Adeventures in Baking Cookies with my Students

So, almost every Saturday, I teach English to some Japanese middle school students at the aptly named, Saturday English School. It's not really teaching, so much as "Let's Have Fun with English!" classes. Today's lesson was making Peanut Butter cookies in English. I was to use only English and the students would follow my instructions and make tasty treats! What could go wrong?

So we started off with a bang. Step 1, put the all the peanut butter into a big bowl. Step 2, put 1 1/4 cup brown sugar into same bowl. And that's where things started going south. You see, I'm in Japan where you really don't bake cookies that often or without a mix. Someone else had picked up the ingredients and picked up 黒砂糖 which is black sugar (better translated as molasses) instead of brown sugar. Also, our measuring cups measured by cc and not by cups. Crap crap crap.

The cup problem was solved with me calling my poor, sickly husband and having him figure out the measurement conversions. 200cc = 1 cup. Now you know! I figured the sugar couldn't be too bad, so we just went ahead with it (at the time, I didn't realize it was like crystallized molasses sugar stuff).

The rest of the making of the cookie dough went smoothly. Then we came to the baking part. I was so excited about today, because I was promised that there would be 3 western-style ovens to use. You see, I don't have an oven. Most Japanese kitchens don't. They just don't like to bake here. So I haven't been able to bake anything since I moved here 16 months ago. Unfortunately, when I finally looked at the ovens, they were Japanese style ovens and not quite the same. It's hard to explain the difference, so just know that they are different. Anyways, we 'gan barimasu'ed and started the cookies.

There were 3 groups making cookies and this is the results of the first batch that went into the oven.




Doh! The black sugar had these little hard, lumpy sugar balls in it and we didn't pick them out on the first go around...so they melted into molasses and would burst. Plus, the cookies burned because we left them in for too long. Sad!

Anyways, the students were pleased with their handy work and set out to make all the cookies. Here's a shot of the girl team at work.


And here is the final results of the cooking:


This was Team Takashi! I had to show the students how to make the cookies, so this was my group. Takashi was my assistant. He's actually one of my favorite students so it was fun to work with him. He doesn't look too excited, does he? Anyways, in honor of him having to work with the sensei, I named our team after him


This is the Team Taisha! These are two students from Taisha Junior High (hence the name). Akira is on the left, Noriyuki is on the right. Man, these two were hysterical. They burnt almost all their cookies and just couldn't get it right. About 2 seconds after I took my picture, they ended up dumping their cookies onto the table. Heh.

This was Girl's Team! I didn't get to hang out with them much because they were far away, but they seemed to really enjoy cooking. Kanako is on the left, Kana is in the middle, and Miho is on the right (Kanako and Miho are from the same junior high school, so they have the same uniforms on). It's not in the picture, but the girls got tired of doing cookies, so they took the last of their dough and made a big heart cookie. It turned out ok...the molasses bubbles kinda ruined it though.


Here's a close up of all three team's cookies. Yes, 90% of the cookies are burned to a crisp, why do you ask?

Let's eat! The students liked the cookies, but I think that's just because they don't know what a peanut butter cookie is supposed to taste like. The black sugar really did ruin the cookies. However, wonderful teacher that I am, I ate a cookie from each group and gave them comments. The cookies...well...they were really bad. But that really wasn't the point of the lesson, was it? Plus, the students said they like the cookies and ended up taking some home!

We forgot to bring bags for them to take the cookies home in, so the kids solving the problem by making green origami boxes to store them in. Does it really get more Japanese than that?

So that was that. As much as the cookies were awful and a complete failure, the day was a success! The kids had a really good time making cookies and talking English and just having fun. Soon will be High School entrance exams, so its good for these kids to let loose a little.

Next week! We are watching My Neighbor Totoro in English! Woo! My job is really, way too much fun!