kids in the kitchen

I've always been quite keen to let my children "help" in the kitchen (we all know they actually make things take longer) but when I was having trouble getting my then 4 year old daughter to eat I wondered if letting her decide what to cook and teaching her to make it would help.
It did help quite a bit and showed me how much all of the children enjoyed cooking

I was also finding that with our busy lives it was difficult to come up with new things to eat each night so I decided to let each member take a turn in chosing a new dinner and dessert to try once a week. It ends up being once every two weeks or so as something always pops up and we don't have the time to prepare it but eventually it gets done.

So, whoever choses the meal also has to make it, with help of course. The kids love it. Not only do we all have to eat what they want but they feel really proud of their work and each time they cook I can see an obvious difference in their skills.
I am proud to say that my 8 year old son cooks scrambled eggs confidently, toast, pancakes and 2 minute noodles. I know grown men who can't even boil an egg so I think he's doing very well.
It was his turn to chose last weekend and we had Creamy tomato pasta with salad and garlic bread, followed by jam drop cookies and hot chocolates.
I was great. The recipe was quite simple so he didn't need much help at all and we were able to do a little work on presentation and setting the table.
We try to make everything from scratch when doing these recipes but we didn't have time to make fresh pasta so we'll focus on that next time.
Her's the pasta sauce recipe-

PASTA WITH TOMATO AND CREAM SAUCE
2 Tblsp olive oil
2 garlic cloves, crushed
400g can diced tomatoes
150ml thickened cream
2 Tblsp chopped herbs, we used oregano and a little basil.
450g pasta
salt and pepper to taste

Heat oil in saucepan,add garlic, cook for 2 mins.
Stir in tomatoes, bring to boil and simmer uncovered for 20mins, stirring occasionally. The sauce is ready when the oil separates a little on top.
Add cream simmer until slighlt thickened, then add herbs.
Meanwhile, cook pasta then add to sauce and toss together.
Serve piping hot.

As you can see it's really simple but delicious. If the recipe is not too complicated the kids don't feel too overwhelmed. I really recommend giving it a try, letting the kids cook that is.

CHAPTER TWO
So it's a few weeks later now and last weekend we did my 5 year old daughter's recipe. It was challenging to say the least. Not the recipes but cooking with a fiesty 5 year old who wants to control everyone and thinks she already knows everything. After a bit of regretable yelling, a few hugs and some discussion on who is the parent and who is the child we finally had a meal on the table.

So, she chose basically a ricotta pastry filled with ricotta, basil and pine nuts. It was good but I actually found the basil a bit strong and would like to have added a few more vegies but it was her meal. It was served with steamed vegetable and again would have been better with salad but that's not what she chose.
Desert was a chocolate bread and butter pudding. This was quite difficult for me for two reasons. I've developed quite a fear of white bread, it feels and tastes like junk food to me. It also makes my children go crazy. The more seads and the darker the bread the better as far as I'm concerned.
I also have quite a fear of soggy bread. It makes me feel like thowing up. I was willing to be brave and take the challenge though, for my daughter.

So, we sat down to eat the pudding with ice-cream and to my suprise it wasn't that bad, quite like a cake. I had a few mouthfuls but my brain just kept saying "SOGGY BREAD, SOGGY BREAD".

Thankfully the kids didn't really like it either so no-one was offended when I couldn't eat any more.

I think I'll assist her more when it's her turn to chose next time so she really knows what's involved. It is helping her to learn what she likes though. Here's a picture as she wanted to make sure her work was recorded as well. I haven't included the recipes as I didn't think they were worthit.