Have you ever baked with children and noticed how excited they are about it?
They are just so eager to help you crack eggs, stir, pour, measure, decorate.
And of course, they love licking the beaters and eating the final product.
Cooking with children is one of the most rewarding things I do with kids. I love watching their little hands work the sifter, their requests about whether what they’re doing is correct, particularly when measuring. The concentration on their faces when they crack an egg. How good they are at holding a cup while you pour liquid into it if they aren’t grown up enough to pour it themselves. And of course, how good they are at helping you taste test.
Cupcakes are one of the best things to make with kids. They get so many options they really feel like they’re part of the process. What flavour cupcakes? What colour/flavour icing? What, if anything goes on top.
When I bake cupcakes with kids we often form a production line for the icing part. Those who are able to ice ice, those who aren’t do the rest of the decorating. Mind you, anyone who wants a go at icing is totally allowed to. It’s so wonderful watching them acquire new skills, and it doesn’t matter if the end result isn’t perfect to our eyes. It is to theirs and considering their developmental stages they do a darn good job!
Yet working in the kitchen with kids can be hard. Yes it will take a little longer. But there’s no reason you can’t make it one of your activities.
Here’s some hints and tips make your cooking experiences with kids go to plan:
- Put your patience hat on. This is imperative. If you can’t be patient and demonstrate, support and congratulate as appropriate you will hate it and so will they.
- Be organised. Have everything you need for your recipe out. If the kids are old enough get them to help you get things out the fridge/pantry.
- Set up a space that you can all work together. It is important that on some tricky things you can intervene if you need to to save your dish. But you don’t want to be hovering either.
- The kids will be excited, but you need them to be calm enough and patient enough to follow instructions and wait for their turn.
- Take turns. If there’s parts of the recipe you aren’t comfortable letting them do then that’s your turn.
- When cracking eggs give the kids a little bowl/dish to crack eggs into. Crack one a time. This makes checking for and removing any shell so much easier. Once you’re satisfied there’s no shell let them tip it into your dish/bowl etc. Be warned, the younger the child the more likely they are to want to squash the egg. Let them crack eggs for the first time when you have multiple eggs in a recipe. You crack one slowly, talking them through it and then do the others together. Make sure the cracks are deep so it’s easy for them to pull apart. And when it’s time for them to pull it apart reminding them not to squash it, but to open it up like they’re opening a book to read it can be helpful. Demonstrate with your own hands if you need to.
- Let them stir/mix first. They’ll get to a point when they’ve had enough and you’ll be able to check that it’s all mixed together.
- If you’re doing something like making cupcakes scooping can be tricky. I like to use two spoons-1 to scoop and the BACK of the other to push your scoop off your first spoon. If the kids are quite young try sharing this-you do the scooping or the pushing off and they do the other job.
- When it comes to icing small bowls with knives of a size appropriate to their hands are important.
- Small bowls with different colours or different decorating things are a great way to let them pick what to put on. Ramekins are ideal and you’re not likely to have huge amounts of leftovers that you’ll need to waste.
