For the past 2 months my children have been taking turns preparing dinner and creating a dessert on Sundays. It just hit me today that I should have been sharing this family experiment with all of you! It has been awesome. My kids enjoy looking through recipe books and talk about their dinner for a few days before they make it and love calling all of their relatives to tell them how it worked out. I allow them to do almost everything (short of pulling a hot pan out of the oven) and they really take ownership of their meal.
I would love for my readers to embrace what I am calling the Kids Can Cook Too Challenge! My children are only 6 and 8 and have created more dinners than I created at 25. It is a great way to teach your kids how to cook and you may just find, like I did, that they are more likely to try new foods when they prepare it themselves!
Here was our experiment for the week!
Jackson's Sunday Dinner
Taco Cups
About 3 of the 6 meals Jack has prepared have been taco-related. He loves them! We got the idea for the tortilla cups from Krafts Foods but decided to use classic taco ingredients instead of the chicken recipe.
Ingredients
1 pound ground beef
1 packet taco seasoning
chopped tomato
shredded lettuce
shredded taco cheese
sour cream
6 whole wheat tortillas (6 inch)
Instructions
Brown the beef in a skillet. Follow instructions on taco seasoning packet.
Heat oven to 425. Crumple 6 sheets of foil to make 6 (3-inch) balls; place on baking sheet. Top each with 1 tortilla; spray with cooking spray. Bake 6-8 minutes or until tortillas are golden brown. Tortillas will drape over balls as they bake to form cups.
Add browned beef, tomato, lettuce, cheese and sour cream to tortilla bowl.
Dessert: Sweetheart Strawberry Tarts (Kraft Foods)
Ingredients:
26 Oreos, finely crushed (about 2 cups)
1/2 cup margarine or butter, melted
4 cups fresh strawberries, divided
1/3 cup sugar
4-1/2 teaspoon cornstarch
1 tsp. lemon juice
1/2 cup water, divided
1/2 cup thawed Cool Whip
Instructions
Mix cookie crumbs and margarine; spoon into 12 paper-lined muffin cup, adding about 2 rounded tablespoons to each, Press onto bottoms and up sides of cup. Refrigerate while preparing filling.
Reserve 12 of the smallest strawberries (I cut some medium sized ones in half for this) for garnish. Slice remaining strawberries. Mix sugar, cornstarch and lemon juice in small bowl; stir in 1/4 cup water. Set aside.
Combine 1 cup strawberry slices and remaining water in small saucepan; bring to boil on medium-high heat. Simmer on medium-low heat 3 min., stirring occasionally. Stir in sugar mixture. Return to boil; cook and stir 1 min. or until sauce is clear and thickened. Cool slightly. Meanwhile, pat remaining strawberry slices dry. Spoon evenly on tart shells; top with strawberry glaze. Refrigerate 1 hour.
Top tarts with Cool Whip and reserved strawberries just before serving.
Results: Simply put: Delicious! The taco bowls were a fun take on the classic taco and everyone enjoyed them. They can be eaten with a fork or you can squish it together and eat it like a taco (it was still soft enough to eat it this way). The pound of ground beef made extra so we were able to make up three extra burritos and used up all the extra ingredients. The strawberry tarts were unbelievable. They looked adorable and were perfectly sweet: not too much and no too little.
If you join the challenge, email me at jamielz@verizon.net and you can be featured right here on Cake Mom. Send me your recipe, how the experiment went, and a picture of the finished meal/dessert (with or without your family photographed)!
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