From DK Canada
About the book
Why does chocolate melt? Why do onions make your eyes water? Why do eggs turn white when heated but bread turns brown when toasted? How Cooking Works provides the answers to every child's favorite question — "Why?" — and inspires them to test things out for themselves in the kitchen!
In addition to a baker's dozen of core recipes from pizza to pasta to muffins to sweet snacks, How Cooking Works also emphasizes the importance of preparation, safety, and kitchen hygiene, covering everything kids need to know in the kitchen — from soup to nuts!
Our Thoughts
As parents, we find it important for our kids to learn to cook and use the various appliances in the kitchen. From a tender age, my kids have participated to the cooking classes at Loblaws and always want to help when we prepare supper. My oldest is even able to prepare supper for the whole family whenever he wants to.
So having more ideas to help them discover the kitchen is fabulous. The book How Cooking Works will not only give them step-by-step instructions to make easy recipes but it will also explain the science behind the cooking. The book is divided as though the child would cook for various meals during a day.
- Start the Day – How to cook eggs, pancakes, french toasts, fruity granola, granola breakfast bars, fruit smoothies.
- Super Snacks – Pean and mint soup, cookie dough, shrimp skewers, rice balls, hummus and popcorn, salads.
- Main Meals – Pizza dough and toppings, vegetarian moussaka, lamb hot pot, mini-burgers, two pasta dishes, chili con carne, fish and wedges, marinated lime chicken.
- Sweet Stuff – Blueberry muffins, strawberry cake, fruity meringues, lemon and lime cake, ice cream, raspberry crème brûlée, refrigerator cake.
All these were mouth watering but we had to pick one of them for the purpose of this review. My son, Alexandre – age 10, wanted to the rice balls. So this morning is prepared the rice and when he started to make the balls he had trouble. He asked me to come and I was able to make the balls out of the rice. Not an easy task but when I remembered to used PAM in my hands, the rice wasn’t sticking to me as much as it was doing it. The balls were prepared and we completed the recipe.
Before and after the coating of bread crumbs (italian style). The recipe is asking for Arborio or another risotto rice but we had Jasmine rice instead. Also I was out of egg in the house so I used milk instead to help to coat the rice balls with the bread crumbs. Finally, we used old cheese instead of the suggested mozzarella because it was what we had in the fridge and also we find the mozzarella not as taste as the old cheese.
Slowly cooking in the oil.
Results – DELICIOUS! Perfect served with a salad. Mind you we have decided that next time we want to cook the rice in chicken broth or something spicier.
We definitively had a feast for lunch today! It was out of the ordinary and fun to do.
There are other recipes that I find interesting in this book. One of them is about cookie dough and on one page it suggest variations of flavors – Cheddar cheese and rosemary, traditional chocolate chip, raisin spice, apricots and cinnamon, parmesan and pumpkin seed, pesto/tomato/olives, tomato paste and pine nuts, and cocoa and white chocolate. I will definitively try some of these – especially the ones with tomatoes! Yummy!
This book is perfect to introduce your kids to Home Ec lessons in the kitchen. Not only will they learn to cook something with their hands but they will learn interesting information about the science behind the cooking process.
How Cooking Works is available at your favorite bookstore, even amazon.ca.
Disclaimer: Thanks to DK Canada for sending me the above mentioned product for review purposes. I was not monetarily compensated for this review. Please note that the review was not influenced by the Sponsor in any way. All opinions expressed here are only my own.
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