Madagascar Unit

I’ve sat here trying to finish off our various different geography lessons for years, and in this case I cooked our recipe for the Madagascar Unit ages ago, like way back in the 20teens, and then when the kids and I were doing our mad dash through the continents trying to finish off our Africa Unit we studied Madagascar again, and I realized I should write a much better Madagascar unit then just, “hey we cooked some food and read a few books,” maybe make it a little more formal like our studies are now. Also, Madagascar is fascinating for zoology. Like it is something scientists love to go study because it’s an island nation that means its biology is completely isolated so it has all sorts of unique creatures there that are found nowhere else. But, I’ve rambled enough, and should now get into our Madagascar Unit for real.

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Madagascar Unit resources

Okay, let’s start off with some websites.

• Nat Geo Kids Madagascar – I always like National Geographic, also because they’ll usually link to some fun videos on there
• World Wildlife Madagascar– Obviously, this one is going to be one where you need to click on other things to read more, but it’s a great resource to start from
• BBC Madagascar Country Profile– great general resource
• Kids World Travel Guide– this one has good pictures

Okay, now let’s get to good YouTube videos:

And the Flag Friday video.

Madagascar books

Oh wait! I think we decided to study because my kids had been watching the Wild Kratts show in Madagascar! That would also explain why every book we got was based on animals….

• Aye-ayes– these guys have crazy eyes!
• Flying Lemurs– these guys fascinate me
• Follow Me!– super cute lemur follow the leader book
• How to Lose a Lemur– a silly board book
• Lemurs on Location– the pictures in this book are amazing

Note from Past Ticia 2019: Biology students love Madagascar because it’s a contained environment with such a wide variety of creatures on it. My kids love it because it’s got so many creatures on it, and they love all of those crazy primates.

Madagascar Unit recipe: Madagascar Chicken

This part will all be written by Past Ticia 2019, I found this recipe on a blog and now when I go to update the post, the original blog has since deleted the recipe, so I cannot do anything to say just how authentic it is. I have ABSOLUTELY no clue. So, if anyone is from Madagascar and reads this, please tell me just how not authentic this is, because it doesn’t feel very authentic to me. I now return you to past Ticia.

For some reason, a year ago I decided to have us learn about Madagascar. I think it might have been one of my last Cooking Around the World with others. I’m not really sure why, but we cooked Madagascar chicken. Now, I’d stayed away from African cuisine after a couple of very disastrous early attempts where no one would eat it, and so I picked a very bland recipe. This Madagascar Chicken recipe is the perfect recipe to start your picky kid cooking around the world.

Madagascar Chicken recipe ingredients

• chicken leg quarters, the original recipe called for 4, but I doubled it to at least 10 because 5 people and all that
• 4 inches ginger, peeled and grated (I just minced it up super small)
• zest of one lemon (for my size recipe, it should be two, but my husband isn’t big on lemon-flavored meat)
• 6 garlic cloves
• onion diced (I’ve started essentially mincing onions since I’m not a big fan of the texture)
• coconut oil
• 2 orange bell peppers (I think I forgot this, because looking at the pictures, I’m not seeing any)

Cooking your Madagascar Chicken

1. Rub your lemon zest, ginger, and garlic over chicken. NOW, if you’ve read the instructions the day before, you’ve figured out this needs to be marinated overnight. Now, I looked at the recipe earlier in the day, and it only marinated in it for a few hours. So…… Your call on that one.
2. In your skillet heat the coconut oil. Because I had lots and lots of chicken, I cooked it in two pans. Coconut oil is one of my subscribe and save items on Amazon. I get a giant tub mailed to me every 3 or so months (maybe it’s 4 months), and I use it for lots of different things.
3. Brown your chicken on all sides, then remove it and cook the onion and bell peppers.
4. Once the onion and bell pepper are cooked down a little, add the chicken back in, cover it, and cook for about 45 minutes until it’s about falling off the bone.
5. Serve over rice, or as we did. I bought some of those fun mini-potatoes and we fried them up, and they made a great side dish to go with this chicken.

Madagascar Chicken

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This zesty chicken meal is filling and delicious meal.

Ingredients

• 3 inches of ginger peeled and grated
• zest of a lemon
• 6 garlic cloves
• 1 onion diced
• 2 orange bell peppers diced
• 4 chicken quarters
• coconut oil to cook with

Instructions

1. Rub your lemon zest, ginger, and garlic over chicken and allow to marinate overnight.
2. In your skillet heat the coconut oil, and brown the chicken on all sides, then remove the chicken, and cook the onion and bell peppers.
3. Once the onion and bell pepper are cooked down a little, add the chicken back in, cover it, and cook for about 45 minutes until it’s falling off the bone.

Madagascar Unit: notebooking pages

We used our Africa notebooking pages and if I’d thought about it, and we weren’t in the made dash through the continent we would also have used the animal report minibook to learn about several animals with the kids, because there are so many amazing animals to learn about, and that could be a whole unit all by itself.

 Okay, this is one of the shorter Geography Now videos, so I don’t have as many notes as I did later in the alphabet, but here are my interesting facts I put down:

• pirate cemetery
• 80-90% of its flora and fauna is unique to Madagascar!
• the largest producer of vanilla
• The closest language to Malagasy is a Polynesian language. Languages are fascinating and I wish I was better at them. Which may be why they fascinate me so much.

More Geography fun with your kids!

• Australia
• Switzerland
• Hawaii
• Spain
• Colorado

• Bernard Gagnon, CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
• By Charles J. Sharp – Own work, from Sharp Photography, sharpphotography.co.uk, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=75870154
• Originally published January 9, 2019