With the month of May upon us, I felt the need to mix things up and get funky. Mother's Day is in may, but spring is finally sprung, bugs are emerging and mud is getting mixed up during the downpours of the season.
Oven Baked "Fried" Pickles
Since we were aiming for weird and different, I chose this Oven Baked "Fried" Pickles recipe. Fried pickles are my restaurant addiction, but many of my students had never tried them. This was teen approved and easy-peasy!
Peanut Butter Muddy Buddy Cookies
We hit the garden with cucumbers, so we continued looking for mud. Here you see Peanut Butter Muddy Buddy Cookies before they were baked. Simple to execute, easy to eat.
Yikes!.... Snakes!
Under mud, or somewhere in the garden, you're likely to discover some snakes. We made these Spicy, Sesame Snake Breadsticks just a bit less spicy (or not at all!) compared to what was called for in the recipe. I like to stress to students their creative license is often welcome to edit the spices of a recipe. Cut spice to your preference or omit ingredients which revolt against your palate.
Crunchy, not slimy
These little snakes were so adorable! Students liked them, too. "Simple and satisfying, crunchy, but not slimy like a snake in the grass."
M i s s i s s i p p i
Mississippi Mud Pie was a great effort of a recipe, but totally worthless regarding the portion size versus the quantity of students in the class. This was certainly my oversight, so something to pay closer attention to. I noticed the pan was not full when these marshmallows were added and I thought the group missed a ton of ingredients. It was a keen-eyed regular who discovered this recipe had a yield of 2 giant, decadent bars! We were all shocked. Who offers a recipe so decadent for only 2 servings!?! We just could not fathom the time wasted. These teens like to eat! And we all agree that a recipe should have enough servings to feed your party or have left-overs.
Herb Marinated Cheese
Moms and loved ones alike in each students life got a jar of special olive oil from this class. Herb Marinated Cheese. Each jar had bits of feta and goat cheeses, which were infused in olive oil with fresh and dried herbs. Such a sweet gift for anyone who is lactose tolerant ;)
The weirdest part of this class was the encore. Considering we worked with mud pies, I wanted to challenge students to eat bugs, but not necessarily may flies. We've read that protein from bugs can be more sustainable than livestock farming, but I wanted to know who would be willing to try.
NOT May Flies
I could not find edible flies, or perhaps I didn't want to find edible flies. I felt most comfortable to eat a grasshopper. So, these packages had 3 boxes of flavored grasshoppers distributed for a random student to receive. The rest of these envelopes had icy pops as a cool treat to end the class. The 3 (un)lucky students to get these grasshoppers were shocked/excited/grossed/pleased to get such an unusual treat. [They also got icy pops to be fair.]
Wanna Try?
Since I challenged each recipient to taste these bugs, the challenge was returned. This box of Sour Cream and Onion Crickettes was the test package. Our senior student was willing to be the guinea pig test subject and we have video proof.
After seeing these brave students, I HAD to try.
Well, I lived to tell this tale and I quite enjoyed that little bug.
(but ask me how I felt about this purchase the day before class)
That's a wrap for Teen Cooking Club this May. We skip June and celebrate the end of this school year in July. We'll discover how ice cream is made at our favorite local shop, Dippity Do Dahs. It's certain to be a really cool, rockin' good time.
