Tips for cooking and eating with your kids

Christine Wansleben, chef and executive culinary director at Mise En Place Culinary Center, which offers cooking classes for both adults and kids, offers these tips:

Younger kids, in particular, love to mimic their parents, so introduce them to all of the foods you eat, from ethnic dishes to new vegetables. “If you eat it, they may, too,” she said. Never discourage them from trying new foods. You might be surprised at what they’ll like.

Take your kids to the grocery store or a farmers market, she said, and let them see and smell and touch the produce and foods you’re buying. Give them a chance to pick out something they’d like to try.

Here’s a biggie: Turn meal preparation into quality time. Turn off the television and talk while chopping vegetables or making soup and sandwiches. Give kids a job to do, no matter how small.

“We have great conversations in the kitchen while my husband and I are getting the meal together,” Wansleben said about her family. “Even if [the kids] are mixing the waffle mix…get them involved.”

Have your kids try at least one small bite of new foods. Wansleben tells kids in her classes that they can’t say “yuck” when they taste a food they don’t like because it’s not polite and it might hurt someone’s feelings. Instead, if they try it and don’t like it, they can say “no, thank you” the next time around.

If your child doesn’t like something, ask why. “It might be the texture or color or shape that could throw them off,” she said. But don’t give up. Kids need to try something about a dozen times before they really know if they like it.

So the next time you make something you’ve made before, change it up a little. Maybe instead of steamed broccoli, add it to soup.
Just keep in mind that while hiding foods like vegetables is OK, kids need to know what the real thing is.

Seize the teachable moments. Cooking is all about counting and measuring and colors and shapes. Kids can learn a lot while having fun.