Over the past few months, I have had the privilege of getting to know a vibrant and faithful couple from Nairobi, Kenya, who joined my small group during the short time they stayed in the United States. As my friendship developed with this impassioned couple, especially the fashion designer wife, Shiru, I learned several cultural differences between the U.S. and Kenya, including their take on hospitality. Most of this learning occurred when Shiru and her husband hosted a traditional Kenyan dinner for our small group.

Upon arriving, I learned that Shiru had spent the entire day cooking, starting with soaking beans the previous night. She presented us with a gorgeous spread of fresh githeri, a traditional Kenyan dish of corn, beans, vegetables, and bacon, served with jasmine rice and cooked kale.

She allowed only 2 contributions to her meal, one of which I quickly jumped at the honor of bringing: a bag of avocados. Shiru had purchased only one avocado her entire time in the U.S. (and had prayed over it for days to ensure its ripeness!) because she just couldn’t bring herself to pay $2.50 for a fruit she only pays pennies for in her home town. I didn’t blame her one bit!

After her husband blessed the meal, we served ourselves and sat together around their living room. As everyone went back for seconds and exclaimed over how much food (and how delicious) it was, Shiru explained, “My mother taught me that if the food runs out, I was a bad hostess. That means I let someone go hungry.”

I loved gaining this particular insight into her background. I, on the other hand, grew up with the notion that if there are no leftovers, your event was a success because it meant that everyone loved the food. I realize that both philosophies are equally acceptable, but in fact, leftovers can be an additional bonus for both the hosts and guests, which proved true that very night: she sent Mr. O&O home with leftovers for his lunch the next day, which he greatly appreciated, and she still had leftovers for her own lunch!

I recently tried this notion at my own dinner party by grilling several extra pieces of meat, sending some home with the guests, and eating the rest for lunch the next day. It worked beautifully; no one went hungry, yet I knew they liked the food because they accepted the leftovers. Thanks for the Kenyan hospitality tip, Shiru!

If you’re interested in getting your hands on some of your own miracle cleaning cloths, you can order them here. Just add my name, Victoria Swider, as your host at checkout. If you want to learn more before taking the clean cleaning plunge, Facebook message me and I’ll invite you to a live online info session this Thursday night (October 30) from 6-8pm (EST).

Do you have any other clean living advice? Comment below, tweet, or Instagram it using the #overdressedovereducated hashtag. 

Unfortunately, due to time limitations, the egg whites didn’t have quite long enough to soak in the dye, so when the kids retrieved them, they had only a faint orangey hue. I think a combination of more dye and more time would have yielded better results.

Once we retrieved the whites from the dye and dabbed the water off with paper towels, the kids scooped the filling into their eggs. We then took our plastic knives and made faint vertical lines in the filling to resemble pumpkin ribs. Finally, I sliced up green onions (about 1/4¼" long) and the kids placed one per egg smack in the middle to stand as the pumpkin stem. 

Ingredients:

• 6 hard-boiled eggs
• 1/3 cup mayonnaise
• 1 teaspoon vinegar 
• 1 teaspoon yellow mustard
• Dash of salt
• Dash of pepper
• Yellow and red food coloring 
• Green onion stems
• Paprika (optional)

Directions:

1. Peel eggs and cut in half lengthwise. 
2. Remove yolks and place in a medium-size bowl. 
3. Fill a separate bowl with lukewarm water and add 4 drops of yellow coloring and 4 drops of red coloring. Mix with a spoon and add empty egg whites to the dye to soak for approx. 25 min.
4. Mash yolks and add all remaining ingredients to the yolks except onions and paprika.
5. Add 4 drops of yellow coloring and 4 drops of red coloring to yolk mixture and mix well.
6. After whites have finished soaking, remove from bowl and place on a clean surface. Scoop yolk mixture evenly into each egg. 
7. Using a knife, make approx. 4 vertical lines in yolk mixture to resemble pumpkin ribs.
8. Slice green onion stems into about 1/4¼" pieces and place one piece in the center of each egg.
9. Sprinkle with paprika if desired. 

Alas, this recipe concluded the first semester of cooking club. But the good news is that Shepherd asked me to stay on for the next semester. Now, I need to plan my next semester curriculum. I have a Pinterest board full of ideas, but there are so many I am overwhelmed! Which ones are your favorite? Or do you have any other go-to, kid-friendly, no-bake recipes themed for fall or winter? Comment on my pins you like best or post your new ideas below, and I’ll let you know which I pick! 

I see a cooking club pattern emerging. We started with individual fruit snakes. Then, we moved to a one-bowl group recipe of energy bites. Now, we are back to individual animals. Cute little owls are showing up in craft and seasonal stores everywhere, so this week we embraced the onset of fall: owl cheese and crackers. 

After we finally lathered on the last of the smear, we pulled apart Ritz bits sandwiches for the eyes. We added a baby bit of cream cheese to 2 raisins and stuck 1 in the center of each eye for the pupil, and voila! Eyes were complete.

Is this everyone’s busy season, or just mine? As summer has ended, my life has gone into complete chaos mode! My calendar has seen an explosion of red appointments, all deliverables at work are all on fire, and everyone’s birthday is this month (darn you, NYE). I suppose back to school means back to busy, and ‘tis the season. What I need is more energy, but I’m not a huge fan of over-caffeinating until I crash and burn (and this also doesn't work well for kids). So to Pinterest I turn for a healthy, energizing snack to get me through the days and to present to the kids at cooking club, and Pinterest did not disappoint.

Enter delicious, nutritious, no-bake energy bites. These are a big winner on taste and energy, but beware: they leave quite a mess. When I think messy, I think perfect for kids; however, this group of kids I’m teaching is a special brand, because they inexplicably do NOT like messes. If I thought the gooey-banana reaction from last week was bad, I had another thing coming. So once again, if your kids fall into this category, you might want to invest in some food preparation gloves.

Unlike the fruit snakes, this is a one-bowl recipe, so we all sat in a circle and took turns filling measuring cups and pouring in ingredients. Trying to incorporate reusable skills when I can, I taught the kids how to level off the oatmeal, coconut, and flaxseed in measuring cups using a plastic knife. This is where the mess began. In anticipation of this, I lined the table with parchment paper, which helped only marginally.

 Next came the sticky substances, which was also the point when the kids went crazy. Apparently, honey, sunflower seed butter*, and vanilla extract are “totally gross,” and as soon as we opened them, a chorus of “Ewws” drowned out all instructions I attempted to provide. Multiple hand-washing trips promptly accompanied any physical contact they had with these “disgusting” ingredients. In fact, the only ingredient the kids didn't make a fuss about was (no surprise) the chocolate chips.

After we mixed everything together, made 4 trips to the bathroom to wash 24 hands, and rolled out fresh parchment, I dished out large spoonfuls of the mixture to each child, and they rolled it into small balls. Each of my 12 kids ended up with at least 3 energy bites, and some many more, depending on how small they rolled the balls. When it was time to eat, the kids completely changed their tune and loved every bite. Many took their extras home so they could have them for an energizing snack the next day.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup dry oatmeal

• 2/3 cup toasted coconut

• 1/2 cup peanut butter or sunflower seed butter*

• 1/2 cup ground flaxseed

• 1/2 cup chocolate chips

• 1/3 cup honey

• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Directions: 

1.  Mix all ingredients together in a large bowl. 
2.  Roll mixture into balls. Yields about 3 dozen.

*Note: One of my kids has a peanut allergy, so we used sunflower seed butter from Trader Joe’s instead of peanut butter; it was a littler messier, but it tasted great and bound the ingredients together just as well as peanut butter would.

Although I don’t have kids, I do love cooking, and as part of my “What do I want to teach the world?” mission, I decided that this is a worthy passion to pass on, especially to the next generation. However, kids don’t typically read blogs, so I’m approaching this from a more proactive angle. This week, I set out on a children-oriented cooking journey at my favorite charitable organization, Shepherd Community Center.

Shepherd has one simple goal: breaking the cycle of poverty. One of their main tools in tackling this mission is a private, Christian school with next-to-nothing tuition for grades K-5. The students from the surrounding inner-city community just started their 2014-2015 school year and signed up for after-school clubs. This is where I come in!

Over the next 6 weeks, I will be leading a kid-friendly cooking class for Shepherd students in grades 1-3. I’m focusing on presenting healthy foods (discernable to them as God-made versus man-made) in a fun way and creating sanitary kitchen habits. We started this week with a slimy yet succulent fruit snake.

The Pinterest-inspired concept was simple enough. Each child received a banana and a few strawberries to begin. After the important task of washing both our hands and our fruit, we peeled and sliced everything into thin pieces (using plastic knives, of course) and placed alternating banana and strawberry slices in a curling line along our plates. Most kids got this without an issue, although some complained about the “gooeyness” of the banana. Tip: Have food preparation gloves handy in case your kids fall into this category.

The hardest part for the kids was the head. We needed to cut a triangular slice out of the pointed end of a whole strawberry. This proved almost impossible for the kids, so Miss Victoria happily cut 12 snake heads. We thinned out the strawberry scraps from the mouth slit to make the tongue.

The best part, surprisingly, was the finishing touch: blueberry eyes. We placed two toothpicks in our strawberry head, stuck a blueberry on each end, and the screams started. “Eeeeewwwww!” “Gross! Look at the googly eyes.” “Ahhh! It's is a real snake!” The kids were delightedly disgusted with this final step, I suppose because at that point it did, indeed, resemble a snake. 
Note: Most of the toothpicks were a little long, so I would recommend cutting one toothpick in half instead of using two whole toothpicks.

If you are looking for a way to encourage your kids to eat healthier foods or just a fun activity to do on a Saturday afternoon, take a shot at this easy fruit reptile! For the duration of the 6 weeks I’ll post each new kid-friendly recipe we try with tips and ideas on improvement.

Ingredients:

• 1 banana
• 3-5 strawberries 
• 2 blueberries
• 1 toothpick, cut in half

Directions:

1. Slice banana. 
2. Set one whole strawberry aside. Slice remaining strawberries.
3. Place strawberry slices between banana slices, alternating every other one. 
4. Remove strawberry hull from remaining strawberry. Place strawberry flat side down and slice a triangle wedge out of pointed end. 
5. Trim this wedge into one thin line, and place perpendicular inside strawberry opening. 
6. Place a blueberry on the end of each toothpick piece and stick the exposed ends on the whole strawberry above mouth slit.