Bear Gives Thanks: Candied Nuts

Bear Says Thanks is the newest in the Bear series, written by Karma Wilson, and beautifully illustrated by Jane Chapman.  I want to give an additional shout-out to Jane Chapman here: I LOVE her illustrations.  I would buy a print and hang it on my wall.  I mean, look at this!

Let me just say that I may be a little biased here: I love Bear.  I am a huge fan.  So when the newest Bear book came out, I had to buy it for my library, and I am so glad I did.

Bear is the title character in this and 7 other books, which began with 2002's Bear Snores On (in which our hero is asleep in cave despite the multitude of animals that join him in order to warm up).  Bear is usually doing something that everyone can relate to - such as getting scared when all alone (Bear Feels Scared), losing a tooth (Bear's Loose Tooth), or making new friends (Bear's New Friend).

Bear Gives Thanks starts with Bear feeling "bored, bored, bored" and missing his friends.  Then, he has a great idea - he'll invite all his friends over for a delicious feast!  Unfortunately, he finds that he has absolutely nothing in his cupboard.  This doesn't stop his friends from coming over, though, each bringing a tasty dish to share with everyone.  Mouse brings a huckleberry pie, Hare brings muffins, and Gopher and Mole bring fresh honey nuts!  As more friends arrive, Bear becomes more and more flustered - they have all brought food to share, but he has nothing to share with them! Will his friends mind that he has nothing to give?

Edited to add: This is also an excellent Thanksgiving book that really gets to the heart of the matter.  There are no pilgrims, there is no turkey, but there is a lovely gathering of friends, sharing of food and company, and general gratitude.  Thanksgiving is a holiday that too often gets shortchanged as an almost-Christmas holiday.

Though these are not honey nuts like Gopher and Mole brought, I figured I, like Bear, could be forgiven, because I misremembered the specific type of nuts when I was looking for recipes, and by the time I realized it, I already had all my ingredients (and realized I was out of honey).  So, we're having Candied Nuts instead.  And, oh! Are they delicious!  Just a note: This is not a recipe that the kids can help with all the way through, but they can help with measuring and mixing.  As a bonus, the kitchen smells really good.

Gopher and Mole's Candied Nuts
1 egg white (from an egg - this won't work with EggBeaters)
1 tbsp. water
10 oz. nuts* (I used walnuts)
1 cup white sugar
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
3/4 tsp. salt

1) Preheat your oven to 250.  Thoroughly grease a cookie sheet (or cover with parchment paper), and set it aside.
2) Whip the egg white with the water until it becomes frothy (an electric mixer comes in REALLY handy here).  In a separate bowl, mix together the sugar, cinnamon, and salt; set aside.
3) Once the egg white is frothy, mix in the nuts until fully coated and there is no liquid left in the bottom of the bowl.
4) Pour the nuts into the sugar mixture, and mix thoroughly, until there is no more sugar left in the bowl (it should all be stuck to the nuts).  Then, spread these nuts out onto the greased cookie sheet, trying to keep them from overlapping if you can.
5) Bake the nuts for one hour, stirring every 15 minutes.

*The original recipe, which you can see here, calls for 1 lb. of pecans.  I used 10 oz. of walnuts, and I did have a little much glaze on my walnuts - but no complaints from me!  You can try fiddling with the amount and nut variety to your own taste - and please let me know what you think!

This is what my walnuts looked like before being baked:

And this is what they looked like after:

Not particularly pretty looking, but pretty tasty!  I got this recipe from the allrecipes.com website, where it's listed as Sugar Coated Pecans.

Kat's side note: Did you ever notice how many bears in picture books are named Bear?  There's Karma Wilson's Bear, Philip C. Stead and Erin Stead's Bear (Bear Has a Story to Tell), Bonnie Becker's Bear (of the Bear and Mouse series), Olivier Dunrea's Old Bear (Old Bear and His Cub), which is not to be confused with Kevin Henkes's Old Bear (Old Bear), Else Homelund Minark's Little Bear (a whole series of him!), Bill Martin, Jr.'s Brown Bear (Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?), and the entire lovably generic Bear family created by Stan and Jan Berenstain (The Berenstain Bears and Any Topic Ever).  You'd think I'd be complaining about this, and begging for more originality, but I'm honestly kind of impressed at how each of these Bears is his own specific Bear with his own specific personality.  Except maybe for Brown Bear, Brown Bear: he doesn't do much, though you can't visually confuse him as any Bear except one designed by Eric Carle.  So, tell me: who is your favorite bear?

One Green Apple Cupcakes

Every children's literature enthusiast is familiar with Eve Bunting, and with good reason.  All told, she has written over 250 books!  Most of the titles are for children and teens, and while I haven't read every one of them, I do enjoy the ones I have read, which cover many various topics, from homelessness to a moose's Thanksgiving table.

One Green Apple was published in 2006, and is one of Bunting's more serious books.  Ted Lewin's illustrations really capture the emotions of the children in beautiful, realistic watercolor, and help to set the tone for the tale.  It tells the story of Farah, who is not only new in her school but new to the country, and doesn't yet speak a word of English.  Worse yet, Farah is the only one in the school wearing a dupatta (her head scarf) - everything is different, and she can't even explain that to anybody.  She wants to say, "it is not that I am stupid.  It is just that I am lost in this new place," but she doesn't have the words.

On Farah's second day, her class takes a field trip to a local apple orchard.  A classmate introduces herself, but Farah is still nervous and uncomfortable.  In the orchard, each student is allowed to pick one apple, which will all be blended together to make apple cider.  Farah sees a smaller tree with little green apples - "it is small and alone, like me" - and picks one.

After a while, Farah notices that there are some things that are the same in any language - like laughter.  She gets up the courage to join the other children in pressing the cider, and, eventually, to try her first word in English.

This book is a wonderful story for both those who are new and feel isolated, and for those who may be hesitant to welcome someone who is different.  It's also a good fall story - who doesn't like cider?  And what's my favorite thing to do with cider?  Bake with it!  (Actually, I prefer to just drink it, but baking with it turned out to be a very good thing.)

One Green Apple Cupcakes
For the cake:
3 cups all-purpose flour
3 tsp. baking powder
2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
2 tsp. ground cinnamon
4 eggs
2 cups white sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
2 1/2 cups applesauce
1 tsp. vanilla extract

1) Preheat oven to 350.  Put cupcake liners into muffin tins - this recipe made me 28 cupcakes.  You could do a combination of cupcakes and regular cakes, or one bundt pan, or whatever you like.  If you use a non-cupcake pan, grease and flour it.
2) In a large bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon.
3) Make a well in the center of the dry mixture and add the remaining ingredients.  Mix well, and pour into prepared pans.
4) Bake in the preheated oven until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.  This took 25 minutes for my cupcakes.
5) Cool completely, and frost with apple cider buttercream (below).

Apple Cider Buttercream
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/4 cup apple cider
3-4 cups confectioner's sugar

1) Cream the butter and apple cider until well-blended, and then add in 3 cups confectioner's sugar until fully combined. Add additional sugar slowly, until the desired consistency.

I got the recipe for the applesauce cake here, at the allrecipes.com website.  The apple cider buttercream was found here, on the TLC website.  They came out rather well, if I say so myself - I sold most of them for a bake sale to fund the American Cancer Society.

Question of the day:
What's your favorite Fall book?

Walter the Farting Dog: Dog Biscuits

Walter the Farting Dog is the first book in a series written by William Kotzwinkle and Glenn Murray, and illustrated by Audrey Colman.  To date, there are five Walter books.

The thing that most people notice about the books (poor Walter's flatulence) is the very reason that the book was banned.  There are a lot of people who object to "poop humor."  (I find this term particularly amusing, because those in the know will mention that the book has "scatological humor," thus removing the need to use the word "poop" - the very word they object to the first place!)

It's true that not a lot of people enjoy farting, even in a dog, and that's actually the plot of the first Walter book.  He gets adopted from the pound by Betty and Billy, but Mother and Father aren't big fans of his smell.  He gets baths, but being dirty isn't the issue.  He goes to the vet, but the low-flatulence dog biscuits make him even gassier!  Poor Walter is so stinky that Father eventually puts his foot down, and tells the kids that he is going back to the pound first thing in the morning.

What can poor Walter do?  He vows to never fart again, and just keep it all inside, no matter how much it hurts, while he thinks things over.  It's like things just get worse and worse for him.  We find out on the very first page that "nobody wanted him" at the pound, and when he finally has a loving home, Father wants to get rid of him!  It's all because he farts, but he can't help it; it's just how he is.  And then, just when all things seem as bleak as they can get, someone has broken into the house!  Can Walter save the day, and keep from being sent back to the pound?

This book was dedicated "for everyone who's ever felt misjudged or misunderstood."  That's a sentiment I can get behind (no pun intended), and I have made special dog biscuits for Walter.

Dog Biscuits for Walter the Farting Dog
You will need:
2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
2 eggs
2 tbsp. peanut butter
1/2 cup canned pumpkin
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon

1) Preheat the oven to 350.
2) Whisk all ingredients together until well blended.  This took a couple minutes even with my stand mixer.
3) Add water if needed to make the dough workable and sticking together.  (I didn't need any water.)
4) The instructions here say to roll the dough to about 1/2" thickness and make 1/2" rounds.  I ignored this entirely and made balls out of the dough, which I flattened with my palm.
5) Bake until dried out and hard, about 40 minutes.

I got the recipe for these from AllRecipes.com, where it's listed as Peanut Butter and Pumpkin Dog Treats.  As I don't have a dog, I gave these to my boss, who has two.  I will post their reaction to the treats once they've tried them.

Question of the day: Can anybody guess what book we're talking about to round out Banned Books Week tomorrow?

Bridge to Terabithia: Twinkies

Katherine Paterson has written several classic, award-winning novels, including Because of Winn-Dixie, The Great Gilly Hopkis, and Lyddie. Bridge to Terabithia, one of her most popular titles, was published in 1977, and won the Newbery Award in 1978.

Bridge to Terabithia is the story of Jesse Aarons, who lives with his family in rural Virginia.  Jess was the middle child and the only boy, with two older sisters (how awful!) and two younger sisters (how annoying!)  It was his goal to be the fastest runner in the fifth grade, and had been practicing all summer long for the first big recess race of the school year ... only to be beaten at the last minute by the new kid! A girl!

Leslie had just moved to town and didn't understand why she wasn't welcomed with open arms (after all, she was friendly!).  After she beat Jesse (and all the other boys) in the recess races, nobody wanted to talk to her at all.  And after Jesse had worked hard training all summer, too.  There were only two options after that: they could be best friends, or worst enemies.  Luckily, the friendship worked out, and Jess and Leslie became inseparable.  Jess made sure that Leslie knew the ins and outs of country life (she had moved from the city with her parents, who had decided to "reassess their value structure," and didn't know all the social norms), and Leslie made sure that Jesse had fun and imagination in his life.  Together, they created Terabithia, a world of magic and imagination set deep in the woods, that you could only get to by swinging on a rope swing over a creek.  There they would sit, King and Queen, with Leslie telling stories and Jess drawing pictures, surrounded by the magic of the forest.

This book is about transformation.  In the beginning, Jess was lonely, bored, and depressed.  As his friendship with Leslie developed, he became happier, more patient toward his sisters, and generally more outgoing.  Rather than just wishing things were different, be began to be proactive in making them better - even getting revenge on the school bully (a horrible seventh grader named Janice Avery) because she stole his little sister's Twinkies.  (When money is tight, as it was with the Aarons family, the Twinkies were a very special treat, snatched away before they could be enjoyed.)

So, why was this book banned?  There are a few answers, though none of them is very satisfactory.  The obvious answer is that it was banned because of a disturbing event that happens at the end of the book, but that isn't cited too often.  It's also said that it's banned because of witchcraft, but there is no magic in this book.  Everything that the kids imagine is pure imagination - none of it is real.  They know none of it is real.  It's all a game.  The answer you hear most often is that it's been banned for profanity, and while there may be a "damn" here and there, what most people are upset about is the fact that Jess says, "oh, Lord," when he's frustrated, which is Taking The Lord's Name In Vain, which is unforgivable.  Honestly, I don't get it.

Anyway, as I said, Twinkies were the start of the whole Janice Avery debacle, so I decided to make some.  Now, I am one of the lucky few to actually own a Twinkie making kit (no, really!), so I'm using it to make these, but mini loaf pans or even muffin tins would work just fine, as long as you don't mind the shape being quite right.

It even comes with a Twinkie The Kid official Twinkie holder!

Terabithian Twinkies
For the cake:
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter
1 cup sugar
2 eggs, plus one egg yolk
2 tsp. vanilla extract
3/4 cup milk

1) The directions specifically say to use a rack in the middle of the oven (I don't know why, but do I did it anyway).  Preheat the oven to 350.  Grease the pan.
2) Sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt.
3) In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Beat in the eggs, egg yolk, and vanilla.  Scrape down the bowl, lower the speed to low, and mix in the milk until smooth.
4) Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet and mix until just blended.  Don't over-mix, or your Twinkies will be overly chewy.
5) Spoon the batter evenly into the pan, filling each Twinkie (or muffin cup, or loaf pan) about 3/4 full.  Bake 15 minutes, or until a toothpick poked into the middle comes out clean.
6) Cool for 15 minutes in the pan, and then remove to cool on a wire rack.
7) When completely cool, load frosting (you can use canned frosting, but the recipe below is really fantastic) into the flavor injector (or piping bag, or large ziploc bag with the corner snipped off), and squirt into the bottom of the cake.  Just like Hostess, I poked three holes into each cake.  If you're using a cupcake instead, you should be able to use just one.

Not that you needed to see this part, but how often do I get to use this, really?

8) Enjoy, preferably with a glass of milk.

Marshmallow Frosting
1/2 cup butter
1 cup confectioner's sugar
1 cup Marshmallow Fluff
1 tsp. vanilla extract

1) Mix using a hand mixer or stand mixer until light and fluffy.

I got both of these recipes from the official Hostess Twinkies Brand Bake Set Recipe Book.  Personally, I think the cake is good, but the marshmallow filling really steals the show.  If you don't want to make both the cake and the filling, I'd recommend using a boxed mix for the cake and making this buttercream from scratch - it's that good!  Why did I never think of Marshmallow Buttercream?!

Question of the day:
Now that I've opened and used my Hostess Twinkies Brand Bake Set, what flavor combination should I make next?

Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing: Turtle Cookies

Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing by Judy Blume is the fourth installment in our Banned Books Week celebration.  (Why was it banned?  More on that later.)  This book was first published in 1972, which was shocking to me, because I read it as a kid and it didn't feel dated at all.  (Except the part where Fudge sticks himself all over with stamps from the grocery store.  That made no sense even when I was in fourth grade in the early 90s.)

Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing is the first in a series about Peter Hatcher, a fourth grade boy who feels like a great big nothing.  He lives in New York City with his parents and two-year-old brother, Farley (who goes by Fudge).  Fudge is the star of the books, and it's always up to poor Peter to clean up the messes.  If Fudge's birthday party guests don't behave, it's up to Peter to entertain them.  If Fudge won't eat, it's Peter who does handstands to make him open his mouth so Mom can pop a bite of food in.  And when Fudge tries to fly off the monkey bars and knocks out his two front teeth, who do you think gets all the blame?  Peter, that's who!

At least Peter has his turtle for company.  Wonderful, reliable Dribble, who sits around in his bowl doing turtle-y things, and never asks for anything.  And Dribble is one thing that Fudge isn't allowed to touch.  But... since when does Fudge follow the rules?

So, why was this book banned?  To tell you, I have to spoil the entire ending of the book.  So, SPOILER ALERT! When Fudge finally gets his hands on Peter's turtle, he eats him, and poor Dribble doesn't survive the ordeal (though Fudge does).  This is considered very cruel to animals.  END SPOILER!

Peter is the protagonist of a whole series of books, including Superfudge, Fudge-a-Mania, and Double Fudge.  The Hatcher family also appears in Otherwise Known as Sheila the Great, which is told by Peter's neighbor and resident know-it-all, Sheila.

So, in honor of Peter's turtle, Dribble, I made turtle cookies!  (Why didn't I make fudge?  I have no idea.)

Turtle Cookies
You will need:
Vanilla wafers
Caramels
Pecans
Chocolate chips

1) Place vanilla wafers on a microwave-safe plate.  I only made six cookies, so I did them all at once, but I would hesitate to make more than that in a batch, because the caramel would cool too quickly.
2) Cut the caramels in half lengthwise, so you have two flat rectangles.  Place one half-caramel onto each vanilla wafer, and microwave the plate until the caramels are soft (in my microwave, it took 25 seconds, but I recommend starting with 15 seconds and poke one to see if it's soft yet, and then adding 10 seconds at a time until they're soft).
3) When the caramels are soft, poke four pecans into each one.  Set aside to cool.  They should look like this:

4) In a small bowl, pour a handful of chocolate chips.  Zap in the microwave at 15-second increments, stirring well after each increment.  Be very careful to not let the chocolate scorch! When the chocolate is smooth, dollop some on top of each cookie, smoothing it out with the back of a spoon.  Let cool on the counter or in the fridge before consuming.

Yum!

Using vanilla wafers as a base for these treats was my own idea, though they play off the traditional Turtle candy (caramel, chocolate and pecans).  The idea to make turtles was Shannon's.  Thank you, Shannon!

Question of the day: This is one of my favorite banned books.  Which ones do you like best?