Kids Cooking Class Video - The Kids Cook Monday!

As a cooking teacher, I have had the pleasure of watching hundreds of my students transform into adventurous eaters and talented little chefs. Even the ones as young as two years old will gobble up all kinds of “grown up” foods including brown rice, sautéed mushrooms, tofu, kidney beans, and caramelized onions. The key is getting them into the kitchen. Much of kids reluctance to taste new dishes is fear of the unknown. But if they help create the mysterious meal, they feel a sense of ownership and are more likely to try it. There is nothing more fun than eating your own art project!

In this video of my kids cooking class, you can see, hear and feel their excitement about ingredients such as black beans, mint, and cherry tomatoes. You’ll also see how easy it is for them to pick up sophisticated cooking skills like mincing garlic, dicing vegetables and emulsifying their own vinaigrette. They are so incredibly capable - we just have to give them the tools and education. How can they have healthy bodies if they don’t know how to cook healthy meals?

Cooking with kids is a fun and effective way to instill healthy habits for life. Exposure to scratch cooking helps kids develop a mature palate and a taste for fresh, wholesome ingredients. The earlier kids become accustomed to nutritious foods, the less likely they will acquire a taste for processed products. Teaching young people how to cook is also a powerful way to start a ripple effect beyond the classroom. Once children are empowered to feed themselves, they have the opportunity to show their families, classmates, teachers, communities, and future generations, that the key to good health starts in the kitchen.

For more information about cooking with kids, visit the new site, The Kids Cook Monday for recipes, resources and a community of people who love to cook with kids.

Rainbow Couscous Salad

A couscous medley is the perfect dinner for chaotic weeknights since it takes only minutes to prepare and you can add in leftover vegetables or meat from the night before. It’s also convenient for lunch boxes since it can be served at room temperature.

One 10- or 12-ounce box of plain couscous
2 cups any combination of vegetables, diced
3-4 scallions, sliced
¼ cup currants or dried cranberries
½ cup fresh parsley, chopped
¼ cup fresh mint, chopped

Optional: beans, nuts, feta cheese, cooked chicken or shrimp

Dressing

1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice(about ½ lemon)
2-3 teaspoons garlic, minced (about 3 cloves)
2 teaspoons white miso
1 teaspoon celery seed
½ teaspoon dried oregano
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1-2 tablespoons of honey
½ cup olive oil

ADULTS: Cook the couscous according to package directions.

KIDS 4 and up: Add the diced vegetables, scallions, and dried fruit to the couscous and stir. Gently fold in the parsley and mint (and the optional ingredients, if using).

KIDS 6 and up: In a small bowl, whisk the vinegar, lemon juice, garlic, miso, celery seed, oregano, black pepper, and honey together and slowly add in the olive oil. Pour the dressing over the couscous and vegetables and stir. Serve this dish cold or warm. Store the couscous in a sealed container in the refrigerator for up to 5 days.

KID TIP:

-Since this dish can be easily changed according to taste, encourage kids to come up with their own dressing and combination of vegetables.

COOKING TIPS:

-Suggested vegetables and other dried fruit options: carrots, celery, radishes, mushrooms, spring onions, leeks, artichokes, raisins, or chopped apricots.

-Try adding seasonal vegetables, such as sautéed leafy greens in the winter, roasted beets in the spring, or peas in the summer.

-Miso is a fermented product like vinegar so it can be stored in your fridge indefinitely. It should not be heated.

-I recommend white miso because of its mild, kid-friendly flavor, but you can use any kind of miso. (Or, omit it if you don’t have it on hand.) Most health food stores carry several different flavors so feel free to experiment.

Prep time: 30 minutes   Total time: 40 minutes   Serves: 4-6

Recipe from Easy Meals to Cook with Kids © 2010 by Julie Negrin

When I was a kid, my mom used to cook dinner for around ten people almost every night. There was my family of six plus a couple of friends from school or family members like my cousins or grandparents. As teenagers, we didn’t have a lot of rules but there was one that, if broken, was a serious infraction: If we weren’t coming home for dinner, we had to call. Otherwise, we’d better be in the house by 6:30pm every night. It sounds so quaint now, right? It doesn’t have to be.

We’ve all heard about the studies showing that kids who share a family meal do better in school, have a larger vocabulary, etc. etc. Laurie David just published an entire book, The Family Dinner, dedicated to resurrecting the family dinner. I know that for many modern parents, this can be a huge challenge.  One or both parents may get home too late to eat with the little ones. When the kids are older, they often have after-school activities that keep them out of the house until just before bed time.

I trust that the data from these studies is accurate. For me, however, the topic of family dinners is so much more personal than statistics. There a lot of things I can now imagine living without as a child - Hebrew school (no problem there), piano lessons (again, easy), sports (much more difficult, I loved them), and countless other things that I can’t even remember now. And that’s the point. In the last couple of decades, it seems as though we’ve prioritized everything but the family dinner - for experiences that will probably end up as hazy memories as adults.

Our family dinners are some of my most vivid childhood memories. It’s where we learned how to converse, debate, learn diplomacy, cope with teasing, navigate controversial topics, tell jokes, serve other people food, share our food, learn manners, and, more than anything, it’s the one place where my siblings and I all had equal footing and access to our parents. What we said during dinner mattered. We mattered, even as just kids. Our family dinners are the reason I now have a career in food. Cooking together with my students and sitting down to eat with them replicates this extraordinary experience every time I teach a class. No matter how technological we get, we are still humans that crave sitting around the fire and sharing our day.

It’s not easy. I get that. This post isn’t meant to make anyone feel bad if they just can’t get the family together throughout the week. Rather, it’s meant to help people re-think how they feed their family beyond nutrients and cooking techniques. Borrow the Jewish tradition of holding a family dinner on Friday nights, connect on the weekends for breakfast, lunch and dinner. It’s challenging, but it’s possible.

It doesn’t need to be some gourmet meal! My mom spent maybe 30 minutes preparing dinner. Here are some quick-n-easy dinner ideas that my lovely Facebook pals shared with me. A few of them are professionals but many of them are home cooks just like you! For other recipe and family dinner ideas, visit a wonderful new website, The Kids Cook Monday or purchase my cookbook, Easy Meals to Cook with kids.

1. Definitely pasta…basically noodles and whatever else I have lying around - usually some kind of vegetable (kale, squash, tomatoes), some kind of protein (usually tofu or white beans), some combination of herbs, a drizzle of olive oil and some cheese. it’s good every time! - Leah Koenig is a write and author of The Hadassah Everyday Cookbook: Daily Meals for the Contemporary Jewish Kitchen

2. I’m a big fan of cook once eat twice (or thrice?). Roast chicken one night becomes the base of a soup or tacos the next. We also like Brinner (breakfast for dinner) - egg white omelets filled with veggies and a quick grating of a good quality hard cheese, low fat quiche, pancakes or french toast made with whole grains and a big fruit salad. I also have a recipe on my blog for a Mediterranean Pasta which is very versatile and can be done in 30 mins or less. -Melissa Marks-Shih, chef and blogger, EveryoneIntoTheKitchen.com

3. Cubed chicken sauteed with honey/garlic/spices and broccoli, mixed with quinoa. All in one meal, in under 30 minutes. - Dr. Maya Shetreat-Klein

4. Quesadillas with whole wheat tortillas and veggie/bean fillings - healthy, crowd pleaser, QUICK and great use of many leftovers. -Naomi Friedman Rabkin

5. We love homemade pizza, I make a big batch of crusts and freeze them. I top them with whatever toppings the kids are into (mostly cheese and olives). Also tacos/enchiladas with soy meat and cheddar cheese. -Cynthia Kravette Gamel

6. Vegetarian chili with quinoa. Kids love “wrap tortillas” (cheese melted on tortilla, rolled up) with it. -Micol Rubin Bayer

7. Chicken breasts or tofu “grilled” on a stove top grill pan, couscous and veggies sauteed in tamari! Kathlyne Jones

8. Tacos- black beans mashed with sauteed onions and bell peppers, topped with a little sharp melted cheddar, sliced avocado, tomatillo salsa wrapped in soft corn tortillas. -Joey Lee, TheKidsCookMonday.com

9. Gluten free pasta, Edens organic pizza and pasta sauce, a little cheese and a heaping helping of broccoli. Easy and yummy! -Sandi Kaplan, www.zingbars.com

10. Who doesn’t love breakfast for dinner? Tonight was french toast, eggs and a smoothie! -Megan Rose Stolber

11. Grilled Chicken Breast with a spinach salad (that has strawberries) and green beans. - Sandra Sarfati Levin

12. Pasta, or tacos and quesadillas. We also like burgers. Our new favorite is the maple glazed chicken from the Easy Meals to Cook with Kids cookbook (we can marinate it the night before and just cook it the night of). -Ilyse Reiter Wagner

Looking for conversation starters for your family dinners? Check out The Family Dinner Downloads via Huffington Post.

It’s finally here. My new cookbook, Easy Meals to Cook with Kids, is a three-dimensional reality in all its colorful, glossy glory.

Self-publishing has been quite an adventure (and still is!) but, it’s finally done and on sale. I’m thrilled to share my recipes with you - along with tips on how to safely incorporate kids into the cooking process, advice on how to purchase high-quality ingredients, and lots of other information for families who want to cook together. To get a sneak peak at the inside of the book and to find out how to purchase a copy, click here. If you want a personally inscribed copy, email me at julie@julienegrin.com.

Although this cookbook is written for kids, it’s also perfect for adults who are looking for easy recipes. If you’d like to get a “taste” of Easy Meals to Cook with kids, check out a recipe from the book, Baja Fish Tacos with White Sauce on my website. It’s so good, it will become a staple in your dinner repertoire.

If you’re new to cooking or haven’t cooked with children much, it’s never too late to start. There are so many great reasons to cook with kids - the most important, of course, is that it is an essential life skill. The more meals we make from scratch, the more likely we are eating a variety of natural, nutritious foods.

Here is some advice on getting started in the kitchen - this is an excerpt from my cookbook:

It’s important that your first cooking experience with children is a positive one, so pick a time when everyone is relaxed and well-fed – perhaps a Saturday brunch or a Sunday night dinner.

Start with something familiar. When introducing the concept of cooking to kids, it’s important to start with one of their favorite dishes so that they equate cooking with something they already enjoy. Once they get the hang of it and trust the process, you can graduate to more unusual dishes.

Find assistants. Invite Grandma over or keep your sitter for an extra hour. It’ll be more fun for everyone if there is someone else to help oversee the project and clean up.

Accept that it will get messy. Plan on some mess and you’ll feel less stressed. Kids are great cleaner-uppers so ask them to pitch in. Many kids, as young as 2 years old, love using a sponge and do a surprisingly good job of wiping up.

Give specific instructions. Kids think very literally, so be extremely clear with them. Years ago, I asked my students to peel carrots and turned around. When I looked again, just minutes later, they had peeled the entire carrot down. (From this experience, I realized it was a safe way for them to “grate” the carrot and continued using that method to prep carrots.)

Roll with the punches. If something goes wrong, just laugh. It’s a good opportunity to teach children how to shrug off mistakes and learn from their blunders. Best of all, that “mistake” could end up being a new recipe idea for family dinners!

Respect their wishes. If they aren’t interested in cooking, it’s okay. The non-cooks can still contribute to the meal in other ways such as: washing produce, cleaning off cans, setting the table, folding napkins, deciding which platters to use, garnishing the dishes, clearing the table, and tasting each dish to determine if it needs additional seasoning.

Praise their efforts. They adore making food for family members so give them lots of compliments when they complete a task well – genuine, well-deserved praise builds self-worth and confidence.

Excerpt from Easy Meals to Cook with Kids © 2010. All rights reserved.

I realize that the school year is ending soon but here are some inventive ideas on how to raise money for schools! This post is also on the Super Kids Nutrition blog - it’s a great site, check it out! www.superkidsnutrition.com.

Help Schools Raise Money

I have lots of good memories of bake sales and school fundraisers at my elementary school. Every year, they had a cake walk. I played it so many times that I won cakes two years in row. But, times have changed. Recently, there was a heated battle about bake sales. New York City banned schools from selling homemade baked goods in order to prevent foodborne illnesses. School officials said it was also to fight obesity. Yet, Pop Tarts were on the list of approved products.

Schools need to raise money. This is indisputable. Instead of banning things - why don’t we come up with new ideas that are beneficial to the community AND raise money for schools? You don’t need to be a parent in order to make a difference at your local school. Perhaps you have a small business that you could promote at a school fundraisier while also providing goods or services at a discounted rate.  It’s a win-win for everyone involved.

By initiating fundraisers that do not involve selling sugary baked goods, we are sending an important nutrition message to kids as well as teaching them how to think outside the box and be creative business entrepreneurs.

Here are some inventive fundraising ideas. I included links at the bottom that include even more options.

Create a cookbook with healthy recipes from the community. With Mac computers and online publishers like Lulu.com and Blurb.com, it’s an easy and fun way to collaborate with members of the community and create a useful product to sell.

Sell items with the school logo on it. The site Vistaprint.com allows you to upload logos that can be printed on calendars, coffee mugs, or pens. It’s inexpensive, easy, and quick.

Help families go green. Sell BPA-free water bottles and eco-friendly lunch boxes.

Sell gardening kits or composting kits. Any time you make it easy for people to start a new eco-habit, you are doing a good deed!

Create T-shirts for a fundraising activity that helps the community. Start an annual school walk-a-thon or offer to build a garden at a local community center. By selling the T-shirts with an artsy logo, you’re promoting a good cause while also raising funds.

Hold your own farmer’s market. Enlist local farmer’s or grocery stores to get involved. Create your own farmer’s market at the school by having the kids build little stands with signs. Ask parents who are confident cooks to hold cooking demos.  One parent sold scripts from her local Farmers’ Markets. The market sold tokens at a 10% discount, then the parents sold them at full price. According to the Florida Fruit Association, fruit fundraisers can raise $8,000-$10,000 in as few as one to two weeks.

Sell local food products. You’ll be supporting local businesses and raising funds for the school at the same time. In 2009, schools in southern Wisconsin collectively sold more than $50,000 of local and fairly-traded products.

Cater a dinner cooked by kids. One of my colleagues runs a wonderful nutrition and cooking program within Children’s AID Society in New York City. Some of her high school students started cooking for school staff meetings and they loved the food so much that it’s now a side business where teens learn how to cook and run a catering business.

Sell flowers! You make the sales, Flower Power gets 50%, and your school gets the rest. The company will mail plants directly to each person who orders so that the parents and the school don’t have to do anything after the sale.

Hold an Iron Chef event. Find a local celebrity chef to be the judge and have different members of the community participate.  Charge each person per head and invite the press for media coverage. It’s fun, inventive and you can hold an auction - or silent auction - at the event in order to raise additional funds.

There are lots of options out there besides selling baked goods! For more ideas and information, check out the following links:

http://www.cspinet.org/schoolfundraising.pdf

Alliance for a Healthier Generation

Seattle Public Schools - scroll to PTA healthy fundraising for links

School Nutrition Association - Scroll to fundraising

Michelle Obama is my heroine.

In one short year, she has done more to enlighten government officials and mainstream America about the plight of our kids than any other person. On Tuesday, she kicked off her new initiative to end childhood obesity, called Let’s Move! which was featured on Good Morning America and CNN’s Larry King.

When she speaks of her own family, she mentions that it didn’t take many changes to start seeing significant differences in her kid’s health. Some of the changes she mentioned during her speech on whitehouse.gov included basic tips that aren’t hard to implement:

Ms. Obama: Water Instead of Soda. Me:  Americans, especially kids, have gotten in the habit of drinking a lot of their daily calories. In addition to limiting soda, I also think kids should cut back on juice, sports drinks, etc. Most store-bought juice is very refined so there are few nutrients and fiber left - and it ends up just being sugar water. I think that non-water drinks should be considered more of a treat than a reliable source of nutrients. I’m not big on calorie counting but it’s worth noting that one cup of o.j. has roughly 100 calories. Our bodies are made of mostly water so what kids need is: water, water, water!

Ms. Obama: Desserts were on once-a-week when she was a child. Me: Recently, I asked my 8 year old nephew if he wanted a treat and he responded with, “Nahhh.” Can you remember ever turning down a sweet when  you were a kid? I can’t! His response is not unusual though. Kids are so used to getting “treats” and desserts these days that it’s not even considered fun anymore! If you’ve read even a few of my blog posts,  you know that I’m a big believer in homemade goodies and treating ourselves on occasion. The problem is that kids are getting treats every single day. If we offer desserts to children after every meal, they will become adults that feel the urge to eat sweets after every meal. I think Ms. Obama’s once-a-week dessert idea is a great one - unless, of course, it’s fresh fruit, popcorn, or some other healthy option.

Ms. Obama: Kids need at least 60 minutes of exercise a day. Me: YES. She astutely pointed out that 1 hour may sound like a lot but that the average child sits in front of a screen (computer, TV, or video games) on average 7.5 hours PER DAY. It’s rough these days since it’s not safe for kids to play in the woods or ride bikes by themselves  anymore and there are fewer P.E. classes. We have to find inventive ways around it - even if it means buying a used treadmill for each family member to walk on while they watch their favorite shows (I watch Netflix movies while I run). Families can also invest in some inexpensive jump ropes, exercise DVDs, or the more pricey Wii. All of these activities can take place indoors. When it is nice outside, exercising, hiking, or going to the park as a family will set kids up with healthy habits for life.

Ms. Obama: Kids are not in charge of deciding what’s for dinner. Me: DITTO. I saw a Burger King commercial awhile ago (check out the video of it) where the parents are whining to the kids and asking the KIDS to go out for dinner! Sure, it’s an exaggeration but I think it’s representative of a current trend. I understand that it’s challenging when everyone is exhausted and there are whiny kids that refuse their dinner. But I remind parents that all it takes is once: if they whine, cry, or throw a fit and someone prepares them a separate meal or takes them out to eat, they tuck that information away for next time when they know they will get what they want if they complain enough. It’s not easy to stay tough and consistently enforce this rule but it’s worth it in the end: less whining, less cooking, better meals, saving money, and healthier habits for the entire family.

I’m grateful that Michelle Obama is giving this extremely important topic such a strong and brilliant voice as hers. We have a long way to go - but I think that it’s possible to turn things around. The future of our kids depends on it.

The organizations now involved in the First Lady’s mission:

Let’s Move! www.letsmove.gov

Partnership for a Healthier America www.ahealthieramerica.org

Over the last decade, or more, snacking has almost become it’s own meal. In an article about Dietary Trends in America, it states:

“Sixty percent of Americans eat snack food regularly, consuming about 20 percent of their  calories  from snacks. Because half of young adults skip breakfast, and one-fourth skip lunch, between-meal eating contributes significantly to the daily  nutrient  intakes of Americans. Children, in particular, require several small meals per day, as their stomachs cannot hold large amounts of food at one time. Carefully chosen snacks can add to good dietary habits. Most Americans, however, do not snack wisely.”

Ahhh, the last sentence says it all. It’s not necessarily how much snacking we are doing - it’s what we are snacking on. With that said, the question remains: how much do kids really need to snack on during the day?

It’s not such an easy question to answer - it’s a delicate balance - finding a way to keep children well-fed so that they can concentrate at school but also making sure that they don’t eat too much.  Clearly, we have not found that balance in America….

Every child is different - some kids don’t need to eat frequently while others get low-blood sugar easily and need to space their meals and snacks accordingly.

So, here are some tips for every kind of eater on how to snack wisely:

1) As kids get older, their stomachs get bigger - so, they don’t need to eat every 30 minutes like when they were infants. By the time they are toddlers and able to go to school several days a week, they will benefit from a structured eating pattern. One mid-morning snack and another in the afternoon - and that’s it.

2) While we are on the topic of structured eating patterns - I want to reiterate how important this is for small children. A random feeding schedule makes it hard for the parents to determine if the children is actually hungry. It’s much easier for the parents to assess how much food the kids really need and how much they are eating, if they are sitting down for a snack at the same time every day. I’m pretty aware of my intake but even I can’t figure out how much I’ve eaten if I graze all day   - so, it’s important to prevent kids from picking up this habit.

3) While we don’t want kids to graze all day, we want to make sure that their blood sugar stays balanced (which I wrote about in a previous post). The trick is to rely on protein to keep blood sugar even-keel.  Most kids are carb junkies - fruit, noodles, crackers - which can cause blood sugar to spike and then drop. But by adding in some protein, they will feel satiated and can go 2-3 hours in between snacks and meals. And the bonus from this strategy is that by letting them get a little hungry, you’ll have much less of a battle at dinner time since they will be than ready to gobble down their meal! And the second best bonus? Less whining, crying, and outbursts.

4) No snacks right before meal time - this includes beverages such as smoothies, sodas, and drinks. Their little tummies fill up fast - and drinks right before a meal will shut off their hunger.

5) Of course, there are many days where snacks will be served in the car and on-the-go but when possible, try to sit the kids down at a table and treat snack time as a proper meal - with no TV! Children who eat in front of the television eat more calories - it’s never too early to teach them good eating habits.

6) And the most obvious tip to snacking wisely is to provide snacks that are nutritious and beneficial to growing bodies! Just because we are eating in between meals doesn’t mean we should reach for the chips and cookies. Again, we are teaching kids how to eat for life - the earlier they learn these simple lessons, the healthier they will be.

Here are some snack ideas - remember, try to include a little bit of protein in each snack (and meal!):

High-protein foods: yogurt, cottage cheese, string cheese, cubed tofu, hard-boiled eggs, nuts or nut butters, (if they are allergic to nuts, try sunflower seed butter or soy butter), sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, tuna (just a little per week because of the mercury), kidney or black beans served as finger foods, turkey or chicken, hummus.

High-quality carbohydrate snacks: dried cherries, mangoes or pineapple, black olives, apple or banana chips, fruit smoothies, low-sugar granola or cereals, trail-mix, sliced fresh fruit, popcorn (not for tiny kids - it’s a choking hazard), vegetables with dip, apple butter on whole grain bread, honey-banana sandwiches (with peanut butter if possible), frozen grapes or blueberries.

I will end with TWO rules of thumb:

• Make sure they are not grazing all day but are sitting down for a proper snack that is actually in the middle of two meals.
• Make sure that the snack is high-quality.

It can sound like a lot of work to change the family snack habit but it will be worth it in the end - kids and adults will benefit from having healthier food in the house!