Toddler + | Toddler games & activities

What’s cooking?

Getting your toddler involved in cooking his own lunch might sound like a recipe for disaster but if you’re prepared for the mess it could just be the magic ingredient you need to get even the fussiest eater to eat up everything on his plate.

Why?

‘Giving your child ownership of a dish means they are more likely to want to eat it,’ explains children’s nutrional expert and hands-on cookery teacher, Fiona Hamilton-Fairly, explains: So that pasta sauce will suddenly seem more appealing if they’ve had a hand in producing it.

Whatever you’re cooking, from a simple salad to a Sunday roast, let your tot watch what you’re doing, explain the process and encourage her to taste ingredients as you go.

Says Fiona, “Encourage your child to help you mix and stir the ingredients together.” Her top tip? You can even get your tot to eat up vegetables this way: chop up lots of different varieties together and help her stir them into a tomato-based sauce.

Talking about different foods, weighing, sifting and mixing is also a great way to spend a rainy afternoon with your toddler – especially if the alternative is likely to be yet another DVD. And, if all goes well, your kitchen will be filled with the comforting smells of baking.

Who knows, you might even have got making the dinner out of the way early. Here are our tips for some great ways to get your toddler (and you!) enjoying cooking together. Don’t forget to wash hands and put on aprons before you start – cooking with little people is rarely a tidy matter!

* Always start the day by eating breakfast together. Make most important meal of the day more fun for your tot by getting him to help you experiment with different fruits and grains to make up his own cereal mix.

* Cooking doesn’t necessarily mean bad-for-teeth-and-tums cakes and biscuits. Making savoury snacks like cheese straws is just as much fun and far kinder to growing teeth. Keep the sweet treats for special occasions.

* If it’s hot outside, make a healthy treat by freezing fruit juice to make lollies. There are lots of lolly moulds around you can buy to make these fun and toddler friendly.

* You don’t necessarily have to go to all the bother of baking a cake together – it’s the icing bit that appeals most to toddlers. Prepare a cake, like the Carrot and Apple cake, below, in advance, then get your tot to help make up the icing mix and spread it on.

As well as the Satsuma ‘carrot’ suggested in the recipe, you could choose any different fruits for your tot to decorate it with – try slices of kiwi or banana, or grapes cut in half.

* TV + food is a surefire recipe for success with most toddlers! Check out Bubble And Squeak, Nick Jr’s new show for little ones which stars Bubble the Wizard, Squeak the Frog and their carrot rocket. Each episode sees them making an easy, healthy-but-appealing dish and learning about the ingredients in it along the way.

* You can download the recipes at nickjr.co.uk/bubbleandsqueak in fun print-out and colour-in pages which you can combine to create your toddler’s own personal cook book.

Recipe 1 – Smarty Party Potatoes

1. Bake a potato for 40 mins at 200 degrees c.

2. Slice in half lengthways.

3. Scoop out the hot middle with a spoon.

4. Mix the potato with grated cheese then press back into the skins.

5. Place two slices of red pepper down the sides as lapels.

6. Cut the green pepper into a bow tie shape and place between the red pepper slices.

7. Add olive slices as buttons.

Recipe 2 – Carrot and Apple Party Cakes

1. Mix 175g dark soft brown sugar, two large eggs and 120mls sunflower oil in a bowl until creamy.

2. Sift 200g wholemeal self-raising flour into the bowl and mix.

3. Mix in two grated carrots and two grated apples.

4. Pour into a greased 16cm cake tin and cook at 170 degrees C for 1 hour and 20 minutes.

5. Mix 100g cream cheese with 1 heaped tablespoon icing sugar.

6. When the cake has cooled, ice with the cream cheese mixture and arrange some Satsuma segments to look like a carrot.

7. Make some leaves for the carrot using green card.