Every parent wants to raise happy and healthy children. One of the best and most fun ways to ensure that your child is on the path to success is to ensure that they have a healthy diet. Eating healthy is not always easy with the many options to eat out and grab a quick bagged snack, but it can be. Children love to help their parents. One way that we can encourage healthy eating is to encourage them to help us cook.
How To Let Children Help Cook
Allowing children to help you cook in the kitchen can set them on the path to success and teach them important lifelong habits. It can be difficult to let children help cook in the kitchen because the kitchen can be a very dangerous place. One of the main things that you need to go over with children of any age is the rules that they must follow in the kitchen. Some basic rules that you might want to discuss include washing hands, not touching knives, following directions carefully, and not eating anything unless they ask first (since some things cannot be consumed raw). After your children understand the rules, you can let them help cook almost any meal.
Young children, with adult supervision, can start helping prepare any meal by washing fruits and vegetables that you plan to use in the dish. Teaching your children about eating a healthy diet that consists of all food groups is important and showing them how to include all of these things in a meal can help them understand.
You can also have children of any age help when it is time to bake. Young children under five can help by adding some ingredients, like delicious Monin flavored syrup, flour, sugar, salt, milk, and more. It is not recommended for you to let kids add it directly to the bowl because they may not measure it correctly. Instead, allow children to measure over a different bowl and then add it to the bowl you want to use. This can help ensure the measurement is correct. Children over the age of five may be ready to add more difficult ingredients like eggs or oil to items.
As children get older, around age ten, they can start using the appliances in the kitchen. They have more understanding of how things work and are more careful than younger children. Children over the age of ten can start working a toaster, microwave, stove, and possibly even the oven. While children of this age can likely do many things on their own, they should always have supervision in the kitchen. Teaching children of all ages how to cook opens up pathways to learning even more. You can teach them about healthy eating, measurements, the process of how things boil, and more.
Healthy Recipes
Breakfast: For breakfast, many parents choose to make a quick meal since it is usually difficult to get children out of the house on time for school. Making toast and cheese with fruit is a great option. Children can help spread the peanut butter, jelly, or butter, and wash the fruit.
Lunch: A great option for lunch is an egg omelet. Kids can help by beating and cracking the eggs or washing the vegetables that are going to go in the omelet. You can also make mac and cheese for lunch because almost all kids love this. You can let your children boil the water. If they are too young for that, let them add the cheese to the dish.
Dinner: A staple in any family is tacos. There is something for children of all ages to do for this meal. You can try making a fresh tomato salsa to accompany your meal. Let young children wash the vegetables, while older children can cut them. You can let children of any age lay out the taco shells on a baking tray.
When you are planning your meals for the week you should encourage your children to help you pick out healthy meals. While grocery shopping, ask your children to pick out some healthy foods that they would like to eat that week. Including your children in the decision of foods that are purchased will make them feel like they have more responsibility. This is what all kids want.
