Cooking with Kids! Fun and Educational with Raddish Kits

It seems every time I am cooking something in the kitchen I have a three and a half-year-old wanting to help, and as much as I love her to be a helper sometimes I just want to get things done so I can move on with my day!  Do you all know that feeling?

I was pretty intrigued when I found  the Raddish Cooking Kits, these are really cool things and you can use them for ages 4-12, I love when you have one thing that you can do with the whole family and not have to leave the little ones out.

When you have the little ones, say about 4-6 you are right with them, they are so eager to work with you and have a great time making food with you, when they hit about 7-12 they are now really curious about culinary arts and want to get their cooking on, of course, they still need guidance but with the Raddish Kids Kits you have a great starting point.

So, how it works is this, once a month you get a box and inside that box you will find everything you need to get cooking with your kids.  You will find three family friendly recipe guides, these have great pictures on them that allow you as the parent to teach new words, and do a whole kitchen lesson, a skill card which helps kids learn new techniques, an activity with everything you need to get talking and eating together as a family, and these can range from a science experiment to games and all sorts of things in between, a shopping list which they also email you and a table talk card deck to get some chatter going during dinner.  It also includes a Raddish patch that you can iron onto the Raddish apron and there is a new patch every month.  They also have included some bonus items to help you get other activities and recipe substitutes.  They really have thought of everything that you could need to have a great time with the family cooking.

I liked how on the recipe guide the pictures are easy to decipher for kids that are not reading quite yet, they still can figure out what they need to do by just following the pictures.  

I liked too that the meals were more sophisticated than scrambled eggs or a sandwich, it really pushes kids and parents to “cook” and create something healthy and fun to do.  The cooking lessons are important I think in so many ways, it can give kids a love of cooking, and since you have to cook to eat, this is important, but it also helps then learn how to follow direction, works on motor skills and helps them learn how to do things step by step.  I can’t think of anything better than cooking to teach kids this if you do things in the wrong order you are not going to have good results.

I remember one time I was cooking dinner and my kids had friends over, I had cut up some celery, carrots and onions and was sauteing them in a pan, my son’s friend asked me very seriously what are those orange things in the pan? I was a little shocked, I said oh stop fooling around, it took me a few minutes to realize she did not know she had not seen carrots chopped and cooking before, these kids teach kids where food comes from how to make it from the seed to the table.  

The guides include nutrition information and helps kids to make strong healthier choices not only during the cooking time but all of the time, they learn what goes into making something healthy.  There is nothing in my opinion better for teaching math than cooking, you have so many chances to have them use their math skills, from counting out two eggs, to using fractions, cooking is about math!

The best part of all of this is that it is fun! It for us was a chance to take the stress out of cooking dinner and cook to have food and have fun, sometimes we just are busy and trying to get a lot done in a short amount of time.  This kit was really the first time we took the time to go shopping explain that it all goes together and had her see how it made it into something to eat.  She loved learning, loved taking the time and having attention all on her.  

If you are homeschooling this would be a perfect addition to your curriculum and even if you’re not, never pass up a chance to have your kids learn and laugh with you!  You hearts and tummy’s will both be full!