After holding and learning about lifestone or gypsum, ask the students if they remember what the Colay people (only women and girls, that is) ate after visiting the Lifestone Garden for memorial services. Answer: soup and flatbread. We’re going to focus on the flatbread as our snack for this book club!
Flatbread is a traditional staple food in many cultures – naan, foccacia, tortillas, matzo. Some flatbreads are unleavened, some leavened then rolled thin and baked or fried.
Many kinds of flatbreads can be found premade at grocery stores. It might even be fun to try a few different kinds.
If you have a little more time and want to try your hand at making flatbread, many recipes can be found on the internet. There is no specific description of the Colay’s flatbread in the book, but in choosing recipes to highlight, we looked to Nova Scotia and Newfoundland – the area where the fictional Tathenland might have been found.
For an easier option using frozen bread dough, try this recipe for toutons – a fried white bread from Newfoundland:
This next option is slightly more involved. It is a recipe attributed to Nova Scotia for a baked bannock bread – a kind of bread common among native North Americans:
If you’d like to learn more about flatbread, here’s an interesting article on Wikipedia:
Alternate idea: One food that appears in The Remarkable & Very True Story of Lucy & Snowcap is something you will want to avoid serving at book club – Snowcap’s poisoned oatmeal! The author suggests changing that into non-poisoned oatmeal cookies just for fun!
Feel free to drop me a line at contact@nationalhomeschoolbookaward.com if you have questions, comments or just need moral support while getting your book club started!
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~ Valerie the Book Club Lady
Next week’s book club blog topic: The Remarkable & Very True Story of Lucy & Snowcap #4: Signature Activity!