MORE THAN A RECIPE
The project of sending Christmas letters between European schools, in which our school Mohylova is also involved, brings our students not only the joy of Christmas decorations and cards, but also the discovery of the traditions and culture of many European countries. And one more thing that we became acutely aware of this pre-Christmas season: the knowledge of the cultural treasures of national minorities, which are represented among the students at our school. Our adventurous exploration of hidden treasures among us began when, in the 3rd grade, we opened a letter from Italy. Everyone was excited to read in the English-written letter about the Italian school that sent it, but one pair of eyes shone even more enthusiastically – it was Daniel's eyes, who has a Czech mother and an Italian father. When we read in the letter about Italian Christmas pastries, he immediately remembered that his grandmother in Italy bakes exactly those. And then, in addition to the information from the letter, he told us many interesting facts and details that he knew from his own experience with his Italian grandparents.
We experienced a second wonderful adventure with the fifth graders when we started exploring letters from Romania. The letters fascinated not only our Romanian students but also their mother, who looked at them during a school visit to the Advent workshops. "Singing Romanian carols with a large decorated star? Walking in a costume with a horned goat head? Baking the Cozonac cake? These are great Romanian Christmas traditions that you can even see in Prague!" And the kind mother invited the teacher to a meeting of Romanians in Prague, where all these traditions came to life. The students did not fall behind in learning about Romanian traditions. Our fifth-grader Stefan was inspired by the Cozonac recipe in one of the letters to bring a family recipe for the same cake from home, of course translated into English, to introduce his classmates not only to the world of Romanian delicacies but also to practice culinary vocabulary in the language we are all learning.
If you feel like discovering the diversity of people around us, the variety of flavors, and the adventure of using recipes in English, join us and bake a Romanian Cozonac as well—you can find the recipe among the accompanying photos!