After being inspired by some tasty wildlife themed food on Pinterest, I couldn’t help but add a little wildlife spark to lunch time yesterday. Sometimes it’s nice to do a simple wildlife activity, not exploratory and not deep thinking. You’ll see more of these creative meal ideas on the new WF4K category – Eat.
I decided to surprise my girls by adding animal pastry cut-outs on top of the chicken, spinach and fetta pies I made for lunch (recipe below). The only thing I wanted them to get out of this activity, was the joy of guessing their animal.
Chicken, spinach and ricotta cheese recipe
Ingredients
- 3 Puff pastry sheets
- 1 tub of ricotta cheese
- 200g – 300g chicken cut into small pieces (we use free range chickens)
- Grated cheese
- 4-6 leaves of spinach
- Mushrooms finely chopped
- egg white (free range)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 200 Degrees Celsius
- Mix the ricotta cheese, chicken pieces, grated
cheese and finely chopped spinach together in a bowl until combined - Use a large mug to measure and cut out some puff pastry circles. You’ll need two circles per pie.
- Add the mixture in the middle of one of the pastry circles and add the other pastry circle on top. Use a fork to seal the pastry together. Do this until the mixture is used up.
- Now it’s time to use the left over pastry to cut out the animal shapes and add them to the top of the pasty. I used small animal shaped cutters and cut out the animals using the remaining puff pastry. I used egg white to stick the animals on to the pie and lightly painted over the top of the pie with egg white. I couldn’t help but make one of the pastry pies into a lion, the fork prints looked just like a mane.
- It goes in the oven for around 15-20 minutes or until the puff pastry is golden brown.
They looked good going in but they looked even better coming out! The animals almost look three dimensional.
Miss Poss, Squeak and Purr really loved the pastry pies and guessed their animals correctly. They even made the animal noises with out any prompting from me. I suspect the animals on top made them more interested in their food too because they’ve never wolfed down a puff pastry pie like that before!
It was so nice to do something simple that brought joy to the girl’s faces. The best part was that it was so easy to add a little wildlife fun to our food.
How have you added fun to your food lately?
These are gorgeous and look incredibly appetising.
My animal loving family would indeed drool over these!
Hinterland Mama recently posted..Drilling gumnuts for future nature craft projects
Thank you! It’s was just a simple animal activity but worth it for the smiles on my girls faces!
Lovely! Unfortunately, we still can’t have any egg in the house due to K-Bear’s allergies. But I did just buy some animal sandwich cutters at a cute Japanese store today, so I look forward to using them with the boys
Grace recently posted..Of Resistance and Acceptance
You can just skip the egg. It will still brown up nicely without it. Seriously!
These look so yummy! I hadn’t thought of using ricotta in a pie..this might be just the right texture for Ruby…got to give them a try…and the animals are such a cute idea…where did you get your cutters from? Off to pin now!!
Jode recently posted..The Heartache of Comparison…
Yep Squeak has texture issues and she is good with this one – thank goodness. Thank you for pinning Jode!
Oh yum!! They look adorable….what a great idea!
Janice@ learning4kids recently posted..Sticky Easel Play Prompt – Sorting Shapes
Thanks Honey. Just an easy activity this time
Great way to get them to eat spinach and mushrooms! I love the little elephants ears
Danya Banya recently posted..A Letter to JJ (2 years, 7 months)
He he, I have to sneak the good stuff in there. The cheese and chicken disguise the taste too!
Cute AND delicious! Pinned it x
Kylie @ Octavia and Vicky recently posted..Pregnancy Update – 33 Weeks – Link up your story!
Thanks Kylie
Such a great idea and so cute!
Deb @ Aspiring Mum recently posted..Every Girl Needs A Planner {Giveaway}
My kids would love this addition to their food!
Amie recently posted..Pool Noodle Indoor Obstacle Course
There wouldn’t last very long at our house. Look DELISH!
Kate recently posted..Rice Play
Love this idea! Dino Boy saw them and said ‘they look great, do we have the right ingredients to make them now?’
We don’t but we will be getting it!!
Kelly recently posted..Saying goodnight