23 Tips For Cooking and Baking with Kids

Toddlers     Elementary-Aged Kids     Teens

Toddlers     Elementary-Aged     Teens

Instruct them on how to add pre-measured ingredients or help you stir as you cook. Even turning the pages of a recipe in a cookbook can help make them feel involved.

Whether your toddler is watching or helping out with small tasks, it’s never too early for you to teach them about basic cooking safety. This can include warning them about hot surfaces and cutting tools, as well as teaching them about which kitchen items are for adults only versus those that are age appropriate for them. Recipes that don’t require much heating like indoor s’mores are a hit, can be done together, with an adult doing the harder tasks, like being in charge of the oven.

Young children are very tactile learners—let them help you with squeezing fruits, smashing soft ingredients and sampling foods along the way.

Use an easy, kid-friendly recipe to make crisp rice cereal treats, and count out loud to your toddler as you add the cups of marshmallows and rice cereal to the pot. You can also add food coloring to the melted marshmallows for a fun color. Once they’re cool enough to the touch, but still moldable, let your toddler roll the mixture in their hands to create shapes or cut it out with cookie cutters.

Engage kids in smaller chores to help them feel involved as you keep meal prep moving. Equip them with a potato masher to squish cooked spuds for mashed potatoes or show them how to use a can opener, peel hard-boiled eggs or place toppings on a homemade pizza. Learn how kids can practice fractions by using pizza toppings and more with Chore Club activities by Whirlpool brand.

Introduce kids to new tastes and smells as you’re cooking. This can help make new foods seem less intimidating to picky eaters and kids may be more likely to eat foods that they had a hand in making. Guide them in adding seasonings to dishes—so they can learn how different ingredients influence the flavor.

Set your kids up to rinse produce at the sink and talk to them about the process of preparing and cleaning food. After rinsing, let them tear leafy greens and peel fruits and veggies. Teach them how to steam vegetables in the microwave.

Have kids assemble kebabs, letting them pick their favorite fruits or meats and veggies to include. Try a quick-and-easy lunch kebab recipe. Complete one kebab yourself as an example and have your children practice doing patterns to make the rest just like yours.

Be sure to show your teens how to properly handle kitchenware, manage hot surfaces, use a meat thermometer and work with raw meats, as these are important steps to developing independence in the kitchen. Demonstrate the correct way to chop and start them out with supervision until they seem comfortable and able to handle these tasks on their own.

Help your teens write a list of their favorite recipes to make. They can start with something simple and quick that they can customize for themselves and their friends, like English muffin pizzas.

Allowing them to decide what to make and guiding them in building a grocery list will help give them some ownership in the cooking project. They’ll have extra incentive to get involved if it’s their favorite meal or their own imaginative recipe choice that’s getting put on the dinner table.

Teach teens how to choose proper pans and ingredients needed for recipes, as well as complete basic cooking tasks like bringing water to a boil and roasting foods, if they are comfortable and able. Give them encouragement, but don’t hover too much after providing instructions and allow them to start taking some responsibility in the kitchen.

Give your toddler a kid-friendly utensil and a deep bowl, and let them crush graham crackers for a pie crust or smash up a few bananas for the start of an easy banana bread recipe.

Toddlers love the chance to get their hands messy in gooey dough. It also helps them explore their sense of touch. If you’re baking more delicate recipes, but still want to keep their hands busy, make some kid-friendly cloud dough for them to play with, not eat.

Use colorful candy-coated chocolate cookies to engage toddlers. Once the cookies are done baking, remove them from the oven and transfer them to a cool surface. Then, use extra candies to press onto the top of warm cookies, alternating colors or placement to make a pattern. Point the pattern out as you do it, and guide your toddler in following yours or making a pattern of their own.

Have them help you read the recipe and measure out ingredients, doubling as needed. It’s also a good time to educate them on different measuring tools, from teaspoons to measuring cups. Explore a simple cookie recipe that helps kids learn addition and subtraction as they bake.

Show your children how to place wax paper on a cookie sheet, grease a pan, use different measuring cups for wet and dry ingredients, crack an egg and set a timer.

Use an easy bread dough that calls for yeast, letting your kids measure ingredients, help with prep and see how the bread rises.

While making bread, explain the basic science behind how yeast is activated by warm water to eat the sugars in dough, producing gas that then causes bread to rise and result in fluffy pockets of air throughout.

Making a cake and doing all the decorating can be a good creative outlet and give teens a sense of pride once completed. Show them how to use a mixer, move oven racks in a cool oven and check a cake for doneness.

If your teen has always been obsessed with Grandma’s homemade apple pie or Dad’s Sunday morning cinnamon rolls, help them use a family recipe to master the famed dessert. This can give them a sense of accomplishment and pride.

Self expression is an important part of teen development and letting them pick recipes that pique their interest can keep them engaged in the process. Let them get creative, experiment with new recipes, and own the results.

Help them try making treats at home that they might usually eat at a cafe or restaurant, like cake pops, donut muffins or soft pretzels. Remind them that you are always on hand to help with trickier cooking processes that might be more demanding than you’d find in the average recipe.