Employing my theory of breaking down food dishes into components, I decided to start with one ingredient at a time so that my son would understand how to make many different dishes, using one main food item.
For my first cooking lesson with Hunter, I had the idea to teach him how to make eggs. Why? Well, because I know how to cook eggs.
Eggs are a fun place to start because they are in every breakfast meal you can think of. I know this because when I take my daughter to breakfast in a restaurant, we need to find her some kind of cereal and give her a side of bacon to appease her sense of moral outrage that they don't have any non-egg breakfast meals.
Eggs. They are a simple food with so many different ways to cook. Our first few lessons involved eggs, until we mastered the basics: scrambled, fried, poached, hard boiled, and omelets. I know an omelet is basically a big fried egg, but it's fun to make.
I will point out that my son already had some experience with cooking by taking a Home Economics class at the beginning of the school year and was working toward his Cooking Merit Badge at Boy Scouts at Scout Camp. He understood the safety rules of keeping knives pointed away from you, not touching hot pans, and keeping his face out of the steam so that he doesn't get burned. These lessons peaked his interest in cooking, but didn't give him a lot of hands on experience. Each lesson, they would take turns either cooking, cleaning, or prepping, so he didn't actually cook each week.
As I mentioned, my mother sent us some things to help Hunter learn how to cook, but the best item was a cook book for kids. It had kid friendly recipes and colorful pictures. It detailed all of the ingredients that would be needed, including which utensils or pans to use. This is helpful since having the right size bowl or pan is important. It also showed pictures of the different kinds of cooking paraphernalia. The best part about the cook book was the fact that it made him consider eating foods he probably would have ignored before.
We started our first lesson with omelets. Why? Hunters likes omelets and we were all hungry that morning.
The first thing I did was lay down the ground rules. No leaving the kitchen. No TV. No stopping to pet the dogs. He had to keep watch over everything on the stove! Once he agreed to stay focused, he started.
Hunter broke 2 eggs into a bowel, per omelet and poured it into the pan. He decided to add shredded cheddar cheese and bacon. Truthfully, we didn't go fancy by shredding the cheese ourselves since this lesson was about eggs and the bacon was precooked, mostly because I hate cooking bacon and burning myself. We will venture into that territory later with meats.
Having only made one or two omelets myself, we turned to our trusty Betty Crocker Cook Book to consult the directions. The one thing it pointed out was to make sure that the egg weren't completely cooked yet since it would continued to cook after the ingredients were added to the flat egg. So, we made sure that the egg was still a little running on top before adding the cheese and the cut up bacon.
The hardest part was folding the egg in half. Hunter had trouble with the first one, but I showed him how to use more force. He was able to handle the next two eggs like a pro. Once the cheese started to leak a little out of the end to prove it was melted, we served the omelets.
I have to admit that for his first try, the omelets were amazing. Granted, fresher ingredients would have improved things, but he got the basic concept.
With omelets under our belts, I decided the following weekend to step it up a notch. We went egg crazy. Since Hunter already knew how to make scrambled eggs, we did fried eggs, poached eggs, and hard boiled eggs, at the same time. Am I nuts for juggling all of this at the same time? Maybe, but because the hard boiled eggs take a long time, it gave us enough time to get everything else done. The important part is that it kept his focus since he didn't have any downtime to walk away.
First, we started with the hard boiled eggs. Boiling eggs is probably one of the most controversial cooking topic. I had just watched a Yahoo! video on the best way to boil an egg. They had employed different techniques and time lapsed the photos to show their results. I was glad that I saw this video since I was confused myself. I have read everything from boiling the eggs for 15-20 minutes, then letting them sit for awhile, to starting with cold water and boiling it, only to take the eggs off and let them rest. Even Betty Crocker had a method different than the kid's cook book. I decided on putting the eggs in cold water, bringing to a boil, and then removing from heat for 20 minutes. Then I ran cold water over them for at least 5 minutes.
All I can say is that Hunter must be a good cook, but these were the perfect hard boiled eggs. The shell peeled right off, compared to the wicked time I tried a different technique myself and had to chisel off the shells. We turned them into egg salad, which he tried and didn't like. Personally, I liked it and will eat it for lunch.
While the eggs were boiling, we made a fried egg. The hardest part of making fried eggs is cracking the egg into the pan without breaking the yolk or leaving shells in the pan. Thankfully, Hunter pulled off the cracking like a pro and got the egg into the pan unharmed. Since I like over-easy eggs, we had to flip it, which again gave him trouble. He needs to learn to angel the spatula and tilt the pan to get a good grip on it. Once he flipped it, he nailed it. The yolk wasn't too runny, but warm and cooked.
The fun part came when we tried to poach the egg. Warning! Danger! I have never in my life poached an egg! I think I had Eggs Benedict at a fancy restaurant once and vaguely remember enjoying it, but it was never something I wanted to recreate. This one was a lot trickier and required a few attempts.
After consulting Betty Crocker and her beautiful color photo with the yolk side up, we gave it a try. The first egg hit the water too hard since Hunter didn't understand the concept of "sliding" the egg into the water. He apologized for making "egg ghosts" when the white part floated up gracefully through the boiling water. We did rescue the egg after a few minutes and put it on the side labeling it, Sample 1. The next egg still hit the water too hard since the term "slide" still didn't get translated properly into his brain. It did hold together better in the water, but still didn't have the yolk anywhere near the surface. The book said to cook 3-5 minutes and my husband didn't specify how runny he wanted his poached egg, so he got the 5 minute egg. When he complained that it was too solid, I show him Sample 1, which had been cooked about 3 minutes. He swapped out Sample 2 and ate Sample 1, so technically our first attempt was not a total failure.
Once all the eggs were cooked, Hunter made his own scrambled eggs without assistance. I was told that they were very good.
All in all, our eggs were a success. I explained to him that I had chosen such a simple food because of it's versatility. I told him that even advance meals on TV sometimes have a fried egg on top, and how fried rice sometimes uses scrambled eggs. It was an easy food to make, but held great potential for diversity.
Here is a photo of our egg salad since I didn't have the presence of mind to take photos of the other eggs. I will make sure to take more photos in the future. I will also have to teach Hunter how to take clear photos.
Our next lesson will involve the potato. It's a staple of my Irish heritage and, like eggs, hold a lot of cooking potential.
For my first cooking lesson with Hunter, I had the idea to teach him how to make eggs. Why? Well, because I know how to cook eggs.
Eggs are a fun place to start because they are in every breakfast meal you can think of. I know this because when I take my daughter to breakfast in a restaurant, we need to find her some kind of cereal and give her a side of bacon to appease her sense of moral outrage that they don't have any non-egg breakfast meals.
Eggs. They are a simple food with so many different ways to cook. Our first few lessons involved eggs, until we mastered the basics: scrambled, fried, poached, hard boiled, and omelets. I know an omelet is basically a big fried egg, but it's fun to make.
I will point out that my son already had some experience with cooking by taking a Home Economics class at the beginning of the school year and was working toward his Cooking Merit Badge at Boy Scouts at Scout Camp. He understood the safety rules of keeping knives pointed away from you, not touching hot pans, and keeping his face out of the steam so that he doesn't get burned. These lessons peaked his interest in cooking, but didn't give him a lot of hands on experience. Each lesson, they would take turns either cooking, cleaning, or prepping, so he didn't actually cook each week.
As I mentioned, my mother sent us some things to help Hunter learn how to cook, but the best item was a cook book for kids. It had kid friendly recipes and colorful pictures. It detailed all of the ingredients that would be needed, including which utensils or pans to use. This is helpful since having the right size bowl or pan is important. It also showed pictures of the different kinds of cooking paraphernalia. The best part about the cook book was the fact that it made him consider eating foods he probably would have ignored before.
We started our first lesson with omelets. Why? Hunters likes omelets and we were all hungry that morning.
The first thing I did was lay down the ground rules. No leaving the kitchen. No TV. No stopping to pet the dogs. He had to keep watch over everything on the stove! Once he agreed to stay focused, he started.
Hunter broke 2 eggs into a bowel, per omelet and poured it into the pan. He decided to add shredded cheddar cheese and bacon. Truthfully, we didn't go fancy by shredding the cheese ourselves since this lesson was about eggs and the bacon was precooked, mostly because I hate cooking bacon and burning myself. We will venture into that territory later with meats.
Having only made one or two omelets myself, we turned to our trusty Betty Crocker Cook Book to consult the directions. The one thing it pointed out was to make sure that the egg weren't completely cooked yet since it would continued to cook after the ingredients were added to the flat egg. So, we made sure that the egg was still a little running on top before adding the cheese and the cut up bacon.
The hardest part was folding the egg in half. Hunter had trouble with the first one, but I showed him how to use more force. He was able to handle the next two eggs like a pro. Once the cheese started to leak a little out of the end to prove it was melted, we served the omelets.
I have to admit that for his first try, the omelets were amazing. Granted, fresher ingredients would have improved things, but he got the basic concept.
With omelets under our belts, I decided the following weekend to step it up a notch. We went egg crazy. Since Hunter already knew how to make scrambled eggs, we did fried eggs, poached eggs, and hard boiled eggs, at the same time. Am I nuts for juggling all of this at the same time? Maybe, but because the hard boiled eggs take a long time, it gave us enough time to get everything else done. The important part is that it kept his focus since he didn't have any downtime to walk away.
First, we started with the hard boiled eggs. Boiling eggs is probably one of the most controversial cooking topic. I had just watched a Yahoo! video on the best way to boil an egg. They had employed different techniques and time lapsed the photos to show their results. I was glad that I saw this video since I was confused myself. I have read everything from boiling the eggs for 15-20 minutes, then letting them sit for awhile, to starting with cold water and boiling it, only to take the eggs off and let them rest. Even Betty Crocker had a method different than the kid's cook book. I decided on putting the eggs in cold water, bringing to a boil, and then removing from heat for 20 minutes. Then I ran cold water over them for at least 5 minutes.
All I can say is that Hunter must be a good cook, but these were the perfect hard boiled eggs. The shell peeled right off, compared to the wicked time I tried a different technique myself and had to chisel off the shells. We turned them into egg salad, which he tried and didn't like. Personally, I liked it and will eat it for lunch.
While the eggs were boiling, we made a fried egg. The hardest part of making fried eggs is cracking the egg into the pan without breaking the yolk or leaving shells in the pan. Thankfully, Hunter pulled off the cracking like a pro and got the egg into the pan unharmed. Since I like over-easy eggs, we had to flip it, which again gave him trouble. He needs to learn to angel the spatula and tilt the pan to get a good grip on it. Once he flipped it, he nailed it. The yolk wasn't too runny, but warm and cooked.
The fun part came when we tried to poach the egg. Warning! Danger! I have never in my life poached an egg! I think I had Eggs Benedict at a fancy restaurant once and vaguely remember enjoying it, but it was never something I wanted to recreate. This one was a lot trickier and required a few attempts.
After consulting Betty Crocker and her beautiful color photo with the yolk side up, we gave it a try. The first egg hit the water too hard since Hunter didn't understand the concept of "sliding" the egg into the water. He apologized for making "egg ghosts" when the white part floated up gracefully through the boiling water. We did rescue the egg after a few minutes and put it on the side labeling it, Sample 1. The next egg still hit the water too hard since the term "slide" still didn't get translated properly into his brain. It did hold together better in the water, but still didn't have the yolk anywhere near the surface. The book said to cook 3-5 minutes and my husband didn't specify how runny he wanted his poached egg, so he got the 5 minute egg. When he complained that it was too solid, I show him Sample 1, which had been cooked about 3 minutes. He swapped out Sample 2 and ate Sample 1, so technically our first attempt was not a total failure.
Once all the eggs were cooked, Hunter made his own scrambled eggs without assistance. I was told that they were very good.
All in all, our eggs were a success. I explained to him that I had chosen such a simple food because of it's versatility. I told him that even advance meals on TV sometimes have a fried egg on top, and how fried rice sometimes uses scrambled eggs. It was an easy food to make, but held great potential for diversity.
Here is a photo of our egg salad since I didn't have the presence of mind to take photos of the other eggs. I will make sure to take more photos in the future. I will also have to teach Hunter how to take clear photos.
Our next lesson will involve the potato. It's a staple of my Irish heritage and, like eggs, hold a lot of cooking potential.
