How Do You Teach Cooking to Children Who Can't Read Yet

How do get your child who is not old enough to read or is learning to read to follow a recipe? There are ways to teach your child cooking and at the same time learn to pick up words. Remember, you can use cooking activities to help your children to read and cook at the same time.

If your kids are not old enough to read, there are limited options on what you can make them create in the kitchen. They should not be cooking on the stove, using knifes or kitchen appliances without your close supervision.

How do you then get them to follow a recipe?

1.    Print the recipe - simple recipes which your kids will enjoy making

2.    Place the recipe in a binder so that both your child knows he is building a recipe book

3.    Cut out pictures from magazines or the get them from the internet

4.    Take actual pictures

5.     Stick the pictures on the recipe book

Happy Cooking and Teaching!

As always, a little tip. This book received good reviews.

Love Cookies

Valentine is coming and I thought I spend some quality time with my kids. I spent yesterday baking cookies with my 2 boys. We made some butter bookies – my intention was to have love shaped cookies but instead my boys had different ideas – there were shapes of birds and bears and stars.

But there is definitely LOVE in the air. My boys enjoyed the whole process. They was butter and flour splattered all over. We (or should I say they) changed the recipe a bit and there was a lot of learning and teaching for both my kids and myself included. Sometimes, we adults need reminders too and kids can teach us a thing or two too!

The kids learnt how to beat and mix. My younger one asked questions – Why was the yolk yellow, why this flour and not that and so on. There was a bit of math but most of all there was a lot of imagination and fund. And the best part about the whole cooking process was everybody loved the cookies! They tasted really good.

This recipe, I think is great. It is a basic butter cookie recipe which you can improvise. You can raisins, or almonds, chocolate chips or decorations

It’s up to the imagination of your kids and you!

Shopping List

125 grams of butter (or about a cup)
Learning Tips
1. How do you measure 125 grams (what is one cup?)
2. 1 kg makes a 1000grams – 125 must be 1/8 of a kilogram
3. Where does butter come from? (No, not the supermarket!)

100 grams icing sugar (or about ¾ of a cup)
Learning Tips
1.Where does sugar come from?
2. What’s 3/4 ? What’s ½? Which is more? Which is less?

1 egg yolk
Learning Tips
1. Egg yolk and egg white – what are they – see how they look like
2. Where do eggs come from?
3. Why is egg good for you?
4. What do eggs have?-What is protein

1 tsp vanilla essence
Learning Tips
It smells really good but taste horrible. Introduce the senses. Vanilla is a flavoring from orchids and is actually a Spanish word "vainilla"or little pods. Here’s how it looks.

150 grams to 200 grams of flour (or 2 cups flour)

Learning Tips

1. What is flour’s texture
2. How do you get 200grams of flour?
3. Where does flour come from?

½ tsp baking powder

Learning Tips

Baking powder is to help the cake rise. How does it work? Baking powder is a dry chemical leavening agent used to increase the volume and lighten the texture of muffins, cakes, scones and biscuits. Baking powder works by releasing carbon dioxide gas into a batter or dough through an acid-base reaction, causing bubbles in the wet mixture to expand and thus leavening the mixture.

Instructions
1. Beat the butter and sugar till fluffy
2. Mix in egg yolk and essence
3. Sift flour and baking powder
4. Add the dry ingredients to form a soft dough
5. Let your kids enjoy shaping the cookies
6. Bake in preheated oven at 180 C for 12 to 15 minutes
7. Allow to cool and serve
8. If you like you can make some cream to decorate the cookies – beat some icing sugar and butter and add color of your choice and cream the cookies

And that’s it. HAPPY VALENTINE!

If you are looking for some homemade cookies for valentine, there are some great shops offering discounts for the season. Try this link, I thought it offers great offers and makes beautiful gifts 15% Off All Items for Valentine’s Day at David’s Cookies! Use Coupon Code VDAYLS at Checkout. Valid Thru February 28, 2010. Click Here.

Useful Resources on Kids and Cooking

Dear Parents, I hope you have been enjoying reading experience this blogs on applying cooking to teach our kids.

If you would have noticed, for a lot of the articles, I set out links to information that could be useful to you if not directly, indirectly in your dealing with your kids and the whole cooking experience. Being an accountant, I have also included some elements of finance. Its for your convenience and I thought that a lot of these material, are an excellent choice and provides value for money.

For this entry, i thought to provide some easy reference information and material that could be useful in teaching kids and cooking. The internet is a huge place and there’s just everything of everything everywhere. And sometimes, we just want something simple. How to get the kids to eat or even trying to figure out what to Ccok.

Some of the books and resources are from Amazon and a lot of others from various places, which I thought are quite good.

365 Foods Kids Love to Eat The bestselling guide to happy, healthy mealtimes with kids. 365 Foods Kids Love to EatHere is-the cookbook with carefully chosen, great tasting, good that appeals to the whole family, especially the kids! Encourage healthy attitudes toward food and lifelong, wholesome eating habits with 365 Foods Kids Love to Eat! Perfect for busy parents.

Kid Approved Meals! 13 Weeks Of Breakfast & Lunch Menus That Are Kid-Tested & Mom Approved, With Categorized Grocery Shopping Lists Accompanying Each Menu. Perfect For Homeschool Families, Stay At Home Moms, And Daycare Providers













This site http://astore.amazon.com/http1teachinb-20
has some great books and ideas in one page. The prices are also reasonable and constantly with ideal promotions. The books are about recipes but what is more interesting is that there are selected books about cooking and kids.

I do hope enjoy these resources. Do let me know if there are other useful resources for other mums and dads. Glad to post it on the blog

Cook for Favourite Dishes From Famous Restaurants Right in Your Own KItchen

Thinking what to cook next – what would entice my kids to eat and to cook with me. Something different, something that you have enjoyed when eating out at your favorite restaurants.

This will definitely get your kids excited! Happy kids are easier to teach. I found this delightful book on preparing

» Red Lobster
» Applebee's
» Chili's
» Olive Garden
» T.G.I. Fridays
» Outback Steakhouse
» Starbucks

This book helps you learn to cook these famous recipes while teaching kids all sorts of things from math to where food comes from and why eating raw is better for some food and not for others.

Click Here To Find Out More about the CopyCatCookBook!

Cook the same recipes from your favorite restaurants for friends and family and have them convinced that you've ordered in. They simply will not believe that you've learned the secret, guarded recipes from the best restaurants! And guess what, you kids will never be prouder. Cooking Tip: Don’t take an ounce of credit. – give them all to your kids. They will be eating out of your hand at the next lesson.

This book has 332 recipes and comes with some freebies and money back guarantee.