cooking with kids

Cooking with Clare…She’s Taking Over!

by Lisa on April 23, 2012

Friday night, I turned my kitchen and my blog over to Clare. Here’s what she created in the kitchen {with some technical assistance from me}.

hi! You know me as Clare from the other ‘Cooking with Clare’s but this time I am taking over! Smile I made up the recipe, I took the pictures, and I am writing the blog!

you need {one tablespoon olive oil,} {one} red bell pepper, {one} yellow bell pepper, some ham {4 slices of deli ham}, bowtie pasta {half of a box}, parmesan cheese {1/4 cup}, and diced and fire roasted organic tomatos {1 can, we didn’t use the tomato sauce}.

first, cut up four pieces of ham into squares like so:

then, put the ham in a bowl, and get the red bell peppers, and cut them into pieces to.

put them all in a bowl with the ham, and mix well until it looks like a rainbow Rainbow

then, add the pasta in a pot of boiling water. {Be sure to bring the water to a boil then add salt before adding the pasta.}

then add the ~~fruit~~ {ham and peppers} into a ~~separate boiling pot~~ sauté pan.

add tomato’s

{Cook, stirring occasionally, for 3-4 minutes.}

once the bowtie pasta is ready, pour it into the ~~bowl~~ {pan} with ham and red bell peppers.

add the parmesan cheese, and mix

~~walla~~ {voila}! You are done!

{Garnish with parmesan cheese and enjoy!}

{We ate ours while watching the Muppets.}

I give it

Peace out

Thanks so much, Clare! We had a lot of fun and I loved being able to talk with Clare about her decisions on which ingredients would work together and why. I think that getting in the kitchen with children is so important and can help establish good eating habits. Even if the final dish isn’t restaurant quality, it doesn’t matter—it’s the experience that matters.

Want to see what else Clare has cooked up? Here are her past posts!

Honeydew Lime Popsicles
Naan
Pizza Night

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Cooking with Clare {Honeydew Lime Popsicles}

by Lisa on August 17, 2011

As a monthly feature on The Splattered Apron, my friend Amadie and her daughter Clarepost about cooking together. Cooking with your children is a great way to get them interested in food, where it comes from and why we need it. I’ve also read that if your child is involved in creating a meal, they will be much more likely to eat it—even if it has vegetables! I can’t wait to be able to cook with my kids. Take it away, Amadie and Clare!

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Dear people who are reading this blog,

I think that you will like this blog post the best so far in the series of recipes my mom and I are making. Here is a small ‘quiz’ to see if you know what we are making. (Hint: it makes a very good cold dessert )

1. Ice cream

2. Popsicle

3. Frozen grapes

4. Bread

And the answer is…… ( … drumroll ) ….. popsicles! I only came up with frozen grapes because when me and my mom were opening the freezer we found some frozen grapes. And I bet that if you’re going to make popsicles, you want to know what flavor they are. Well the flavor is ………… HONEYDEW LIME!!! It was a lot of fun making it and I hope you have fun, too! Good luck! –Clare

It’s hot outside. {For some reason, that statement always makes me think of Matthew Broderick in Biloxi Blues.} And it’s not just around here, but across most of the country. Most people don’t even want to think about turning on the oven, much less cooking up a big meal. That’s why for this installment of Cooking with Clare, we decided to do an easy recipe that not only is yummy, but also helps you beat the heat.

Kids love popsicles, and Clare is no exception. But I cringe every time I hear the jingle of the Good Humor ice cream truck heading down the street because I know she will want some corn syrup-based frozen concoction in the shape of Sponge Bob. I’m not averse to giving her occasional junk food treats, but during the summer that truck makes its way down our street nearly every day. So how does a well-meaning parent combat the lure of the highly processed frozen sugar treat? With a freezer full of tasty homemade popsicles.

There are many fantastic sites that provide a plethora of popsicle recipes, but we decided to go with this simple and refreshing Honeydew Lime Popsicle recipe from Epicurious.

Ingredients:

1/4 cup superfine or regular granulated sugar
1/4 cup water
1 (3 1/2-lb) ripe honeydew melon, peeled, seeded, and cut into 1/2-inch pieces (4 cups)
2/3 cup fresh lime juice

Since we were using granulated, rather than superfine, sugar, we first dissolved the sugar in boiling water to make a simple syrup and then let it cool a bit.

While it was cooling, we squeezed the limes and cut up the honeydew into chunks.

Once the syrup had cooled, we put half the honeydew and half the lime juice in a food processor and ran it until it was smooth, and then added the rest of the honeydew, the rest of the lime juice and the simple syrup.

We processed it again until all the chunks were gone.

At this point, we were left with a mixture that had roughly the consistency of applesauce. We strained that mixture through a mesh sieve into a bowl, and pressed down on the solids to release more of the juice.

Once we were done with that, we discarded the solids and poured them into our awesome rocket popsicle molds, which then went into the freezer to set.

The next evening? Ahhhhh…a refreshing and not completely unhealthy treat to share with friends.

Stay cool!

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Cooking with Clare {Naan}

by Lisa on June 2, 2011

As a monthly feature on The Splattered Apron, my friend Amadie and her daughter Clare post about cooking together. Cooking with your children is a great way to get them interested in food, where it comes from and why we need it. I’ve also read that if your child is involved in creating a meal, they will be much more likely to eat it—even if it has vegetables! I can’t wait to be able to cook with my kids. Take it away, Amadie and Clare!

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Cooking with a kid requires many things — patience, a sense of humor, the willingness to overlook spills and messes — but most of all, it requires a plan. That can be particularly challenging for me, because I am very much an improviser in the kitchen. However, Clare wants to cook, and I want her to have the experience of working with fresh ingredients and understanding the transformation of ingredients to food. One way I do that is by trying to recreate recipes of packaged or restaurant food she has tried and really liked. That is why, for this blog post we decided to try making…well, I’ll let her tell you about it.

Hi! Clare here. This time we made naan, it is a type of bread. We chose naan because one time, we were eating dinner and we got naan! I loved it so much, that my mom suggested that we should do it for our blog. I loved making naan! I even got to flatten them with a rolling pin! I made the last naan shaped like a heart! We were grilling them on the outside grill. It was so fun! But unfortunately, it started to rain hard and we had to go inside )-:

In the times I had made naan previously, I learned that it is really a two-person effort. It takes one person to roll out the individual portions of dough and another to cook them because the cooking time is so short. Other than that, it is a very easy and kid-friendly recipe to make.

We used this recipe that we found at AllRecipes (minus the garlic, but I think I’m going to try adding it in next time). It starts with one cup of warm water, to which you add a .25 oz package of active dry yeast. Let it sit for 10 minutes to activate the yeast.

Then, add in the sugar, salt, milk (which I might try replacing with yogurt in the future to see how that works), egg and flour.

Knead this mixture for about 6-8 minutes until it is smooth and elastic and shaped sort of like a ball. Place the dough in a bowl coated with cooking spray, cover it with a damp cloth and set it aside to rise for an hour.

After the first rise, the dough should be about double the original size.

Punch it down, divide it into individual golf ball sized portions and place them on a baking sheet. Let them rise for another 30 minutes.

While the dough is rising, heat the grill and oil the grate. After the 30 minutes is up, roll out the dough into 5 or 6 inch circles and place them directly on the grate to cook.

It works best if you have one person rolling and the other person at the grill.

Cook for about 3 minutes on one side, flip it over, brush the cooked side with some melted butter, and cook for another 3 minutes.

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They’re best eaten fresh, so be sure you have a hungry family or friends over to enjoy this tasty treat!

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Cooking with Clare {Pizza Night}

by Lisa on April 22, 2011

Friday night, Clare came over to spend the night so her parents could go celebrate their anniversary. Clare loves to cook and gave me a pizza stone and pizza peel for my bridal shower.

There are so many things that I am looking forward to about my daughter, I can’t even count all of them. But one of them is the experience we’ll have of being in the kitchen together. With this is mind, Clare and her mom Amadie are going to be writing a monthly post here on The Splattered Apron about cooking together!

Clare and I kicked off the series tonight and Clare is going to introduce herself, in her own words:

Hi! My name is Clare. I know Lisa because she started babysitting me when I was only two and a half years old! Then she stopped babysitting me when I was about five years old. Then my mom and dad became really good friends with her. Only a while ago I was the flower girl at Lisa’s wedding, and it was awesome! The things I like to do besides cooking is swimming, hanging out with my friends, and of course, hanging out with Lisa! : -) I am eight years old and I live with my mom, my dad, and my cats. I have two cats, one is named Spencer and the other one is named Kinsey. Spencer is funny because he is a scaredy- cat. Tomorrow morning Lisa and I are going to make doughnuts! Yum, yum!

I think we have a future blogger on our hands!

Tonight we used the pizza stone and pizza peel and made cheese pizza. First, we made the dough, using this recipe. It was super easy and didn’t require more than 30 minutes of rising. Clare is responsible for most pictures in this post, but here she is carefully measuring the salt for the dough.

While the dough was rising, we made some quick pizza sauce. All it takes is a large can of crushed tomatoes and 2 tablespoons of pizza seasoning. Stir well and simmer slightly over low heat.

Next, grate some mozzarella cheese. Clare did most of the work here. While she did that, I preheat the oven to 450 degrees with the pizza stone in it.

By now, the dough should be ready. Sprinkle corn meal on the pizza peel and stretch out the dough by hand, being careful to avoid making holes in the dough.

Spread the dough on the pizza peel, the cornmeal will help the pizza not to stick to the peel so it will come off easily onto the pizza stone. Which is not exactly what happened for us, because I did not have any cornmeal. Oops!

Next spread an even layer of sauce on the dough and then cheese.

Finally, put your finished product in the oven for 15-20 minutes, until the crust is crisp and the cheese melted. I did this part, but Clare showed off our finished product.

Due to our lack of cornmeal, we decided to turn this pizza into a calzone, in order to get it onto the pizza stone. It still turned out great! I loved the dough and am looking forward to trying it again as a pizza. And to use it to make smaller calzones to freeze for lunch.