Feeding Boys & a FireFighter

Recipes & tips for filling bottomless pits

Book review and chance to win: Grow it, cook it with kids by Amanda Grant

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I was warned about the glut of courgettes we’d get at our allotment – but seeing really is believing. The plants are firing out green torpedos at a rate of knots it’s very hard to keep up with. And if you leave them for longer than a day they take on giant marrow proportions… crazy!

So I’m suddenly getting very interested in different ways of cooking them. My first port of call is to use them in baking. I had a batch of cakes to make this week for Arlo’s last day at nursery – they deserve a treat for taming him this last term!

So I turned to a book i’ve been sent to review Grow it, cook it with kids by Amanda Grant. It’s a lovely little publication full of the kind of produce you can easily grow with your children, but loads of helpful recipe ideas of what to actually do with your crops once they arrive.

Courgettes lend a fantastic juicy quality to this chocolate cake

And here’s the recipe:

Chocolate and Courgette Cake – By Amanda Grant

3 courgettes (about 450g) peeled
250g butter, softened
250g light brown soft sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract
3 eggs
125ml milk
350g self-raising flour
1 tsp baking powder
4 tbsp cocoa powder
a cake tin, 30cm x 20cm greased with butter

1. Turn the oven on to 180’C (350’F) Gas 4. Cut a piece of greaseproof paper the width of your cake tin and a little bit longer. Lay the paper in the tin so it goes up the sides.

2. Grate the courgettes using the smaller holes on the grater – you want the courgettes grated finely so that they mix into the cake mixture easily.

3. Put the softened butter, sugar and vanilla extract into a bowl and beat with a wooden spoon until creamy. You can also beat with an electric whisk if that is easier.

4. Crack the eggs into a bowl. Beat lightly with a fork.

5. Add the eggs gradually to the bowl with the cake batter. Add the milk and whisk together.

6. Put a sieve over your missing bowl and carefully pour in the flour, baking powder and cocoa powered. Shake the sieve gently so that the ingredients snow down into the bowl. Take a metal spoon and fold in to the batter.

7. Sir in the grated courgettes and mix well.

8. Spoon the cake batter into your tin. Using oven gloves, put the tin in the oven and bake for 35-45 minutes. Test the centre of the cake with a skewer – when it comes out clean the cake is ready. Leave the cake to cool then cut into squares.

This recipe was a real success, but what about the book as a whole?

Well it’s been out for year and was written by Amanda Grant, broadcaster, food writer and mother of three young children.  She has written several books, mostly specializing in children’s food and nutrition including the very useful Healthy Lunchboxes for Kids.

Her latest book recognises the rise and rise of the allotment and the desire to get our children interested in fruit and veg at an early age.

Who is it for?

Children keen on the idea of growing their own produce and cooking with it. Older primary school children will be able to use this book by themselves (with adult supervision of course) as it’s really clearly written and laid out. And grown-ups will love using it with their pre-schoolers.

Easy to follow?

Each chapter is divided into manageable sections that are easy to navigate – Plant it, Grow it, Pick it, 5 Ways (quick ways to use the fruit or vegetable) and Cook It

As it’s aimed at kids it’s packed with beautiful photographs detailing the steps of the growing/cooking process along with very clear instructions. The stages of the recipes are broken down into shorter chunks than a grown up book would be, which is really useful.

Ask an adult to help you – is always clearly written within the method to signpost the trickier/dangerous bits of kitchen work!

There’s also a helpful glossary to explain cooking processes like folding in and blanching, but also gardening terms too, which for a novice like myself is fantastic! I love things written for children as you’re given such a clear definition of things that doesn’t use complicated vocab or assume prior knowledge. Simpleton? Moi?

Family friendly?

In so many ways! It encourages your family to get into gardening and cooking together, but the recipes are also fab family-friendly meals. It’s all very simple and achievable for children, so it’ll give them confidence.

If I can get to the stage where my boys are cooking my dinner I shall be one happy lady and my work here will be DONE!

Most likely to cook

Green rice – a kind of fresh pesto coated rice dish that I think my vegetarian crowd would adore.

Creamy spinach pasta – very fattening with double cream and butter in it, but that’s what makes it sound so damn good!

Pea puree bruschetta – given the pea obsession in this house, I reckon this would make a very tasty lunchtime treat

Strawberry ice cubes – what a lovely idea – bet they taste fab in ice-cold lemonade or a glass of pimms….

Least likely to cook

I couldn’t find one objectionable recipe to be honest.

Would you buy it for a friend?

I think all my friends who have children and space to grow veg would ADORE this book – it’s fab! It would also make a great gift for primary school aged kids who are keen to get into gardening.

Rating out of 10

9

Grow it, cook it with kids is published by Ryland Peters & Small

Thanks for my review copy! 

*****THIS COMPETITION HAS NOW CLOSED, NO MORE ENTRIES PLEASE****

WIN WIN WIN!

I have a copy of Grow it, Cook it with kids to give away to one lucky reader…

1. For a chance to win please comment on this post telling me about your what you like to cook with your children

2. For a second chance to win please tweet this post “Win Grow it, Cook it with kids recipe book @cookingkt http://wp.me/pU5T8-So” and comment HERE telling me you have done so along with your twitter username

3. For a third chance to win please follow me @cookingkt on Twitter and comment HERE to tell me you have done so.

This giveaway is open to all readers with a UK mailing address. The winner will be chosen using an online randomiser and announced in a subsequent post.
When commenting please leave your e-mail address so I can contact you if you win.

I am running this competition on behalf of Ryland Peters & Small who will be responsible for sending the prize to the winner. Their decision is final and no correspondence will be entered into.

There is one main way to enter and several ways to get bonus entries. You must leave a separate comment for each bonus entry otherwise they will not be counted.

Closing date: 10pm Thursday 18th August, 2011

Good Luck!

*****THIS COMPETITION HAS NOW CLOSED, NO MORE ENTRIES PLEASE****

Comments

  2. lindsey bluff says

    Oh forgot to add, I love baking with my 10 year old and 2 year old, we make fryut and cheese scones, fairy cakes with butter or fudge icing, quiches and corned beef plate pies!

  4. Kirsty Fox says

    I love to make Fairy cakes with my 4 year old son James, they are easy to make and taste delicious!

    @bloomingfox

  13. Cheryll H says

    We love to cook fairy cakes – my 4 yo loves decorating them but only ever eats the icing on top he he 🙂 @pipersky1 on Twitter

  16. Sarah Ballantyne says

    I love cooking pizzas with my daughter – she enjoys playing with the dough and putting her own toppings on. We make lots of mess but it is such fun!

  17. Sarah Ballantyne says

    I am already following you on twitter (@rugbylovingmum) and have tweeted.

  18. Catherine Harris says

    Apart from the usual cake baking that goes on in our house my 2 girls love helping to cook their favourite tea – spaghetti bolognaise 🙂

  21. Lucy Jackson says

    Hi, I’m not on twitter as I’m usually too busy baking! Today my children and I have made a carrot cake (they’ve literally just finished icing it with fresh orange and cream cheese icing!). We’ve also weeded our veggie patch and picked some french beans ready for supper.
    I’ve just asked my children their favourite recipes to cook
    Stanley (3) – Elliot soup (this is a lentil and carrot soup from a recipe given to us by Stan’s friend Elliot!)
    Daisy (6) – Homemade pizza
    Molly (13) – Gingerbread
    Shame I can’t upload photos of them baking!
    Lucy 😀

  26. Caroline French says

    My children are 2 and 10mths so i am just beginning to get my eldest involved with cooking (even though they are ALWAYS watching and hanging off my apron strings since they could crawl!). Recently i have let my little girl mix for cupcakes and scones and use cutters for biscuits, she is really into for about 5 secs or until she realises she has to wait til its cooked to eat most of it! She’s quite creative so does enjoy spooning coloured icing onto cakes or adding the sprinkles and she does wash my carrots and other veg/salad for me (usually resulting in a soaking but all good fun!)

  32. Jamie-Lee Norris says

    I love baking especially cakes with my daughter. i had her mixing the ingredients in a bowl from 8 months haha (with my help obviously 🙂 ) although all i get now is her crawling behind me picking up anything i drop and then later me finding it stored in her cheeks eg: raw carrot. therefore when i cook i sit her in her highchair next to me so she can see what im doing, i then give her plastic childrens utensils to use and give her some food thats safe for her to explore with her utensils. Ok she may not be cooking with me as i don’t use the food she has completely mauled but still for now as far as she is concerned she is helping her mummy at 11 months old cook daddys dinner 🙂

  37. Judy Wright says

    We like to bake cakes and biscuits! We’re just making a chocolate beetroot cake 🙂

  39. cheryl fothergill says

    We love to bake and decorate caks and cookies (not very adventurous!). Would love some inspiration from this book though as we have loads of beans, corguettes, sweetcorn and october we will have loads of pumpkins in our garden!

  42. busymumofthree says

    I am useless at cooking and always looking for inspiration especialy as I now have a cooker after being without one for 6 weeks so sounds boring but all we could do together was make a jelly.

  43. Claire Butler says

    My son and his dad love making proper american style pancakes for breakfast. He’d eat them everyday if he could

  46. andi g. says

    I would love to win this! I cook with both of my children and am always looking for new, healthy recipes to keep them interested in good wholesome food!

  50. Julie Cook says

    Chocolate beetroot cake from our allotment crops, the kids love the pink mix it makes and cant believe it makes chocolate cake

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