Cook Healthy Food with Kids

Healthy foods help kids grow fit and strong. And cooking with your kids gives you the chance to introduce them to food groups and emphasize healthier choices like fruits and vegetables, whole grains, low-fat dairy, lean meat, and seafood. Kids who help pick and prepare foods are more likely to try them — and develop a taste for them. Working in the kitchen with your young children from also gives you the opportunity to teach them about food safety and food handling to avoid common food-borne illnesses. How you design these cooking lessons will have a direct effect on whether they enjoy the experience. Here are ways to set your budding chefs on the right culinary path.

Kids will have more fun — and be more apt to learn — if you choose a healthy recipe geared to their ability level. Introduce kids to “cooking” by making a simple trail mix with nuts, dried fruits, and whole grain pretzels or crackers. Little hands can ladle out each ingredient and maneuver a big spoon to mix them together. Even if you’re the one measuring, have your child count off each nut or cracker — you can even make a game of it. The amount of prep work a child can do naturally increases with age. Taking apart lettuce leaves and giving them a water spray is a fun introduction to making a healthy salad that a 2- or 3-year-old can handle. Three-year-olds can also knead dough and put pre-measured ingredients in a mixing bowl. Four- to 5-year-olds usually have enough finger dexterity to allow them to measure ingredients; a 5-year-old is not old enough to use a knife to cut carrots, but can wash and peel them with a safety peeler. Related jobs like cleaning up and setting the table can be assigned by age, too.

A better idea is to choose from a specific recipe and prepare it with your child simply for the experience. Make shopping for ingredients a special outing, just as you would go to an art store for craft supplies. It’s always smart to have extra ingredients in case you have a cooking mishap and have to start the recipe over from scratch. Let us discuss one such recipe that you can easily cook with your kids.

·         Prep time: 45 Minutes

·         Cook: 10 Minutes

·         Yield: 8 to 10 Servings

Ingredients

·         2 cups flour

·         1 tsp salt

·         1/4 tsp baking powder

·         1/4 cup shortening or vegetable oil

·         1/2 cup lukewarm water

Directions

    Put flour, salt, and baking powder into a mixing bowl. Mix the shortening or oil into the flour mixture until it forms pea-size balls. Add the lukewarm water, a little at a time, until the dough is soft and pliable.

    On a floured surface, knead the dough until smooth, for 1 to 2 minutes. Place in a bowl, cover with a clean dish towel, and let it "rest" for 30 minutes. Knead dough and form 8 to 10 balls. Roll them out as thin and round as possible.

    Preheat an ungreased griddle or cast-iron frying pan. Cook tortillas on griddle one at a time, flipping when a bubble forms (less than a minute). Put cooked tortillas in a plastic bag until ready to serve, to keep them warm and soft. Serve with butter, or fill with eggs, cheese, or cooked chicken.

How kids can help: Sometimes Garcia will give her granddaughter a small cookie cutter to press out fun shapes. Ashley's favorite way to eat her tortilla is warm, and filled with scrambled eggs or cheese.

Per serving: 175 calories, 7.1 g fat (.5 g saturated), 292 mg sodium, 0 mg cholesterol.

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