Pigs In The Oven

We took the kids to Tattered Cover recently and let each of them pick out a book. M and S picked seemingly random books, but C picked a kids' cookbook by Klutz, called Kids Cooking that comes with it's own, color-coded measuring spoons. She was very insistent that, if we buy this book, we must use it for cooking.

I looked through it and I was impressed. I've seen other "kid recipe" compilations that were inexplicably full of ingredients I would otherwise never buy, or instructions they couldn't understand (but could probably do if I explained it to them). On the other end of that spectrum, there are a lot of kids recipes out there that are just too simple. Combine yogurt and fruit. Exciting.

This cookbook has muffins and french toast and from-scratch brownies. It also has a "not to eat" list that includes a dog treat recipe, homemade bubble solution, and play dough. And, as I have come to expect from Klutz, it is written for kids. In fact, it is written TO kids.

My kids aren't quite that confident in their reading skills yet, but if they were, the instructions would be spot on for them to understand. "In a big enough mixing bowl, stir together the flour and the quick oats (or wheat germ) and the sugar, baking powder and salt. Then dig a little hole in the middle of it all.", it says. Of course, that little hole is for adding the liquid ingredients, later. What I love is "big enough". As an adult, I get pretty tired of reading small, medium and large as though that means anything to me. As far as I can tell, all of my mixing bowls are large.

And if you somehow don't understand the instructions, there are plenty of illustrations of white gloves following directions. This must either be the Hamburger Helper guy, or disembodied Mickey Mouse hands.

The first section of the book is "kitchen rules". I love rule #2: "Be Clean. Cooking is a lot of fun, but you won't get to do it very often if you leave a mess behind you. If your recipe makes you wait for something to cook, why not wash some dirty dishes while you wait? Afterwards, clean everything up and put it away. You'll keep your grown-up assistant a lot happier."

Overall, this is an amazing book and I could rave about it for pages. We used it to make pigs in blankets, even though I think every grown-up in America knows how, or would know immediately if they just saw one. The kids were thrilled to use the cookbook and follow the directions, which has it's own value.