The Blue Whale dinner menu
This month’s theme for Family Dinner Book Club is Whales, and our lead book is The Blue Whale by Jenni Desmond. Here you’ll find a menu that can be prepared with the help of your children. Head over to Growing Book by Book for a full reading list of books about Whales. Then visit Sunny Day Family for family activity ideas. We invite you to share a picture from your dinner with us anytime during the month on our Family Dinner Book Club Facebook or Instagram page!
The Blue Whale is a fantastic book to teach kids (and adults!) all about blue whales. This book is filled with interesting facts and makes you really stop and think about how we can protect our oceans and the creatures who live there.
The diet of a whale is made up of a whole bunch of krill, a shrimp-like fish. So our dinner this month is a meal fit for a blue whale! Oven Shrimp Trio. That is, shrimp cooked three different ways in the oven. Whenever you are going to buy and enjoy shrimp, or any seafood, make sure you are choosing sustainable varieties. Wild caught is the first step to sustainability, and wild caught shrimp from the US and Mexico are the best options to help protect our oceans.
Add a ginger seaweed salad and sparkling cherry lemonade to round out this special sea-themed menu the blue whales would approve of. As you can see in the photo, I like to serve a small salad to everyone, but also serve the ingredients separated for everyone to choose their favorite veggies from the bunch. Sometimes a salad all mixed together is overwhelming for the kids, so letting them choose their own veggies from a platter is a way to ensure they’re getting something nutritious in their bodies.
The Blue Whale
Family Dinner Book Club
Menu
Oven Shrimp Trio (recipes below)
Dipping Sauces: thai sweet chili, cocktail, crushed pineapples
Ginger Seaweed Salad
Sparkling Cherry Lemonade
Blue Whale Cheesecake
A Giant Blue Whale Has Appeared In City Walk Outside The Green Planet
If you’re in and around City Walk for the next couple of weeks, chances are you’ll have a blue whale encounter. No, one hasn’t washed up in the middle of the city (hey, there’s no beach there). However, a colossal blue whale sculpture has been created using recycled plastic. Specifically, 8000 plastic bottles and 1000 plastic bags.
You’ll come across this fantastic plastic leviathan outside The Green Planet. The sculpture is a limited-time-only installation created by the indoor biodome to raise awareness about plastic pollution and its effect on marine life. Don’t miss the big unveiling happening today June 5!
Big blue whale sculpture, bigger message
Measuring 18 metres long, this blue whale sculpture is just a few metres short of the real deal. Average blue whales easily measure anywhere between 21 and 24 metres long. That said, this plastic sculpture is colossal enough to completely dwarf you in pictures and create a whale of an impact with just a striking visual. But we’ll still spout some facts for you. According to the WWF , whales ingest plastic found in the sea and the toxic chemicals can harm them. Also by 2050, the amount of plastic in the sea will outweigh the fish.
It took ingenious students and teachers at Dubai’s GEMS Legacy School more than 800 hours to construct this blue whale. One man’s trash is resourceful school kids’ artwork. This eco-friendly project is the result of The Green Planet joining forces with the GEMS Global Ambassadors’ Programme. The idea is to teach young minds about climate literacy through creative activities.
Lesson learnt. Those kids, we’re sure, are going to think twice about buying a bottle of water. Who wouldn’t if you spent an equivalent of 33 days rummaging through garbage that has the potential to clog the ocean and harm gentle giants like the blue whale?
Making a sustainable splash
This isn’t The Green Planet’s first ride in the sustainability rodeo. The indoor rainforest has ditched single-use plastics at its cafe, gift shop and other facilities for a while. And the cherry on the (birthday) cake is their environment-friendly birthday party packages that switch balloons with bubbles to avoid plastic.
So, if you’re looking for a whale-watching experience that’s also a reminder to reduce, recycle, and reuse head out to The Green Planet. The sculpture will be around until June 30.
