It is almost time to get back to school and no matter what that looks like for you and your family this year you will want to prepare meals and snacks that are healthy for your family. A great way to do this is to get everyone involved in the cooking. The library has some great cookbooks for kids that teach the basics, inspire creativity, challenge picky taste buds and expose children to flavors from around the world. Cooking is also a great STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, Math) activity to introduce and reinforce academic concepts.
The Complete Cookbook for Young Chefs has spent more than 60 weeks on the New York Times bestseller’s list. It has full color photographs of the food, step-by-step directions, instructions for getting started in the kitchen, and some fun tips throughout the book. There are recipes for all skill levels and tastes. I have even learned a few new things myself and I have been cooking for, well, I’ll just say many years. Check this book out and start cooking!
In the Kids’ Fun & Healthy Cookbook you will find great recipes, step-by-step photographs help junior chefs through each recipe, and food fact sections that highlight specific ingredients and detail what makes them nutritious. This book has recipes for every meal of the day including dessert and all of the food is made with a healthy twist. A great book to help kids discover that eating healthy can be delicious.
One summer I challenged my kids to make a meal where all of the food was blue. We had blue juice, blue berries, blue alfredo sauce and a blue centerpiece for the table. The library has a lot of themed cookbooks to inspire your child’s creativity and have a little fun. My favorite is the Awesome Edible Kids Crafts. It has a little bit of everything to make meals and snack time fun, including marshmallow playdough, painted toast, tiger quesadillas, and dragon eggs. Or you may want to check out the
or the Pokémon Cookbook for some interesting themed food.
Last fall we were able to host a student from Spain at our house. He enjoyed trying new food from our culture and we got to try new dishes from Spain. One thing that he taught us about were tapas. Tapas are similar to an appetizer or snack. Watch the video below on how to create your own simple tapas using something delicious from the garden. The recipe can be found in the book Cooking Class: Global Feast.
If you would like to look for more cookbooks in the children’s area, head to section 641.5 in the nonfiction books. Keep Reading!!!! Keep Learning!!!
The O'Fallon Public Library News 