Thanks to Mr. Rogers and Grandma!

My children were so excited this morning. We had watched Mr. Rogers make bread shaped sandwiches with cookie cutters, peanut butter, raisins and walnuts. My daughter asked, "We can't do that, can we?" We are gluten intolerant-which means that any kind of bread with wheat, rye, or barley will make me and my children sick. Emma knows that the bread we have now is very dry and hard and could not be cut like the wheat based bread. I heard the wistfulness in her voice and this morning came up with an idea which I hoped would work.





We made pancakes! I have a great mix made by the Cravings Place. when we first had to go gluten free, the first thing my family missed was pancakes. My husband used to make them every Sunday morning. He wanted to continue but asked that I find a mix that you just add water and it would taste good. I bought all kinds to try, but only one was just add water, and in the taste test, it won forks down over all the others. You guessed it, it was All Purpose Pancake and Waffle Mix from the Cravings Place! No egg, no dairy, no beans, no nuts.


So today I made pancakes. My mother gave the kids some metal cookie cutters, so I at first used those to shape the pancakes while they were cooking. I sprayed the cutters first with oil, put them in the pan just like crumpet rings, and poured in the batter. When the pancake batter looked dry, I lifted the cutter shapes and then turned over the pancakes. The shapes turned out great! Then Emma and Jules reminded me that Mr. Rogers cut out the shapes, so I made some big pancakes so they could cut them out and decorate. they decorated with jam, peanut butter and raisins. The pancake sandwiches turned out so cute I felt the need to write and post pictures about how much fun the kids were having!

Of course, we haven't mentioned all the questions that come from cooking together. All that science and math that comes from measuring the mix,measuring the water--oops added too much water, what can we do? (hypothesis, experiment) and all the questions. How does heat change the batter? How do we know it it time to turn the pancake? How do we know when to take off the cutters?(observations) Why did they get so hot?(heat transfer) If heat changes the batter, can heat change the pancake back? (irreversible change)

After the pancakes were made, the kids compared the shaped pancakes to the round pancakes. they did geometry- working with the shapes to see if the pancakes had enough area to fit the cutters and came up with a diameter estimate that the pancakes should be to fit the star cutter. Shh, don't tell anyone, but I am learning myself! :)fabulous!