Today is the official holiday of Pi Day!! As a former math teacher, I love to celebrate it. Last year I gave you some of the sheets I used with my high school classes to celebrate it and to justify our having pie. This year I thought I would look at a bit of the history of pi.
Well this year (March through February) I have joined some great bloggers in traveling the world through dishes. Our first stop is Ireland. Since I shared a bit about Ireland the other day with the first of the Irish Cinderellas, I will skip doing it again. I am very excited to join this group, because I see it as such a wonderful way to expose Hazel to new cultures and countries and for her to learn a bit more about the world. Before we take our trip to Ireland, however, I am going to share with you the reason we did not make Irish Soda Bread today and why Hazel did not help me with the Irish Chicken and Leek Pie for dinner. We had a beautiful feels like spring day. So we went out to play this afternoon. When Steve got done with work, he came out and I came in to cook dinner and go to my Weight Watchers meeting.
Hazel and I went on a walk around our neighborhood looking for signs of spring. We saw budding trees, birds, and the tops of flower plants poking up. We went home and filled a suet feeder with scraps of yarn, wool roving and ribbon and hung it on a tree and we filled the bird feeder. Then Hazel pulled out her magnifying glass and eventually pulled out her garden shovel and rake and dug in the garden. When I came back out, Hazel had been joined by our next door neighbor who is eleven but still loves to play with Hazel and they were having a great time rebuilding their fairy house. And for those of you who read our post about the snow storm last week, here is what is left of Hazel's snow mountain.
It is amazing how fast it is melting!! I am glad robin has woken Sister Spring up!
Ok, now back to Ireland! Today we tried a recipe from a book I got out of the library, Cooking the Irish Way by Helga Hughes. It came from the children's section so I thought it would be great to get Hazel and I trying some Irish cooking. I decided to try the chicken and leek pie. I was not sure how Steve and Hazel would feel about the leek aspect, but figured I would give it a try. Overall, we all loved it. Hazel was not totally sure about the leeks, but ate them mixed in with everything else.
I did change the recipe a bit, but not too much. Chicken and Leek Pie (adapted from Cooking the Irish Way by Helga Hughes) 1 package ready made pie crust (I bought frozen, but would have preferred refrigerated) 6 slices of uncured precooked bacon (this is the only way we really do bacon in my house) 1 tablespoon olive oil (The recipe called for bacon fat) 2 small leeks, chopped (I bought already cleaned ones) 1 1/2 cups of chicken breast already cooked and cut into bite size pieces 6 tablespoons flour 1/2 teaspoon dried rosemary 1/2 teaspoon ground pepper 4 tablespoons nonfat milk 1/2 cup fat free sour cream 1 cup frozen mixed vegetables (I put these in in case Hazel or Steve would not eat the leeks) 2 tablespoons fresh parsley chopped 2 tablespoons milk for glazing Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Press one of the crusts into pie pan. Cook/heat bacon in microwave and then chop it. In skillet heat oil. While heating put chicken and leeks into large ziploc bag and add flour. Shake to coat chicken and leeks with flour. Put chicken and leeks into oil and discard excess flour. Stir and brown leeks and chicken. Remove from heat. Stir in the bacon, rosemary, pepper, milk, sour cream and mixed vegetables. Then spoon into pie crust. Sprinkle parsley on top. Then cover with second pie crust. Glaze with milk by using brush or paper towel. Cut slits in pie (unless you used a frozen one like me and it already had slits/cuts through it). Put in oven for 20 minutes at 400. Then turn temperature down to 350 and bake for 15-20 minutes longer, until crust is a light golden brown.
We had ours with the suggested salad. Then Hazel and I had strawberries for dessert. A delicious meal!! We will be trying some more Irish recipes this week, so stay tuned!!
You can find an Ireland coloring placemat right here and the passport right here (the cover for the passport is right here for you!).
Well, I think I am finally having my dear grandmother, Hazel, smiling down at me. She is the one who provides me and Hazel with a bit of Irish blood. Hazel and I have been reading some Irish stories and we decided to make a leprechaun trap. Now I got the idea for this and the rainbows Hazel colored from DLTK. We of course gave it our own twist.
We found a squarish box and covered it with green construction paper. We left a hole for an opening on top. Then we began decorating. While decorating we also made a ladder out of gold pipe cleaners and I got the idea of adding some signs. We decided to call it End of the Rainbow Inn. Then I also made a sign saying "Leprechauns Welcome". You can get the signs at Leprechaun Trap Signs.
We put some cottony fluff inside so the leprechaun will have a soft place to stay. We covered the hole with green sparkly ribbon looking a bit like a rainbow shape. Hazel is so excited to catch a leprechaun. She keeps asking if there are any in our town and what do you think it will say.
I bought some chocolate gold coins to put in it and I think I will make her a leprechaun--either a peg doll or needle felt or bendy. I haven't decided which yet. She cannot wait to check it on St. Patrick's Day. We also tried the cupcake leprechaun that we say over at I HEART CRAFTY THINGS. We also made one with a paper plate. We put the cupcake liner one on our trap and will hang the paper plate one up as a decoration. We are thinking tomorrow will be another fun day of baking some Irish soda bread and learning more about Ireland.
Oh, we also planted some shamrocks or clover. We bought a package the other day, so I doubt they will grow in time for St. Patrick's Day, but Hazel loved planting them.
So as I stated the other day, we are ready for spring. We have been busy thinking about spring crafts and putting away our winter decorations. Today I am going to focus on a couple rainbow crafts we have done. After all, rainbows seem to say spring as well as St. Patrick's Day.
The first one I saw on I Can Teach My Child. We changed it a bit by using wooden beads, white clay and adding a sun coming out of the clouds.
After making this craft, I decided to make Hazel a needle felted picture of a rainbow. I took a piece of white wool felt and needled a light blue roving all over it for the background.
Then I added the rainbow using small amounts of each color. After the rainbow, I added some clouds and tried to make them three-dimensional and added a bit of grey to the white in them. And of course I added some sun, so it would be like the craft we did together. Now to find a place to hang it.
Well with St. Patrick's Day approaching we have been thinking Irish lately. So I thought this week we would share one of the Irish Cinderellas. We will explore the second one next Sunday since the Virtual Book Club for Kids will be on Monday (and Sunday is St. Patrick's Day). This week we will be looking at Fair, Brown and Trembling by Jude Daly. This version seems a bit softer than the versions I have read on-line at Sacred Texts and Authorma. But before we explore the story, let us learn a bit about Ireland.
