Baking with toddlers
Betsy of Fluffy Windover's Diary offers advice on baking with toddlers in this week's Toddler Thursday:
Toddlers have a keen sense for when you’re trying to do something that doesn’t involve them. They can tell right away when you’re busy trying to get something done, and they will choose this precise moment to get into monkey business. Around the holidays this can be particularly vexing. While I’ve been baking, cleaning, addressing cards, and preparing for houseguests, Edwin has been busy destroying the house.
So to involve him in the holiday activities, I got the bright idea to let him help me with a batch of cookies. Baking with your toddler can be fun, supposedly! They love to help out, they love to dump things into other things, and they love chocolate chips. I thought baking with Edwin would be a win-win, but it was not exactly the Hallmark moment I envisioned. Here are some tips that I learned the hard way, so that you may have more success:
Pre-measure everything before you start. Open canister of flour + enthusiastic toddler = BIG MESS.
Have a snack and a drink at the ready. If your little one gets hungry during the process, you won’t have to turn your back on him to prepare a snack. Also, he won’t try to eat the cookie dough. Hopefully.
Put the eggs away after you use them. We had a very close call with the carton of eggs that involved much gasping and diving on my part.
Give your toddler one spoon for each hand. Best to keep both of his hands occupied. A free hand could mean disaster when there is batter involved.
Use an easy, easy EASY recipe (see below). This is key. I got too ambitious with the cookie recipe. There were too many ingredients, everything took too long, and Edwin got bored and started rifling through the china cabinet and causing mayhem.
Here is a very easy cookie recipe that takes no time at all. By the time your kid loses interest, the cookies will be done!
Easy Peanut Butter Cookies
1 cup peanut butter (chunky or smooth)
1 cup sugar
1 egg
Preheat the oven to 350.
Mix together all ingredients. Roll dough into 1-inch balls. Place balls evenly on a greased cookie sheet. Take a fork and press down to make a criss-cross pattern. Bake 10 minutes. Let the cookies cool on the sheet before you transfer them to a container (or to your mouth).
