Cinco de Mayo

Tomorrow's Cinco de Mayo...you know, the 5th of May? And while most may not know the historical significance of the holiday, it will no doubt be well celebrated tomorrow as many folks enjoy Mexican food and margaritas, right?

We really don't have much planned in the way of Mexican celebrations tomorrow. Maybe just tacos or fajitas for dinner with a big ol' bowl of fresh guacamole. {No margaritas for this preggo mama.} But we did celebrate with a muffin tin lunch today.

It's been a while since we've done a muffin tin lunch. We jumped back on board this week with a little Mexican lunch feast for Cinco de Mayo. Here's what was on our plate....err, tin.

Cheese quesadillas with sour cream and guacamole, fresh mango & pineapple, and homemade churros.

The churros were actually more like funnel cakes since I didn't have a big enough star-shaped tip to pipe them in properly. Instead I just swirled them into the hot oil and made little funnel cake shapes. They were really yummy.Here's the recipe for the churros, adapted slightly from Bon Appetit.

Churro-style Funnel Cakes

Cinnamon Sugar
1 cup sugar
2 tsp. ground cinnamon
pinch of table salt

Batter
1 cup whole milk
1/2 stick regular, salted butter
2 tsp. sugar
1 cup all purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
4 large eggs
3 cups canola oil

Mix cinnamon sugar ingredients in a large shallow bowl or dish.

In a medium saucepan, bring first 4 batter ingredients to a boil, stirring until butter melted and sugar is dissolved. Reduce heat to medium-low. Add flour and cinnamon and stir constantly until dough forms. Transfer to mixer bowl and allow to cool for 5-10 minutes. Add eggs and beat with wire whisk attachment until well combined.

Heat oil in large pot until approximately 350-400 degrees. Spoon batter into a large pastry bag fitted with a medium sized star or round tip. Pipe batter into hot oil with swirling motion to achieve a mini funnel cake shape. Cook about 1 minute per side or until golden brown. Transfer to paper towels and toss {while warm} in cinnamon sugar.

I'm not big on frying things and do it pretty rarely. Besides being unhealthy, it's a big, stinky mess. But I'd say these were probably worth it - they're delicious. And since it's a beautiful day the open windows and fresh air are getting rid of that hot oil stench pretty well. The biggest challenge will be not picking at the leftovers all afternoon. Ahh!

Boo last year on Cinco de Mayo.

Last year for our preschool co-op I taught a Cinco de Mayo lesson. Here are a few ideas I incorporated with our 2/3 year olds that might be fun to try tomorrow...

Bean Bag Sombrero Toss
We used a sombrero we got from the Dollar Spot at Target as our tossing target. The kids took turns tossing bean bags from different distances into the upside down hat. The hat swung every time it was hit, making it a more complicated target.

Kid-made Pinatas

The kids cut fringe in strips of colored tissue paper and glued the fringe around paper lunch sacks. They each got a handful of dum-dums to fill their sacks with and we tied up the tops with ribbon to hang their pinatas.When Daddy got home Boo got to bust open his pinata with a wooden spoon.
Spanish Words

I labeled several household items with their Spanish words and we walked around the house identifying and pronouncing different objects in Spanish.