Today, in honor of Cinco de Mayo, my daughter shares the story of our visit to El Rancho De Las Golondrinas, a historic ranch near Santa Fe. She also talks about her experience baking Bizcochitos.
5 Star Foodie Junior:
El Rancho De Las Golondrinas is a living history museum. It is a ranch where settlers from Mexico would have lived 300 years ago. There are buildings like a mill and shops where they make things like leather or weaving. There is also a farm with animals like sheep and different plants like corn and squash, and a farm house.
The ranch shows how people used to live in New Mexico a long time ago.
Mommy and Daddy told me that El Rancho De Las Golondrinas was like the ranch the American Girl Josephina lived on. When we entered the ranch, first we went into the gift shop. I was dressed in an outfit like Josephina’s outfit and the gift shop lady really liked me. So she put a scarf over my shoulders and she gave me a fan and Daddy took a picture of me. The gift shop lady told me that the pictures in Josephina’s books are from this ranch and that I will be able to even see the bedroom where Josephina used to sleep. I got very excited about that! I really wanted a Josephina doll so Daddy bought me one. I carried Josephina with me on the tour.
First, our tour guide talked about leather, how to make leather. The people who made leather were called leather tanners. Then, our tour guide showed us a herd of sheep and goats. Next, he showed us a well for getting water. Then, we went into Josephina’s house. We saw Josephina’s bedroom. In the bedroom, there was a little table with some toys on it and another table with chairs beside it. There was a bed on the other side of the table.
We walked all around the ranch and through the farm fields to see the pond and the mills. On our way back, we saw a cool snake. Before we left the ranch, we stopped by the gift shop and I told the gift shop lady all about the tour. It was really special visiting the ranch where Josephina used to live.
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When we toured Josephina’s house, we also saw a kitchen where Josephina would have helped with cooking meals. Josephina really liked to cook, and one of her favorite foods was Bizcochitos which are New Mexican sugar cookies flavored with anise.
When I returned home from my trip, I made these cookies based on a recipe from Josephina’s Cook Book. First, I mixed the shortening with sugar. Then, I added in the egg and anise seeds.
Next, I put flour, baking powder, and salt into a bowl and sifted them together. I combined the flour mixture and shortening mixture.
Then, I added the vanilla and water, and I formed the dough into a ball.
I divided the dough into two balls. I rolled one ball of dough out and cut out the different cookie shapes, like a star, a heart, and a diamond.
With the second ball of dough, I cut out simple rounds. Then, I sprinkled the cookies with cinnamon sugar that I mixed earlier.
Finally we baked the cookies. After dinner we ate the cookies. They tasted cinnamony and sugary. Mommy thought that they tasted like licorice because of the anise seed.
