who is Mexican. I asked if she would tell the kids a bit about her background, but she went above and beyond and created a PowerPoint presentation on Mexican history and culture! The coolest thing I learned was how many English words are based on one of the languages spoke in Mexico called Nahuatl. Words like avocado, cocoa, guacamole, chile and chocolate are just a few examples.

Food
Oh, man did we have fun with the food this week. Growing up in Texas gave me an appreciation for Mexican food--or at least Tex-Mex. Here was our menu for the week (recipes linked): chicken fajitas, homemade tortillas, Mexican rice, tacos, chilaquiles (a baked egg dish), elote (Mexican street corn), and churros! Obviously that was over the course of the week...not just one meal!

Making churros and tortillas was really fun. Both were surprisingly easy and SUPER delicious! I used margarine instead of lard in the tortilla, and it was perfect.

After a great week in Mexico, it was time to stamp our passports and head on to our next country: Russia!

See our other country weeks here.