Cooking with Kids

I suppose I scared people with the knife. I admit I didn't start (my ex did , he was good in the kitchen when he went there, really good) and I clammered about not letting her use it, but she already had chopped perfect young carrots. I am not sure what year that was, but she was good with it much earlier than I would guess. Maybe it was relief from not having to use a regular table knife.

Re my niece - my ex's bro had her climbing all over the place young. She learned to get around the city on a bicycle young. She is fairly adept at self defence at this point. Her dad has survivalist instincts, if not the politics of that.

Me, I was raised as a young lady and was cautioned not to get overheated.

Heh, a lot of these choices really are cultural.

I'm a little scared by the knife, being klutz-ish and having gotten maybe half of what serious injuries I've ever had from knives. (Self-inflicted.) That wasn't purposeful exclusion, though, thank you too, for that and other comments. Cutting could still work, of some kind.

I am mother klutz, so I understand. On my own I wouldn't have let her. John, who learned to cook to the extent he did in a kind of self defense, had none of my quibbles. He saw her competence and he, I guess, thought himself faster. (maybe wrong).

As it happened, she has great athletic capability, and the business of me protecting her changed fairly early into her protecting me, or some mutual thing re physicality and life knowledge.

However, if your child is like me, don't let her near a knife.

But, re T, she is now on the track team. Girl has command, and did early.

From what I know about her ever being hurt physically, it was on another of the many mile bikerides with dad, when she fell off at some point. But of course she was always helmetted, bounced back. She and I are not each other, I am slight re her. She keeps me from falling off of curbs at twilight.

I might keep her from being taken as a whore in daytime, since she is a stranger in a strange land visiting me here.

Well, this is off of cooking and on to life - but I suppose physical competence can be seen young.

I think I wavered, depending on where I was. Some are gifted, but people like me can enjoy physicality. Introduction to it without fear is - actually - near priceless.

Which brings back the knife question... for T, she was annoyed by a regular knife cutting, say, a some celery...

Food Network is what helped me learn to cook, and to learn to like cooking. Also, lots of positive feedback (and constructive criticism) from RP. I always thought of myself as a lousy cook until about 2 years ago or so, and started cooking more in order to save $$ and watch the cholesterol, and he started telling me how tasty things were. Huh? Me? I made something good. Yes, you did.

It helps, it really does.

Oh one quickie thing - what about canning or making jam? It's that time of year. Maybe you could make pickles. You would do the cutting of the cukes, but sozlet can do the rest of it. 2 weeks later or so, voila, you've got pickles. I'll hunt around, I have a kind of down and dirty jam recipe where fruit goes in the microwave and something like 18 minutes later, you have jam. I'll see if I can dig it out tonight.

Soz, tortillas are really, really easy to make:

2 cups flour
1t salt
2 t baking powder
1 T shortening

Enough water to make a soft (but not sticky) dough.

Mix the dry ingredients, cut in the shortening, add the water (3/4 cup or so usually does it).

Knead it for about 5 minutes, pinch off a piece of dough, roll it into a ball, pat (or roll) it flat, toast in a heavy dry skillet.

Corn tortillas are even easier if you can find masa harina which is kind of an instant corn flour (not to be confused with corn meal)

A little less than twice as much flour as water to make a soft dough, pinch, pat, toast, done.

I think naan, the indian bread is easy too, will have to look up a recipe.

And crackers, I suspect crackers are easy, I've seen recipes

Good crackers being quite expensive - I want to try making them one of these days.

I think naan, the indian bread is easy too, will have to look up a recipe.

And crackers, I suspect crackers are easy, I've seen recipes

Good crackers being quite expensive - I want to try making them one of these days.

Sorry about double post.

Most of the naan recipes I saw involve yeast and some complication, but this one is without yeast and fairly simple -
Naan Recipe

Epicurious.com has many cracker recipes. This one appealed to me, and is perhaps too peppery for a child, but it'll give an idea of how easy it is. http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/recipe_views/views/11891

Found the jam recipe. I think it may be Paula Deen's. I have no tried this so I cannot vouch for it yet.

Crush your fruit of choice. I recall seeing this done with raspberries, but other berries are probably fine. I would assume that something more structured, like an apple, would not work. You want something smushable. Anyway, I think the show used a blender or food processor but I bet a mortar and pestle could be used (another tool sozlet could use safely).

Add sugar. I have no idea how much. I'd say, taste it, but assume that the sugar is going to carmelize and concentrate so add less than you think you might need (you can always add more but can't take any out if you've added too much). It has to be something that can be cooked so sugar is okay and so is, I bet, Splenda. Equal doesn't work for cooking so don't use it. I assume honey would also be fine, maybe even maple syrup. Hmm.

Stir.

Microwave, uncovered (so as to let the steam out) for 18 minutes. Since I am unsure which type or power level microwave was used, I'd say, check every 5 minutes or so. I believe it was on high. If you're using a liquid sweetener (like honey), I bet it will take longer to get to the right consistency. Anyway, reconcile yourself to the very real possibility that the first batch or two will be trial and error.

Suddenly, it's jam!

Refrigerate. Toss after, I'd say, 2 weeks. This is homemade so there are no preservatives in these, heh, preserves, so you need to be careful. Definitely keep it refrigerated as botulism could be a concern.

I recall on the show it was very spreadable, really appeared like professionally made stuff. I think I might try it this weekend.

My suggestion would be to call it cooking 'time' and let her make small recipies for HER while you cook for the family. That way she isnt involved in the hot oil, or the boiling of something.. or any other time sensative cooking stuff.
Have her prepare her own snacks for tomorrow or even her own meal. Remind her that i is a BIG help to do that because the meals you make are so big that anything she can do is great.
A recipe I even use with bean now for ' home made granola bars " =

1 1/2 cups quick rolled oats
1/4 cup whole wheat flour
2/3 cup dates, chopped ( or raisins, or dried fruit.. what ever she likes )
1/2 cup walnuts, chopped
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 cup orange juice
1 1/2 cups raw apples, shredded

( from here, I put about 3 tbps of honey on top
of the mixture and smear it around. It leaves a
good sweet glaze )

Combine all ingredients. Let stand 10 minutes. Press
mixture into 8" x 8" baking dish. Bake at 375? until
lightly browned, about 25 minutes. Loosen with
spatula, and cut into bars while warm. Serve hot for
breakfast.

cooking with kids
What about getting a cookbook suitable for children. There are a number of them, and you can look at them in your public library to see what recipes they have that might be interesting and what parts of the process are suitable for her to help with or even do on her own.

You say she's good at peeling garlic - well that takes a good deal of digital dexterity, so there may be other similar areas that she could deal with.

Of course, stirring stuff is always a possibility (unless it's on the stove), as is spreading stuff on sandwiches.

But I strongly recommend checking out children's cookbooks.

bookmarking

I am getting more and more interested in cooking with my kids. My son attends a traditional Montessori and now my daughter too. It is encouraged as a very important skill because according to Montessori principle if a child is capable of doing something and you do it for them it is damaging to them, will be adding soon.

Over the weekend we tried Soup, While I made entree for me and my husband I put a pot of organic chicken broth on the stove and then we took turns adding our ungredients, Like I would say who wants to put a clove of garlic in the soup, who wants green peas, they were excited, by the time we were done we had this soup with egg noodles, pieces of beef, green peas and carrots and actually tasted pretty good.

My son's principal also with small kids, did a parent ed seminar where she demonstrated How preparing dinner with her 2 and 4 year old girls s a daily ritual. She showed us these cooking paraphernalia from pampered chef and other sources that work safely. For me butter knife works, very unlikely they could cut themselves if I am there? I have a small kid's table with two chairs in the family room that i drag in the kitchen and it becomes their food prep area , use one of those flexi cutting boards but I am oplanning on getting small cutting boards for them. Our nexzxt project will be garlic bread. THen we may move onto tortillas

I started this one a while ago -- sozlet now helps more regularly, and does a lot more. She's got baking down quite well, and can make things on her own, almost (reading helps!). For regular dinner prep, it varies. She likes to help me make fruit salad -- she handles softer fruits like bananas (easy to slice with a butter knife) and watermelon, plucks grapes off the stems to include, that sort of thing.

Yaya helped the other night by adding the craisins to the salad and setting her place at the table.