Cooking with Your Kids

There's just something about home cooking. I remember helping my dad make his specialty - peanut butter cookies - when I was a kid. I helped pull the flour and sugar out of the cabinet in their big shiny silver canisters. My dad would set the radio to his favorite classical station and off we'd go. Saturday was pizza night, when we'd load up a crust with all our favorite toppings and listen to Garrison Keillor. I can make scrambled eggs as fluffy as my mom's but my piecrust just isn't as flaky as hers. I'm certainly no Iron Chef, but now that I'm out of my parents' house, with a family of my own, I'm grateful for my early cooking lessons from my parents.

Cooking with kids is becoming more and more important for many reasons, not least of which are the health benefits. In an age when fast food is a mainstay in many American homes, cooking at home with your family presents an attractive alternative to high-fast, expensive restaurant fare. Over 65% of American adults, 13% of children (ages 6-9) and 14% of adolescents (10-17) are overweight - a condition many experts feel is the result of the abundance of over-processed, nutrient-deficient food. On another level, cooking at home saves calories and money, and gives you a chance to spend some time with your kids.

By getting your kids to help out in the kitchen, you're encouraging them to take healthy responsibility for the family. Kids will really feel like part of the team when they're included in meal preparation. And what a wonderful treat for Mom or Dad when the kids can take over meals one or two times a week!

Kids can get so much out of being in the kitchen with you. They can learn math skills as they measure out the ingredients. They learn to read and follow directions. By cooking a variety of food from many countries, they learn about foreign culture, geography and language. Younger kids learn shapes, numbers, and colors. Teach them family history as you whip up Nana's famous Peanut Butter Fudge. You can model safety in the kitchen by showing them how to hold knives, use the stove and oven, and what to do if they get a burn or a cut. Picky eaters will be a lot more encouraged to try food they helped prepare than they will if you just plop the plate of food in front of them. With your guidance, your kids can also find wonderful opportunities to build their self-esteem and creativity.

Kids of all ages can help out in the kitchen and be part of the meal preparation. Younger children can assist the head chef spoons or ingredients as needed, stir ingredients, or pour them into the bowls. Older kids can learn basic kitchen skills like measuring, folding, separating egg yolks, and following recipes. Teens can plan, shop for, and prepare meals for the family with minimal guidance from you (wouldn't that be nice?).

Here are some tips to get you started with kids in the kitchen:
-Try not to let your inner Martha Stewart take over and insist that everything be done perfectly. So your daughter over-salted the soup. One bowl of salty soup isn't going to kill anybody. Have fun with this.
-The good thing about cooking missteps is that you can almost always still eat the finished product. Be your kids' culinary cheerleader and know that sometimes the soufflé is just going to fall no matter what.
-Ask your kids what they want to have for dinner. Of course, you may have to put some limits on this question - no, we can't have ice cream and mac and cheese every night. Let them browse your cookbooks (or the libraries) for inspiration (especially ones with pictures) or the Internet to find recipes they want to try, then have them help you prepare the meal.
-If they insist on mac and cheese, then at least make it from scratch.
-Most of the popular cooking shows have some kid-friendly episodes. Find out when they're on and watch with your kids.
-If your child has a favorite restaurant dish, help your child experiment with re-creating the dish at home. (I've gotten quite good at pizza crust so we almost never order delivery anymore at my house - it costs about $6 to make a homemade pizza and tastes like a $1,000,000.)
-Find some kid-friendly equipment. Don't hand your 6-year-old an electric carving knife and a rump roast. Plastic is cheap, durable, and you can find it in smaller sizes for smaller hands.
-Teach your kids how to read nutrition labels. Have them do the research on the food - which is cheaper, which has more sugar, and so forth.
-Model good behavior in the kitchen. Show them the proper way to handle equipment.
-NEVER leave your child unattended in the kitchen.
-Don't forget to enlist the soux chef to help you with KP duty. Cleaning up is just as important as making the meal.

So get out there and have fun with your kids in the kitchen. Throw away the number for Domino's, bulk up your grocery list, and get cooking. Think of how proud you'll be when Junior is whipping up Gruyere fondue and chicken scaloppini for six, and the neighbor's kids can barely boil water.