Mixing Bowl Kids

Lunchbox Cookie - Whole Wheat Dark Chocolate Cranberry Drops

Two nights ago, faced with a freezer full of cookie dough ready to meet the warmth of my oven, I entered the kitchen, pulled out my mixing bowl and supplies, and went to work on a new cookie recipe.  Exactly what you would expect me to do when I had 500 sugar cookies to bake, right?  Probably not...but "make new cookie recipe" was what I did.

I wanted to make something similar to a scone, and while I wasn't completely successful in that endeavour, my result was more of a crumbly cookie, rich with flecks of dark chocolate and bits of dried cranberry and no refined sugar.  It's not a traditionally sweet cookie but that is what I like about this recipe, and when paired with a hot cup of tea for Mom and some milk for the little ones, this makes for a nice afternoon snack.

Your children will be able to help you make this cookie with little difficulty.  Older children can use a small knife to chop the dried cranberries or they can use a box grater to shred the butter.  Your younger children will be able to crack the egg, add the milk to the dry ingredients and mix everything together. I like the idea of using vintage hand beaters for young kids to mix batters together.  They are safer than electric beaters and the task can be done at a table as electricity is not required.  If you don't know what I mean by vintage hand beater see here.  I'm hoping to scoop up a few of these at my favourite antique market this summer as I think they're the perfect tool for young bakers. 

Happy Thursday to you all...I'm off to bake more cookies....

Whole Wheat Dark Chocolate Cranberry Drops, my recipe

2 1/2 cups whole wheat pastry flour

1 tbsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 cup cold butter, grated on a box grater

3/4 cup milk

1 egg

1/3 cup honey

1/4 cup dried cranberries, chopped

1/4 cup chopped dark chocolate

~ Preheat oven to 400 degrees

~ In a large mixing bowl combine flour, baking powder and salt.  Set aside.

~ Add in the grated butter and blend with your fingers until crumbly.

~ Combine the milk, egg and honey in a large glass measuring cup and whisk well.

~ Add to the flour/butter mixture and mix until almost blended.

~ Add the chocolate and cranberries and stir until well combined.

~ Drop large spoonfuls of dough onto parchment lined baking sheets.  Sprinkle the tops with coarse sugar if you like.

~ Bake for 20-25 minutes of until golden brown

~ Enjoy! 

A Cookie Decorating Table

I have yet to meet a child who doesn't enjoy slathering a freshly baked sugar cookie with coloured icing, topping it all with various sprinkles and candies and then sitting down to eat the fruits of their labour. Doesn't that sound like fun?  As I mentioned last week, I'm making 400-500 cookies today and tomorrow for children to do exactly that and I can't wait to see how it all works out.

If you haven't organized or managed a cookie decorating table before, I encourage you to give it a try. It's a great activity for a birthday party, playdate, rainy day activity, fundraiser, or community event. Below are some of my tips for preparing for and running this type of activity:

~ Determine how many children you will be expecting at your event.  Allow for 1-2 cookies per child if you're hosting a fundraiser or community event and 6-8 cookies per child if you're decorating cookies as a birthday party/playdate activity. 

~ Once you've determined how many cookies you will need to have, make your dough.  All sugar cookie dough freezes well and can be made up to three months in advance.  I find it easier to remove the dough from the freezer, thaw it in the refrigerator overnight and bake the cookies the following day, then to make and bake the dough in the same day.

~ Cookies can be baked 2-3 days prior to the event.  They will keep fresh if stored in an air-tight container.  Alternatively, you can make the cookies a few weeks in advance and store them in the freezer in a lidded container, lined with wax paper.

~ To keep the mess contained I recommend using squeeze bottles for the icing.  If you use Royal Icing for the cookies, these work best.  Piping bags can be too finicky for smaller hands.  I also find the squeeze bottles to be more hygienic as children won't be able to have direct contact with the icing.  No messy little fingers finding their way into the bowls of icing.

~ Keep sprinkles, coloured sugars and candies in small bowls with spoons.  Encourage all of the children to use the spoons to lift the decorations out of their bowls and scatter over the cookies.

~ Keep baby wipes close by.  They work great to remove icing and candies from little hands and work surfaces.

~ Royal icing takes time to dry.  Give each child a sheet of wax paper and ask them to write their name on it.  When they have finished decorating their cookies, they can place them on the labeled sheet and come back to them when they are dry.  If you're working a fundraiser or community event encourage the kids to move on to another activity and to come back to pick up their cookie once it's had the chance to dry.

I will let you know how my own decorating table works out this weekend and if you have done something similar I'd love to hear your stories (good and bad!) about how it all worked out.

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Some housekeeping for today:  If you're in the West Toronto area, The Mixing Bowl is going to be running a half day cooking camp for kids in August.  We will also be starting after-school classes, held in a neighbourhood church, in September.  Stay tuned for more details or email me at mixingbowlkids@gmail.com for more information.

Baked Eggs with Tomato Sauce and Mozzarella

In staying consistent with our "keep it simple" plan for this week, the above was what we had for dinner last night and it was good....and easy...two requirements for this weeks meals.

The above took five minutes to prep and one hour to bake, which gave me plenty of time to finish homework with the kids and get everyone organized for soccer.  If you're looking to make this an even quicker bake, the original recipe calls for the eggs to be baked in individual bowls (2-3 per bowl), and preparing the meal this way will have it on your table in just under thirty minutes. When I make this again I think I will go that route, as this family-style method took a bit longer than I would've liked and made the edges of the dish slightly overcooked.

However, once it was pulled out of the oven we served it with some leftover bread and a quick salad, and dinner was served in no time at all.  I think this would also make an excellent breakfast if you fall into the "savoury breakfast food" camp, and your kids can easily get involved by helping you crack the eggs, grate the cheese and add the tomato sauce to cover everything up.

We love eggs in our home...do you?  What are your favourite ways to eat eggs?  Do you only eat them for breakfast or do you consider them to be a lunch and dinner food as well?  

Baked Eggs with Tomato Sauce and Mozzarella, adapted from Everyday Food Magazine

1.5 cups of tomato sauce

12 eggs

1/2 cup grated mozzarella cheese

1 tsp basil

1 tsp oregano

salt and pepper

~ Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees.

~ Place a pie plate on a rimmed baking sheet and set aside.

~ Scoop 1 cup of the tomato sauce into the pie plate.  Crack the eggs on top, sprinkle on the basil, and oregano and cover with the remaining tomato sauce.  Season with salt and pepper and spread the mozzarella cheese evenly over the other ingredients.

~ Place the baking sheet into the preheated oven and bake 45 minutes to an hour or until the egg whites are opaque and yolks are still soft.  If you prefer your yolks to be cooked a bit more, leave it in the oven for a few minutes longer.

~ Enjoy!

Fresh Bread Everyday

The theme of our meals this week is quick and easy.  With the boys Spring/Summer sports beginning and a freezer full of cookie dough patiently waiting to be baked for that big event, there really isn't much time for long afternoons to be spent stove-side whipping up a new recipe or lazily prepping an old one.  

For times like these I have a few recipes that I turn to when I need a meal in a pinch, and while I was trying to decide which of these gems I should share with you today, it dawned on me that you need to know about the bread recipe that I use.  This bread recipe is so fantastic my family and I are able to eat fresh homemade bread, almost every day of the week, with very little work on my part.  In fact, we haven't bought a loaf of bread from the grocery store since December, this recipe is just that easy.

This bread is extremely versatile and we use it for toast, paninis and dippers for our soup.  After a few days, if there happens to be a hunk of it left, I slice it up into cubes, and toast it in the oven for homemade croutons.  I try to make two or three loaves at a time so I don't have to bake the bread fresh every day, but making a loaf a day is also an option.  Kept in a cloth bread bag, or even a zip-lock plastic bag, this bread will keep fresh for 2-3 days. 

Children are easily able to make this bread with you.  When you're ready have your little chefs measure and place the four (flour, yeast, salt and water) ingredients into a bowl and mix them all together.   Essentially that is all that needs to be done to yield three great loaves of bread.  I already have one of my loaves sitting on the counter waiting to be used for breakfast tomorrow morning, and I can't guarantee it won't also make an appearance with our dinner as well...it's that good...and easy!

Homemade Bread, slightly adapted from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day

4 cups whole wheat flour

2 cups all purpose flour

1.5 tbsp salt

1.5 tbsp granulated yeast

3 cups of lukewarm water

2 tsp. dried seasoning of your choice (sage, basil, rosemary and thyme)

~ The first thing we need to do is mix and store the dough.  Warm the water slightly. It should feel like a nice warm bath..not too hot and not too cold.  If you're using a thermometer the temperature should read 100 - 105 degrees.

~ Add the warm water to a large re-seal-able, lidded bowl.  Sprinkle the yeast, salt and seasonings on top of the water.  Don't worry about making it dissolve.  

~ Add all of your flour at once, sprinkling it over the water/yeast/salt.  Mix the ingredients together well with the end of a wooden spoon (I find the end works better than the spoon itself).  Mix until there are no dry patches of flour and everything is uniformly moist.  DO NOT knead the dough.

~ Cover the bowl with a lid that fits well but isn't airtight.  Allow the mixture to rise at room temperature until it begins to collapse (flatten) which will take approx. 2 hours. 

~ You can use the dough at this point if you like.  I prefer to place it in the fridge and use it the next day. 

To make the bread: 

~ Prepare a baking sheet by sprinkling it with cornmeal to prevent the loaf from sticking.

~ Sprinkle the surface of the refrigerated dough with flour.  Pull up and cut off a 1 lb. piece of dough (about the size of a grapefruit.  Hold the mass of dough in your hand and add a little more flour so it won't stick to your hands.  Shape the dough into a ball and place on the cookie sheet.  This part of the bread making should take no more than 1 minute.

~ Allow the loaf to rest for 40-60 minutes (go about and play with your kids, make dinner, garden, walk the dog, do homework etc).

~ Twenty minutes before baking pre-heat the oven to 450 degrees. Place a rack in the middle of the oven for the bread.  Place an empty broiler tray for holding water on the bottom rack of the oven.  

~ Dust the top of the loaf with flour and slash the top with a serrated knife.  

~ Place the loaf into the oven.  Add 1 cup of water to the broiler tray and close the oven to trap the steam.  Bake for 30 minutes or until the crust is nice and brown and firm to the touch.

~ Allow to cool before eating.

~ Store the remaining dough in your fridge for up to 10 days.  You can also freeze 1 lb. balls of dough in an airtight container and defrost them overnight in the fridge prior to baking the next day.

~ Enjoy!

It's Friday!

Happy Friday friends!  

I don't have a recipe for you today as I spent most of yesterday prepping for an upcoming event where I am making and baking 400-500 cookies for some young kids to decorate.  A lot of work?  Yes!  A lot of fun? Yes!  I really enjoy activities where kids and food intersect and this project is no exception.  I can't wait to see the all the cookie creations that get made and I hope to be able to post pictures for you in a week or so, after the fun has been had.

So while I'm off to spend another day in cookie-land I thought I would provide you with some links to a few things I'm liking this week:

~ An Anthropology location has finally opened in Toronto!  And while I can't deny that they carry the most whimsical and lovely clothes and linens, I must confess that it's the kitchen accessories that make me swoon.  I love things like this and these are awfully sweet too.  Oh, and don't even get me started on theses linens.

~ I just received a lovely cookbook in the mail this week and so far it looks like a great read.  I hope to share a recipe or two from here next week.

~ I keep a notebook on my desk where I jot down notes on recipes I'll like to make for family or recipes I hope to alter so my kids can make them easily.  This dessert tops the list, although it will have to wait for a special occasion as we're not eating too many sweets right now.  But leeks are definitely okay, and really well liked by my boys, so I'm hoping to have a quiche grace our table this weekend.

Wishing you all a wonderful, warm and sunny weekend.  What you are planning to cook and read over the next few days?

PS - The winners of yesterday's book giveaway were posted late yesterday.  Please scroll down to see the names of those who won.....

The Winner(s)!!

Thank you to those who entered comments into the draw for the cookbook.  The good news is, I have drawn two names at random as I was given an extra book to give away.  Congratulations to:

1 ~  Katie at Good Life eats "I love to make vanilla caramel brownies (on my blog) with me son. This sounds like a great book! Thanks so much for stopping by goodLife {eats} after seeing me on Design Mom. Glad you liked what you saw and hope to see you around again!"

2 ~ Wendi "Nice idea! I've seen this done with chocolate pudding, but we're not much for pudding around here. Ice cream is a GREAT idea!

Don't know if I've commented here before. I found your blog a couple of weeks ago, and have been enjoying it thoroughly!"

Please send me an email at <mixingbowlkids at gmail dot com> to claim your prizes!

Earth Day Bars

I'm happy to say that the "Dirt Dessert" from yesterday did result in a post-dinner smile from my youngest boy.  I've been waiting days to see one so it was a great relief to finally catch a glimpse of his loose-tooth grin.  Having said that, the above Earth Day bars didn't elicit quite the same response from him, although my older boy thought they were very tasty and eagerly shared them with his friends on the playground after school.  

Inspired by a recipe I found on-line, featuring a dish created with ingredients from different countries around the world, I decided to do the same thing in the form of a snack for my boys.  I also knew I wanted to make something healthy as we've been indulging in far too many sweet treats in our home of late (Easter, a birthday and dirt dessert!).  I discovered the below recipe on-line, and tweaked it a bit to suit my family's tastes.  I chose to make these bars with dark chocolate (native to Asia and Latin America), dried cranberries (native to North America), coconut (native to South Asia) and walnuts (grown worldwide).  

These would be a great treat for your kids to make with some friends as the add-in's can be customized to suit the likes of each child.  I might also suggest using these bars to teach geography...Earth Day Asia Bars, Earth Day North America bars...you get the idea.  Simply use add-ins from specific continents or countries while studying those geographic regions.  Happy Baking! 

Earth Day Bars, adapted from this recipe

1 1/2 cups of whole wheat pastry flour

1 1/2 cups of rolled oats

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 cup packed brown sugar

1/2 cup olive oil

1/2 cup apple butter

1 egg

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp salt

Add ins:

Chopped dark chocolate, coconut, dried cranberries, walnuts

Possible add ins:

raisins, dried fruits, nuts, pineapple, apples, blueberries

~ Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees

~ In a large mixing bowl, combine the flour, oats, brown sugar, cinnamon, baking soda and salt.  Set aside.  In a small mixing bowl whisk together the oil, apple butter and egg.

~ Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix with a wooden spoon until the dough has a crumbly texture.  

~ Customize you add ins and fold in 1 cup total of the add-ins of your choice.

~ Lightly oil an 8x8 baking pan and press the dough in firmly.  Bake in pre-heated oven for 17 minutes or until the bars are set.  Let cool for 30 minutes before cutting.  Store in an airtight container for 2-3 days.

~ Enjoy!

Dirt Dessert...and a Giveaway!

Happy Earth Day, friends!

Earth Day, celebrated annually on April 22, has been created to bring awareness to our Earth's environmental issues.  School children across our city, country and continent, including my own, are participating in activities this week to honor this terrestrial planet we call home.  This week our kitchen has been no exception as I've put together a few treats for my young ones in celebration of this day.  My youngest has been having a tough couple of days and I think he will be delighted to know that there is a celebratory dessert waiting for him upon his return from school.  

In the picture above we have an old-fashioned snack which I've made with a slight twist.  Classic Dirt Dessert is usually put together with chocolate pudding, Oreo cookies crumbs and gummy worms.  My version is made with the cookie crumbs and gummy treats, but instead of pudding I've used ice cream - my little boy's favourite. I think the use of ice cream in place of pudding adds an unexpected element (and hopefully a smile) to this treat and if Earth Day happens to fall on a warm Spring day, then it will make for a nice refreshing snack. 

These are also the perfect sweet for a classroom party and can be a fun activity for a group of pre-schoolers looking for a craft alternative.  

On another note, I have an additional copy of the cookbook, Eat it Up - Lip Smacking Recipes for Kids to give away.  To enter, simply leave a comment (below the recipe) letting me know what your favourite dish to make with/for your kids is.  The winner will be announced on Thursday.

Dirt Dessert, my recipe

Small terracotta plant pots, washed well with soap and hot water

Ice cream, any flavour

Oreo cookies crumbs

Gummy worms

~ After washing and drying your plant pot well, fill to the top with an ice cream of your choice.

~ Cover the ice cream with Oreo cookies crumbs and stuff with gummy worms

~ Easy-peasy and I hope you enjoy! 

Technical Difficulties

Sorry folks...my computer is experiencing some technical difficulties today and it seems I won't be able to get a post up....but please come back tomorrow for a giveaway and some ideas on Earth Day celebrations...with your kids and fun food of course.

Have a great day!

An Easy Apple Turnover

For most of my life I did not enjoy anything made with baked apples.  I think it was the texture that I didn't like, as I found the warm apples too mushy for my taste.  I loved the cinnamon and apple combination, just not when warmed.  Sometime last year, or perhaps the year before, I ate a slice of apple pie and it was good.  Really good, actually.  After so many years of disliking this kind of dessert how could I suddenly find the taste so yummy?  A quick inspection of the filling, revealed that the apples had been cut to a small dice and were so tiny they had become almost mashed, which made all the difference for me.  Finally I had discovered the beauty of a baked apple dessert.

Yesterday, after finishing the weekly food shopping, I realized I had more apples that we could possibly eat this week, so I decided to incorporate them into the after-school snacks I would make for my boys. 

Making turnovers seemed like the most logical answer as the portability of the snacks is great for kids. They don't require a plate or utensils and can be packed and eaten with ease and speed.

Despite my dislike for baked apples for most of my childhood, I always did have a fond spot for apples and cheese together.  Serve these with a slice of old cheddar, like my husband did yesterday,  and I promise you won't be disappointed.

Easy Apple Turnovers, adapted from a Martha Stewart Recipe

For the dough:

2 1/2 cups of all purpose flour

1 tsp salt

1 tsp sugar

1 cup ice-cold butter, grated on a box grater

6 tbsp ice-cold water

For the filling:

2 cups small diced apples, slightly mashed

1/4 cup sugar

1/4 cup brown sugar

2 tbsp corn starch

3 tbsp lemon juice

1 tbsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp ground nutmeg

~ Prepare the dough: In a small bowl combine the flour, salt and sugar.  Mix well to combine.  Add the grated butter and 4 tbsp of water and mix well until the flour mixture begins to look like coarse meal with pea-sized pieces of butter in the dough.  Your hands will work well for this.  The dough should be crumbly but hold together when squeezed.  Add more water, a tablespoon at a time, if needed to bring the dough to the proper consistency.

~ Form the dough into a large round disk, wrap with plastic wrap and place in the fridge for one hour.

~ While the dough is resting, combine the apples, sugars, cornstarch, lemon juice, cinnamon and nutmeg in a medium bowl and toss together.  Set aside.

~ Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.  On a lightly floured surface roll out the dough and cut into 12 rectangular pieces (they don't have to be precise).  Spoon some filling into the centre of each piece of dough.

~ Brush some egg wash on the edges of each piece and fold the dough over so it meets at the edges.  Press firmly to seal and crimp with the tongs of a fork or with your fingers.

~ Place turnovers on a parchment lined baking sheet.  Brush the tops with remaining egg wash and sprinkle with coarse sugar.  Using a sharp knife, or scissors, score a hole in the centre to allow the steam to escape while baking.  Bake until golden brown, approx. 20-25 minutes.  Serve warm or at room temperature.  Store in an air-tight container for 2-3 days.

~ Enjoy!