There is something so therapeutic about working with dough. At first, the idea of a savory pancake made with green onions didn't appeal to many of the kids... until they made them with their own hands and tasted the result! Each student got to make their own pancake, which then got shared with the whole class.
I taught everyone how to say 葱油饼 (cong you bing - literally "green onion oil pancake") in Mandarin. We learned how Chinese is a tonal language and how varying the tone of a single syllable like "ma" can yield the words for "mom", "sesame", "horse", and "to scold" (their clear favorite).
Instead of a tisane, we drank hot, sweetened soymilk as is traditional for breakfast in Taiwan. One student said it reminded her of edamame, which led to a discussion about how the two very different foods actually come from the same ingredient. On Wednesday, we finished the meal with a rousing chorus of "Thank you, Taiwan!" started by a particularly enthusiastic group of second graders.
The dough had to rest before students started to work with it.
Helmets are a key safety tool in the kitchen classroom ;)
We brushed the rolled out dough with avocado oil.
Rolling up the pancake filled with green onions.
We called this the "cinnamon roll" step!
The pancake right before we cooked it.
Students really enjoyed adding more oil and flipping the pancakes as they turned golden brown.
Ready to serve!
Smashed cucumber salad made a refreshing pairing with the savory pancakes.
There's a step missing here, which is to sprinkle more salt and sugar on the cucumbers to taste right before serving!