High School History ~ 3 Kings Day

History:

Oldest dd starts high school next year ...(pause for brief freak-out)... and the tiny remnant of Type A that exists in the corners of my self is prompting me to do this little planning project. I'm making a spreadsheet showing different scopes/sequences for history based on different sources/approaches. I'll be working backward to see what we need to focus on next year. The areas I'm exploring are: a school district HS history classes; a private part-time school history classes; classical ed; university requirements from a state university; university requirements from a private university. I'll post my findings later.

Three Kings Day:

I am so psyched about this new recipe. Our family tradition on Jan. 6th (Epiphany or 3 Kings Day or Dia de los Reyes) is basically this:
1. Eat a crown cake for breakfast [Oh, and we hide an almond in the crown cake and that person gets a small prize.]
2. Open stockings
3. Drink apple cider or hot chocolate while packing up the Christmas decorations and taking down the tree (I'm going to try homemade chocolate syrup using honey/cacao - we'll see how it goes).
4. Give a huge, satisfied sigh (while dh puts the boxes in the attic)

This is how we *use* to make the crown cake:

Layer 2 cans of cinnamon rolls in an angel food cake pan. Bake. Dump on a plate and drizzle with icing. Tastes delicious but full of the trans fats that we now avoid at home. Last year I *think* I used Kelly's bread recipe with her cinnamon roll instructions and did it basically the same.

(drum roll)

This year I'm using this recipe for sourdough monkey bread. I killed my sourdough starter a couple of months ago but I just started my first attempt of the 5-minute soaked bread recipe. In fact, a few minutes ago I took out a blob of dough to rise for the 10-grain variety. Anyway, I think you could just use whatever your basic bread dough recipe is and continue with her instructions. How easy can it get? Roll balls, dip in melted butter, roll in cinnamon sugar, put in the angel food cake pan, bake. Eat. Eat. Drink milk. Eat. Mmmm.

For the icing I'm going to use the butter/powdered sugar/vanilla combo (compromise food, to be sure - but in a small amount!). I will probably wing the amounts at the last minute.

http://nourishyourchildren.com/blog/2009/12/sourdough-monkey-bread/

By the way, this was posted on Real Food Wednesday hosted by Kelly at kellythekitchenkop.com.

What's Cookin'?

-I just had the *best* snack! Leftover spaghetti squash pesto heated in chicken broth with Salvadoran cream added in the bowl after serving with some salt added.

- Black beans were soaked last night and cooked all day in the crock pot. They are done and we'll eat them tomorrow mixed with rice (Casamiento) and corn bread on the side. I may throw some salsa in the Casamiento if I remember.

- There's a loaf of bread rising on the counter. I'm trying this recipe (I didn't have wheat gluten nor the seed mixture for the top):
http://www.motherearthnews.com/Real-Food/Whole-Grain-Bread-Recipe.aspx