| Fun Food for Kids to Make During the Summer (Tested Recipes) |
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By Joyce Rosencrans
Scripps Howard News Service "What is there to do, Mom?" Those words will be spoken about a zillion times this summer by kids caught between team practices, day camp, church camp, summer camp, space camp, computer camp, community-hall activities, swimming-pool privileges and plain old rainy days. It's not that most children's bedrooms couldn't afford enough entertainment opportunities to satisfy P.T. Barnum, thus tiding the kids over these dull spots ahead, but they won't. Bugging the parental unit on hand after school is out is too satisfying. It's an activity within itself. So have a few surprises in store to answer that age-old question --"What is there to do?" -- when stormy or too-hot-and-buggy afternoons stop you from shooing youngsters outside. Be sure to include the kitchen as a source of entertainment because making food together is fun and a good opportunity to teach math, measuring and nutrition. It's a given that kids eat heartily of whatever they cook themselves. For one thing, they can help make their own snack stockpile. Gather some cookie cutters and use real fruit juices to make more nutritious Jell-O Jigglers (see recipe). Lacking cutters, just set the firm gelatin in a square pan and give youngsters plastic knives to cut cubes for piling into colorful parfait glasses. Layer the gelatin cubes with fresh fruit, custard or pudding for fancy parfaits. Short of sending the kids on a cruise, let's turn to the Mouse for activity suggestions. Lucky kids at Walt Disney World embark on culinary adventures. Yes, they are actually encouraged to play with their food before eating it. The program is called "interactive desserts." Epcot pastry chef Jacqueline Palladino dreamed up the sweet ending for vacationing families while keeping her own daughter occupied while she sipped her after-dinner cappuccino. "The interactive desserts inspire creativity and pride and, at the same time, give parents a little helping hand," says Palladino. "And lots of time the whole family gets involved." At Disney World, kids can make a strawberry "shortsnake" with an S-cut shortcake and sliced berries for "scales." A whole strawberry is put into place for the "serpent head" and kids use M&Ms for eyes and fruit leather for the tongue. Chocolate "moose" is mousse (or pudding could be lightened by folding in Cool Whip) rolled in cookie crumbs that kids can decorate with cookie antlers (small pretzel twists), eyes, nose and mouth. Epcot's Akershus restaurant in the Norway pavilion offers youngsters troll cookies to decorate with cotton-candy hair; Coral Reef restaurant at the Living Seas offers the "sandy beach cup" -- vanilla pudding, pecan-sandy cookie crumbs and gummy fish for assembling in cup-size metal buckets (these can be found in craft stores). A real Disney favorite is the recipe for peanut butter "play dough" (see recipe) that the kids can shape, then decorate with pretzel sticks, chocolate chips, mini-marshmallows and sprinkles. Parents shouldn't over mix this stuff. Do it by hand or with a paddle attachment of an electric mixer just until the mixture comes together. Also at Epcot, youngsters get to spend time in a professional kitchen in the junior-chef program. Kids picked at random dress in a toque and chef's jacket to help make fresh pasta in Pasta Piazza restaurant in Epcot Future World. Cake decorating and salad tossing are other events in the kitchen rodeo. At home, kids can build their biceps by rolling out an old-fashioned noodle dough (see recipe). They won't be able to wait until dinner to serve their homemade noodle strips or squares. The best part is that moms don't have to wait for the noodles to dry before tossing them into boiling broth or boiling, salted water. Make 'em, boil 'em, eat 'em. Meanwhile, teach the kids to "fatigue" lettuce for a properly French tossed salad. Bring out the cruets and croutons. Vigorously tossing greens with a bit of salad oil first coats the lettuce with microscopic droplets, so that the lemon juice or vinegar-to-come doesn't cause it to wilt. There you have education and a nicely balanced menu. More food activities for kids this summer could include properly brewing tea in a real china teapot. What tea party doesn't demand an etiquette lesson for attending Teddy bears? Use apple-juice tea for younger children; make peanut butter and jelly tea sandwiches. More food fun could be ice cream-making in a Donvier, hand-crank or electric freezer and a bread-machine session for fast pizza dough or cinnamon rolls.
Disney's Peanut Butter Play Dough Ingredients: 2 cups smooth peanut butter
1 cup light corn syrup
4 cups powdered sugar
2 tsp. vanilla extract Preparation: Measure peanut butter by packing it into a dry, nesting-style measuring cup. Level off the top with a rubber scraper. Some think spraying the inside of the cup first with nonstick cooking spray helps the peanut butter slide out of the cup. Add peanut butter to a mixer bowl fitted with a paddle attachment, if available. Otherwise, plan for Mom to mix this by hand, using plenty of elbow action. Lightly mix the peanut butter, corn syrup, powdered sugar and vanilla, just until well combined and the dough comes together. Serve with treats for kids to decorate and build creations: chocolate chips, vanilla wafers, pretzel sticks, marshmallows, fruit leather, apple slices, dates and raisins. Serves: 12
Juicy Jell-O Ingredients: 1 cup boiling water
1 pkg. (4-serving size) gelatin, any flavor
1 cup cold fruit juice, such as apple, orange, white grape, cranberry Preparation: Stir boiling water into gelatin in medium bowl at least 2 minutes until completely dissolved. Stir in cold juice. Refrigerate 4 hours or until firm. DO NOT use fresh or frozen pineapple, kiwi, papaya or guava juice. Gelatin will not set. Canned pineapple juice or any juice that's cooked will work. Stir in raspberries, blueberries or chopped strawberries, if desired. Jigglers: Stir 2-1/2 cups boiling fruit juice into 2 packages of gelatin (8-serving size each). Stir 3 minutes or until dissolved. Do not add any cold water. Pour into a 13x9-inch pan. Refrigerate three hours or until it doesn't stick to a finger when touched. Dip bottom of pan in warm water 15 seconds. Cut decorative shapes with cookie cutters or cut 1-inch squares. Lift from pan. Serves: 24 pieces. Parfaits: Select a red gelatin and any non-red gelatin. Place each in separate bowls (the 4-serving size box in each bowl). Stir 1 cup boiling water into each bowl and stir to dissolve. Stir 1 cup cold fruit juice into each bowl. Pour into separate 9-inch square pans to refrigerate 4 hours or until firm. Cut each pan into 1/2-inch cubes. In 8 dessert glasses, layer alternating gelatin flavors, adding sliced fruit, custard, pudding or Cool Whip in between, if desired.
Old-Fashioned Noodles Ingredients: 2 eggs
1/4 tsp. salt
1 tsp. oil
1-1/2 to 2 cups all-purpose flour Preparation: Beat eggs, salt and oil with a fork in a medium bowl. When well blended, stir in enough of the flour to make a dry dough, a bit crumbly at first. Stop adding flour when particles are still damp enough with egg to be gathered together into a ball. Knead the firm dough with both heels of the hand until smooth, not floury. Divide in half. Roll out noodle dough as thinly as possible, bearing down with a rolling pin from center to outer edges. Repeat with second half of dough. Flouring countertop is not necessary because dough is not sticky. Let dough rest while bringing broth, vegetable soup or just salted water to boiling. Slice noodles into strips or small squares with a metal table knife and toss a few at a time into boiling liquid. Stir when all are added so they don't stick together. Cook anywhere from 10 to 20 minutes or until noodles are tender; take one out with a fork and try it. Cooking time depends on how thinly the dough was rolled out. If youngsters left the noodle dough rather thick, try to make it even and simply cook the dough a bit longer. (Joyce Rosencrans is home editor of The Cincinnati Post.) (Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.shns.com.
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