(Whoops! I accidentally posted this while I was writing laying out thoughts on my phone so I apologize if you received a barely-written, random crazy person note about honey taffy in your inbox. Now here is the real thing.)
We love freezer taffy - essentially what we call honey poured on frozen food. One of my favorite treats in summer is a half cup of frozen blueberries over a scoop of coconut cream (just cream not ice cream) with a drizzle of honey. Something wonderful happens to the honey on contact with frozen foods - it hardens (solid matter - science can happen in the kitchen!). And this hardened honey becomes the texture of taffy.
And it is good.
For homeschool, we were learning about dandelions in our spring unit. We used this post from Proverbial Homemaker as a base/foundation for the study. If you're interested in a plant study, check out Little House Grand's plant unity study and borrow Dandelions: Stars in the Grass from your library. We watched a time lapse of a Dandelion on Youtube. And I made a word search all about Dandelions. My daughter really likes word searches (she is five and she randomly discovered them one day) and I've found that after we read our books about a subject, doing a word search together can be a fun way to review letters, material and start phonics. The Dandelion Word Search is here (and free) if you'd like to use this at home!
Because I'm all about herbal and Wild Edibles, I liked the idea of making something from our dandelions... but the ease of a project and the amounts of mess were (and are) big factors. So instead of baking cookies or making fried dandelion fritters (although I'd really like to try this), I thought "Why not use my honey taffy idea and make a nutritious candy?"
My daughter was all for it. She loves to help cook and the scavenging for dandelions added to the excitement! Here is my littlest scavenger frolicking through the fields:
And here is my daughter's hands plucking out all the flowers:
So before we finish, let's review some important notes. Please be safe scavenger/wise foragers! Don't pick food from the roadside. Don't pick where land is sprayed. And if you don't know, don't pick! You can check out more information about foraging in this book Wild Edibles.
For the recipe, all you need is non-sprayed dandelion flower heads and some local raw honey. Grease (we used coconut oil) your mold. Hold the bottom of the Dandelion head and pull all the flowers out (each yellow petal is actually a flower - one Dandelion head holds hundreds of flowers!). Stick these in your greased mold and then pour honey over them (you can use a chopstick to stir the flowers in each section). Freeze for at least two hours (we had a hard time waiting that long - it can be a lesson in self control)! Take out and devour enjoy right away!
And here is the Dandelion Word Search if you missed it earlier. We've found them to be a fun way to review letters, phonics, and learning material with our five year old!
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