Cooking with Kids!

Thursday, September 3, 2015

This post was originally posted on Jess's blog, Being Mrs. Beer, on August 21, 2015. You can find the original post here. But I thought I'd share it on my blog as well since we just cooked together again and had a blast!

Today I wanted to talk about cooking with kids. Now, before I share, I have to admit something. I don't cook. And if you've been reading my blog for any amount of time, you probably know that. Now I've probably just thrown all my credibility out the window when I said that, but I have to set the record straight. Seth is the cook of the family and I am the baker. And we've done both things with Mason.

I tried to incorporate baking with Mason at a young age. I started off verrrrrry slowly and with something I knew he couldn't make too much of a mess doing and wouldn't be able to hurt him (no cooking, no heat, and no raw eggs). We made Lucky Charms Treats for St. Patrick's Day. Mason was probably one and a half and I figured it would be fun to try baking with him.


As you can tell, it didn't go so well since he just wanted to eat the whole thing! (ps can we talk about how LITTLE he is in these pictures?!)

I've since tried making banana bread with him but he just wanted to eat the chocolate chips and stick his hand in the mixing bowl as it was mixing (not so safe!) and making lemonade. The lemonade went over better than the banana bread.

And then after that, I kinda of stopped trying. I had seen tons of other moms bake with their kids all the time, and I thought mine was just an anomaly that hated cooking (but obviously loved eating). And then... I decided to try again about a month or so ago... and it was SO FUN!

We were making our homemade grilled pizzas and I wanted to let Mason help make his. I knew it would probably slow us down and create a mess but Mason seems so interested and curious about things lately that I thought it was worth a shot. 

And he LOVED it!


He was actually surprisingly clean about it, like he was really concentrating on what he was doing. Of course all the cheese ended up in one big pile and we had to move the pepperonis around, but I'd gladly do that just to see his face. In fact, this pizza making adventure went so well that we decided to try it again a couple weeks ago.


He LOVES helping and is so proud when he accomplishes something (as you can tell from that huge grin!). I definitely foresee many more cooking and baking adventures happening!

And moral of the story? Don't be afraid to cook or bake with your kids! I'd definitely tailor the activity to the age level, but they will get such a kick out of cooking in the real kitchen (vs their play kitchen) and will love that they get to help Mommy and Daddy! I'm only sad that I waited so long to try again. I can't wait to cook with him again!

What's your favorite thing to cook with your kids? What recipe should we try next?



16 comments:

  1. I do this with my grandchildren now. Eli eats half of what we prepare too. The fact you are spending this time with him is enough. Messes make me nuts, so they are teaching this grammie that messes always can be cleaned up afterwards. Love this Elizabeth.

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  2. Oh I'm so glad you did try again and he loved it! As you know noah loves to help me cook and bake. And thank goodness he's fairly neat about it too lol.

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  3. You are so good!! I'm really trying to let Mia help me more in the kitchen. Eric is actually way better about it than I am, ha ha!

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  4. Love this! The only thing Sophie is allowed to do baking wise is hold the oven mitts until we're ready for them. I can't wait till she can actually enter the real baking arena.

    liz jo @ sundays with sophie

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  5. I'm glad you reposted, somehow I missed the original guest post? I agree with starting slowly, not only do children have short attention spans, but some kitchen ware is kinda dangerous (like stand mixers, yikes!) But I love cooking with Kinsey now, she stands on her stool and stirs the mac and cheese for me haha.

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  6. Ummmm I want to come to your house and you can make this stuff for me.

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  7. You have a little chef on your hands!
    Occasionally I will pull out the baking stuff and give Marcus (mostly) free reign (and try not to let the ginormous mess bug the hell out of me), and he always seems to enjoy it.
    Now that it is FINALLY cooler we may have to whip up some banana bread or muffins. :)

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  8. I love this!!! Mac is really into helping me in the kitchen too! We made pizza bagels the other day, which he loved. He's also helped me make cookies and brownies - he loves the mixer. Sometimes I let him help me pull all the meat off a rotisserie chicken - it's super messy, but he loves it! And we find the wishbone together. He also really loves washing the dishes when I'm done with them. They don't get clean at all, but he thinks he's helping and it keeps him occupied for 5 minutes, so it's worth it!

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  9. Amen amen! It is always worth the extra clean up to let them join in the fun and seeing them so proud of what they have done.... it's just awesome.

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  10. His smile is the BEST! So contagious! This is so much fun!

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  11. Look at the pizza smiles!!! Does he deliver?

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  12. I love how happy he looks after he's helped with the pizza. It's important to teach them to cook/bake early & they love doing it. :)

    PS - I want both of those things, the pizza & the Lucky Charms mix. Ha!

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  13. Love this!! (Exactly what I was thinking, look at that LITTLE Mason!!) :)
    One of Tyson's favorite things is sprinkling cheese too..!! I let him stir/spread, etc. and even go TOTALLY out of my comfort zone and let him help crack eggs - HE LOVES IT (then we quickly head to the sink and wash our hands)!!

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  14. That last photo of Daddy and Mason with pizza is adorable!!
    My kitchen helper is getting a little better, but it still makes me nervous for the mess :) :)

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  15. aww tiny Mason! I'd just want to eat it too. One of the times Aria and I baked something with eggs I went to toss the shells and Aria was like oh let me taste the raw eggs in the bowl! Oops. I make sure to put the raw eggs on the other counter now lol. oy.

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  16. Love love love this!! It's been a while since I've cooked with my Mason...I think I need to put this in the works!!

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