A day of gastronomy and spelling

Yesterday I made zucchini bread (as usual.) I'm a little bored with always making the same thing, but since the first time I made it, my roommates haven't stopped bringing it up. They like it so much that I know at this point that if I make any other thing to share with them, the response will almost definitely be "This is good. But the zucchini bread is better!"

So since today there was a Concurso de Gastronomia (Cooking Contest) up at the adult English school in town, I figured zucchini bread was both quite American and a safe choice to bring. It ended up getting 2nd place in the "English/American dish" category. (There was a different category for the best French dish) Not bad for my first try, I think. :-)

Here's a picture of a few of the dishes. The woman in the picture is my friend Angela. She comes to the English conversation table on Thursdays and works at a mantecado factory in Estepa. Her carrot cake won 1st place for the "English/American dish" and rightly so. Delicious.


I'm very full and happy.


Also today at school we had the semifinals for the first annual CEIP Lope de Vega (name of the elementary school where I'm teaching) English Spelling Bee. It's fun to see all of the students nervous and excited and running up and looking at the lists of who won the previous rounds for the 5th, 10th, or 50th time this week during recess. Since we started the contest, I've been thinking about spelling, phonetics in Spanish vs English, and pronunciation of words way too much. But I don't mind.


Now it's time for Sevillana* class, maybe a Cruzcampo afterward, and the beginning of a 4-day weekend. Que bonita es esta vida....**





*What is Sevillana? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sevillanas

**Reference to a song I just got stuck in my head: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azAjn8jHt5Y