Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Kalona Field Trip

Today Morgane my daughter had a field trip to the village of Kalona south of Iowa City. It is an Amish/Mennonite community, with buggies and cool history.
So for the first time, I volunteer for a field trip... OH BOY!! Now my hat goes off to those teachers that endure all the noise that those lovely kids do, I would have a headache in NO time! To tell you the truth, went I got home, I slept for 2 hours I was so exhausted! Amazing!

Anyway, back to the visit.
We first visited a Cheese Factory, where we learn that cheese is actually white when it comes out of the factory; they only add the food coloring at the big company like Kraft. That made me wonder WHY on earth someone decided that cheese should be orange. In France our cheese are normally white or creamee color, the crust might have a different color, probably due to the spice or bacteria that they let them sit in! (Don’t ask me, I don’t have a clue). But why Orange?? Anyone has an idea?





After that little cheese stop,
we stopped at the local bakery. The kids were very very interested to get some donuts and other goodies. The bakery also makes fresh Pasta, so we went to see how they were making it. 2 questions from the kids, were regarding the fact if they could use the machine to make cookie pasta! Answer: I don’t think so! They can use in a week up to 500 dozen egg for Pasta making and Angel food cake in the Easter season!!

Then after a quick lunch, we went to the Historical Village Museum, very interesting. Some of the pics are from the Buggies repair house, or the “Grandpa’s house” or the little school etc.. you will see that the kids loved being able to ring the school bell. I was the only adult except for the guide, and I had to remind all those kids to keep their hand in their pocket and not to touch anything. I was amazed of how many times one can remind a 10/11 year old kid to not touch anything… Morgane probably now is considered unlucky to have a cop as a mother! ;-) Oh well, such is life!

2 comments:

Andrea said...

Wow! I can't believe the authentic equipment that they use!

Brave girl for accompanying a school group.

I'm not sure about the orange cheese question....I am fond of "whiter" cheeses anyway :)

C N Heidelberg said...

I think I've been there! I didn't get to go to the cheese factory though...the people I was with were more interested in looking at quilts. :) I have no idea why cheese should be dyed orange!