Introducing Young Children to the Kitchen
There are two major steps in introducing young children to the kitchen. The first step is to instill in them an attitude that the kitchen is a desirable place to be where you can create things that you and your family will enjoy. The second step in the introduction of your child into the kitchen is for them to develop a positive attitude towards food.
Let the children know that the kitchen is a warm, homey and fun place to be, filled with love and sharing and creative self-expression. Let your children know that out of the kitchen comes not only the family meals which are essential to survival, but also experiences that contribute to the 'joy of living'. Food can and should have an aesthetic appeal which will give pleasure to the creator, the beholder and the partaker. (To all our senses)
Developing a positive attitude towards food means that a child is led to believe that food is good, and that eating is fun. Eating is a natural process and most children, if they are not forced, will develop a positive attitude towards food and feel that eating is good, that food satisfies not only basic needs but psychological needs as well. Eating should not be merely to satisfy the body, but should also satisfy the soul, or the psyche
One way to develop a positive attitude is to make meal times as pleasant as possible and to try and make children's meals child-oriented. If you cannot make all your meals child-oriented, plan at least one meal a day or part of one meal which is designed specifically with your child in mind and can give him/her something to look forward to.
For Mothers who stay home with their children, lunch would be the best meal to gear specifically towards the child's level of appeal. To make food appeal to the child all you need to do is to be a little inventive, let yourself think like a child and watch your child for clues. Most of us have a little bit of the child left in us and all we have to do is to stretch back a few years and try to remember what it was that we as children liked.
A very simple lunch that can be very appealing to the child is a cottage cheese and fruit salad. Only with a few inventive strokes of the imagination you can transform that salad into something enticing and fun to eat. One example is by using peach halves and carrot sticks to make salad people. Simply use a peach half for the body, carrot sticks for the arms and legs, cottage cheese for the head and raisins for the facial features. Many other creations can be made from other types of canned or fresh fruit and cottage cheese.
Instead of giving your child a plain sandwich, cut the bread out with cookie cutters. Children get turned off by very large portions; if sandwiches are cut up into several small pieces, the task of eating them will be much less formidable than if it were served in large portions
Breakfast can also be child-oriented rather easily. Instead of a plain fried egg which many children dislike, make an egg in the window' which will be enticing and fun to eat. Instead of plain cooked cereal add raisins or some other type of fruit to it. My Mother did this for me (I didn't like to eat cereal because it took too long to eat and I thought it was boring) but with raisins it became a treasure hunt for added flavor. I still do this to this day and so do my children. Raisins add excitement to plain cooked cereal!
For dinnertime, you can again use the salad theme; one variation on it is to cut an orange in half, remove the pulp, cut it up and mix it with another type of fruit or tiny marshmallows and return it to the shell. Meatloaf can be made in muffin tins, hamburgers can be served on skewers like lollipops and chicken legs or chops can be served with leggings or frill to keep fingers clean and make the food more attractive.
Again, keep a positive attitude towards food and cooking and the children will emulate it. Make your meal preparation and mealtimes a joyous time in your family's life. Make the meals fun to eat as well as being nutritious.
Body Odor In Young ChildrenI have been an educator teaching teens and pre-teens for over 35 years. I teach monthly classes in Ventura, County California for children, teens and their parents. I love to share my ideas to help kids be safe, learn and have fun in the kitchen. I hold a MS in Nutrition and Food Sciences from California State University.
Please check out my website for the recipes to food mentioned in this article and more tips for cooking with children at http://www.sylveeeskitchen.com