Cheap, easy recipies required!

Becles

My 8 year old is getting interested in food and cooking, so he's decided that every Tuesday he's going to cook an evening meal for me and his younger brother. Obviously I'll be around to supervise and help if needed.

He wants to know what sort of dishes do your children make, and have they got any easy recipies for him to start with?

Galtizz

I thought they'd be loads of sites on the web for this kind of thing, but there are hardly any and those there are naff!

There's the planet cook website here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/planetcook/ but I'm not sure you'd want to eat the food!

Check out http://www.thebookpeople.co.uk They have 2 kids cookbooks at the min that look good.

Otherwise I would suggest pizza, it's fun to make the dough and they can top it with whatever they like and the only time they come into contact with the oven is the last bit.

Lasagne, your little budding chef might enjoy layering all the food and you could fry the mince and sauce if you don't want him using hte hob.

Sarahsaver

My kids make pizza, buns, mashed potato, they like to grate and chop things - supervised of course. My daughter even liked rolling mutton in flour to make irish stew. Please dont think there is any such thing as 'kids food' they will eat 'grown up food' and thank you for it!
Noodles with prawns is easy - pack of economy noodles, handful of prawns and handful of frozen veg, takes as long to cook as the noodle cooking time on the packet.

crana999

It doesn't get much easier than this..

Put 1 tin of chopped toms, 1 tin of sweetcorn (drained) 1 tin of kidney beans (rinsed and drained in a pan with some ground cumin, ground coriander, and a little of some kind of chilli (If you don't have any of these you could probably just use some curry powder).

Simmer it all together till the beans are soft and nice, then serve over rice/jacket pots with melted cheese on top.

You could also add a chopped onion and/or pepper fried in a little oil in the saucepan before you put the other things in.

tiff

I know its not a meal but how about making smoothies? Choose a couple of recipes that involve different fruit and they will have great fun whizzing it up in the blender

Queenie

I beg to differ tiff - but a yummy smoothie with a slice of carrot cake *is* a good healthy lunch (and if you tell my kids any different, I shalln't speak to you for a whole week! )

My boys learned to make (and toss) pancakes this year; previously they have made omelettes, stir fries, prep'd casseroles, rice puddings, trifles, gorgeous cakes. They are confident using the grill to cook toast, bacon, sausages, homemade burgers. They make a mean coleslaw too!

The only thing I tend to do with my boys (but don't when *I* cook ) is teach them to do things w/out gadgets. My 9yo gazed in loving amazement at me when he'd beated the butter/sugar for his cup cakes (his poor little biceps were exhausted!) "Wow, Mum, you must be very strong with all the cooking you do!"
My reasoning? When they set off on their own journey in life, they may only have a fork, wooden spoon ... better they know what to do with those before they splash out on expensive gadgets, or the 'leccy meter runs out

I really treasure the time I spend with my boys "supervising" their cooking and I know they will have equally fond memories, so do enjoy!!

tiff

Sorry Queenie, please forgive me LOL Of course its nutritious but if I sat my lot down for an evening meal and produced a smoothie they would have something to say LOL

I dont have half the gadgets that other people do, and I make cakes by hand rather than in the food processor because I cant be bothered dirtying it and washing it! Lazy cook that I am.

Alison_B

I have just got my latest brochure from the book people and they have got a set of 3 Usborne cookery books for children (or beginners). I have got a few childrens cookery books and I am going to buy these for my boys.

It is on page 7 of the link http://www.thebookpeople.co.uk/catalogue/catselect.asp

Ticklemouse

I've just come back from Costco and I noticed that they do quite a nice cookery book for kids. I think it was £5.99. Would make a nice pressie for someone if they wanted to get into cookery early.

Sarahsaver

Very cheap tasty pud.
We had this for afters today (yes afters - dessert is for whan you are being posh)
Pineapple crumble
1/2 a fresh pineapple cut into 1cm cubes, sprinkle with sugar, 2tbs water, covered with crumbled stale jam sandwiches (it was my son's birthday on Wednesday and they were leftover from the party)
Sprinkle with 2tsp melted margarine
bake in a hot oven for about 20 minutes, or longer in a cooler oven.
It is yummy - and cheap, and can be replicated with any fruit, and plain bread instead of sandwiches if you like.
It's a bit like an american recipe 'apple brown betty' but when I said to my kids 'this is cherry brown betty' last week (had a jar of cherries in the dark recesses of the kitchen) it sounded like i was introducing someone.

Becles

Thanks for all the tips

He made his first meal last night. I told him how to make pizza dough and the only thing he struggled with was rolling it out. He said it was too heavy so I did that bit!

Then I chopped an onion and a pepper for him as he was wary of using a sharp knife, but he put the rest of the toppings on himself. He made a pepperoni pizza and a tuna and sweetcorn one, and they were gorgeous.

He's now thinking up what he's going to cook next week