A great way to spend family time and create a fun activity to occupy kids is to have them help you out in the kitchen. It builds confidence, teaches them important culinary skills, and is a great time to talk to them about healthy eating habits and family recipes. But how can you entice a child to help if they would rather spend time on their iPad? Our friends at truLOCAL have some tips!
Some Assembly Required
A great way to introduce kids to the basics of making a meal is to choose one that requires some individual customization. Meals like build-your-own pizzas, quesadillas, fajitas, tacos, hamburgers, and hotdogs require some input, and ideally, let kids make their own decisions while creating their very own culinary masterpiece. Kids will love feeling like they are helping and will feel ownership and pride over creating their own meal. These truLOCAL recipes are a great way to get kids interested in cooking while allowing them to assert their independence:
Fun to Make
When kids have fun doing something, they want to do it again. Why not use that to your advantage and make meal prep exciting by adding an element of fun? Recreate a favourite cooking show in your home kitchen featuring the kids as the chefs. They can be involved in the recipe no matter their culinary skill level – whether it’s mixing dry ingredients in a bowl or creating a competition-style cooking showdown against you. Try to include ingredients that they like so that they can get really excited. Try incorporating chicken, steak, and ground meats. Make sure that your freezer is stocked with the stuff they love.
- Chicken is incredibly versatile. It can be made into kid-favourites like chicken parmesan, baked chicken fingers, fajitas, or a chicken stir fry.
- Steak is great on its own but really shines in kid-friendly dishes like fajitas, either with the tortilla or without.
- Wanting to swap our ground beef for a more SmartPoints-friendly option? Try ground chicken or turkey in recipes like chicken burgers, chili, cottage pie, or crispy beef bowls.
Fun to Eat
Kids get excited by food when the food is exciting, so have some fun while eating and make memories that will last.
- A simple way to make food more exciting could be as easy as changing where you eat. Treat a family member to breakfast in bed but have the whole family share the bed. Try eating dinner outside, weather permitting, with some music in the background. Have a family picnic, even if it is just in your living room. Encourage your children to decide how dinner is plated - kids can make the food into a face or a picture and they will have fun helping out.
- Allow them to decide what the meal will be and build a feeling of ownership. Kids will want to help cook the meal that they chose because they feel more grown up and in-charge.
- Children love making some kid-friendly meals that are just fun to eat. Try some kid-proven winners like turkey spring roll cups, bacon and egg muffins, and an easy chicken stir fry which can be customized to their preferences.
How to order with the WW Signature box or any customizable box with truLOCAL
Options available to you!
1. WW Signature Box: with products curated just for WW members - refreshed quarterly and available separately from the below subscriptions.
Order your WW Signature box here!
2. Customizable subscription box: choose between a small or regular-sized box and build your own!
Order your customizable subscription box here!
Use promo code: WWLAUNCH when you check out to get six chicken breasts FREE in your first three regular sized subscription boxes!