By Jennie Ellis, Kindergarten Teacher
We love to make stone soup in our class! This is a two day, will work activity. We use our will to wash and chop all the vegetables. We help with prep all the way to clean up. An excellent exercise in direction following, will, patience and fine motor skills. Perfect for all ages!
Chopping vegetables on the first day, we chop on Tuesdays, but this is a fun activity to do before a rainy or over cast day as you could enjoy the warm soup-the true fruits of your labor on a cold, rainy day.
Waiting a day after chopping to enjoy your soup will build up your child's patience muscles and the joy that comes from the anticipation.
Materials Needed
child safe knife (butter knives can cut most vegetables if you don't have a smaller knife)
cutting board
cooking pot
vegetables
bouillon or broth
We wash and prep all of the veggies. We chop them and add them to our pot of broth. We add any herbs and spices that would compliment our vegetable pallet. Feel free to add whatever will make this soup appetizing to your family's taste. I usually do a stone soup day in my home on a day I am cleaning out the fridge to make room for new groceries. Carrots and celery that are looking limp make great soup additions! We let the veggies sit in the broth overnight in the fridge. We put the soup on, in the morning, allowing the delicious aroma to take over our classroom, much like on bread baking day. You could cook on low heat the next day starting at noon and it would be ready for dinner. Piggy back your soup chopping day with bread baking and you could enjoy a fresh loaf of bread with your stone soup.
Working Parent Tip
Prepping dinner around lunchtime to put to the side in a crock pot or oven on low has proven to be a time and sanity saver in my home over these past two weeks. Involving them in cooking may take a bit longer to complete the prep but you will gain in the long run. They will hold onto the immense connection they made with you during dinner prep help and carry it with them into free play. They may not need your attention as much as they were able to recharged their incessant desire for undivided connection and attention from you. You are their life forces!! This might lead to some prolonged independence away from you, allowing you to possibly get some work done. Fingers Crossed.
Please find this story below that can go along with your stone soup project.
Stone Soup Story
Once there was an old man who had been traveling for a long time. He was poor and had no money or food. When he came to a village, he began to go from door to door to see if someone had food to spare. But wherever he went, the people said they had nothing to give and sent him away.
When he came to the last house, the man of the house jeered and said, “All I have to give you is water.”
“ Oh, thank you,” the old man said with great enthusiasm. “I can make some stone soup with that water”. The man from the village shook his head at him, but because he was curious about this stranger and his stone soup, he gave him a big pot of water.
The old man sang a merry tune as he built a small fire and set the pot upon it. He took a small, round stone out of his pocket and ceremoniously placed it in the pot. After a while a passerby stopped beside him and asked what he was doing there.
“ Oh, I’m making stone soup. Would you like some when it’s ready?”
“ What does it taste like?” asked the villager.
“ Well, not bad, but it would taste a lot better if it had an onion in it.”
The villager said he had one onion he could put in it, if that was all the old man wanted of him. He gave an onion, and into the pot it went. Pretty soon another villager came and asked about the soup. When he asked what stone soup tasted like, the old man replied:
“Well, not bad but it would taste a lot better if it had a potato in it.”
This villager had a potato, if that was all he wanted. So, a potato went into the pot. Since news travels pretty fast in a small village, it was not long before a carrot went into the pot, if that was all he wanted. Another brought a tomato, and one after another, the whole village added one vegetable each.
At last, the soup was ready. Great tables were placed in the square and all around were lighted torches. The villagers brought bread and cider and soon a banquet was spread and everyone sat down to eat. And they ate as much as they wanted.
The old man, who had eaten his fill too, was careful, however, to retrieve the stone from the pot and put it back into his pocket for another day.
