FAMILY TIME
COOCKING WITH KIDS
Exploding chocolate and the anatomy of a turkey twizzler
When our son was still at crèche, they had a cook working there who had
got fed up with the late working hours in the restaurant, so he ran the kitchen
downstairs and produced lovely weekly menu cards, lovingly hand-decorated and
with wonderful descriptions of the dishes. And his cooking was GOOD! Wow. Many
parents found excuses to “just happen to be there” during lunch.
And this cook invited the kids who were interested to help prepare lunch. This
must have been a nerve-wracking ordeal, because in the time the kids took to
peel a single potato he would have finished the lot. But he talked to them about
the vegetables, taught them how important it was to wash your hands and that
raw meat isn't “icky” but you have to be careful handling it. Also,
he showed them how to hold a paring knife properly and to stay away from hot
pans.
At about the same time, I was given a set of DVDs of Jamie Oliver's “School
Dinners” which horrified us by showing kids in primary school who had no
idea about where food came from and appeared to live primarily from a truly awful
invention called “turkey twizzlers” and other junk food. A turkey
twizzler appears to be a twirl of reconstituted turkey leftovers from the slaughterhouse,
puréed, pasted, squirted into a spiral and heavily doped with flavour
enhancers to cover the gross taste it would otherwise have. Yeah, I somehow lack
the desire to try one, too.
Bringing these two things together and because of the fact that we are both enthusiastic
cooks, we were determined that our son would not grow up exclusively on McDonalds,
other junk or “Schnipo” (Schnitzel & Pommes Frites). So we set
out to get him interested in cooking and where food came from.
First, we got him involved in shopping for food with us, but in a fun way (we
hoped). I recall one evening when I was shopping with him, when there were few
customers around and the fish counter man spent about half an hour showing him
the various fishes, describing how they tasted and giving him a handful of cooked
shrimps to try. Two years later, our son still remembers this and has expressed
a wish to try lobster or crab (“especially that goody bit inside the claw”).
Today, when we cook, Oliver often gets involved and wants to taste and smell
the ingredients. Then he describes the taste. It's a kind of game: How to describe
the smell of rosemary? I remember one time I was cooking Mexican and had a big
bunch of coriander leaves. Our son nibbled a leaf and then cut off a big handful,
poured some limejuice over it, and sat happily munching coriander salad. Or when
I was so tired I didn't make fresh mashed potato but tried to sneak mash from
a packet past him. He took one bite and said, “Papi, I don't know what
you did, but this potato tastes like cardboard. I don't like it.”
We have found that the best things to cook with kids are things that
they can
get really involved in preparing. Hamburgers where they get to knead the herbs
and spices into the meat and form the patties. Or making bread is another great
idea. They can really get stuck into beating the dough. And how about bacon bread
rolls for a picnic? Or a pizza? We try not to only make dessert with him, although
they are a guaranteed hit in any case. Oh – on the topic of desserts, our
greatest dessert disaster was entirely my fault. We tried to melt chocolate in
our (brand new) microwave oven to dip cape gooseberries (phisalis) into for a
surprise dessert for my wife who was ill at the time. We broke the chocolate
into large chunks and put them into a glass bowl, put the bowl in and turned
the power up halfway. And watched. Nothing happened. Full power. Waited. Nothing
happened. Got impatient. Turned my back. Suddenly: splat! Everything went brown.
Note to myself: Chocolate explodes in the microwave. We managed to salvage enough
melted chocolate to dip the gooseberries (and took two hours to clean the microwave)
and laid the chocolate-coated berries out beautifully on a platter and put them
outside to cool. In January. You probably know where this is going... An hour
later we presented the surprise dessert to Mami who was delighted. About ten
seconds later she let out a screech and there she was, holding the entire platter
up by one rock-hard, frozen chocolate-coated gooseberry. I honestly had to take
a hammer and chisel to the darned things to get them off the plate. No, we couldn't
wait for them to thaw. They needed to be eaten NOW.
I think our greatest difficulty with cooking with our son is that we
get impatient
because obviously he takes longer than we would to get things done. With some
recipes he is quite happy to be the “kitchen blender pilot” and to
stir the pans. With others, he wants to get more involved and be the main chef.
Then we get to be his assistant (and remind him what comes next). The most important
thing – we think – is to involve him in the decision of “what
shall we make for dinner tonight?” Also, raise his awareness of other countries'
cooking and cook curries, Mexican and other “slightly exotic” meals
to vary the flavours. Our son likes Mexican and curries (as long as they aren't
too hot). He likes Thai and is disappointed with Chinese. Food texture seems
to be very important to him. He doesn't like “slippery meat” (his
main bone of contention with Chinese at the moment).
We know that sooner or later, he's likely to drift into the McDonalds crowd with
school friends, but we're doing our best to show him that there's a whole world
of really cool fresh food out there and cooking is fun, not some mysterious thing
that happens behind closed doors. We'll see whether it's had any effect in about
eight years, I guess, when he hits the dreaded teens (the “McDonalds years”).
| DANIEL SCHWARZ
CARIGIET Born: 1966 in Lugano, Switzerland - Mother American, father German Family: married to Astrid, father of Oliver |
 |
| Occupation: Freelance photographer / commmunications consultant |
|
foodtime: Morels
my husband walked around the playground looking like he was going
to find something delicious there, and while making fun of him for that,
my husband suddenly jumped with joy and declared he had found gold. “What
is it?” I said, not having the slightest idea of what it could
be. “I found morels”.
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die Hausfrau
Staying at home with my children I
was quickly labeled as “Hausfrau”,
and no matter how I try I still cannot seem to get used to this title.
I don’t mind at all being at home with my kids, but with this unasked
for title I get the feeling that someone is constantly looking over my
shoulder to see if I am
doing Hausfrau chores.
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Hausfrauen der Schweiz – vereinigt
euch!
Das Ansehen der Hausfrauen verbessern ist das
erklärte Ziel der Hausfrauen-
und Hausmännergewerkschaft.
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