Cooking with a two-year-old - good idea or foolhardy

[newkid]

Does anyone have any suggestions for a good recipe to attempt with a 25mo? Is this a good idea? Ideally something sweet:)

It sounds like my idea of hell, but my 23 mo ds 'cooks' at his nursery. Usually they make biscuits that the children can cut out using a shaped cutter, or roll with a rolling pin. Sometimes they make little cupcakes with icing and sprinkles, I think they all get to stir the mixture when they make cakes.

buy some buns and ice them

if you must

Fairy cakes. You could always use one of those packets where you just have to add egg/water. IME they like decorating the cakes best.

Try something with eggs in. DS loves breaking them on teh side of the bowl, and whisking them, then he plays with the empty shells.

Peppermint creams made of fondant icing with a drop of peppermint essence are usually pretty low stress - lots of rolling and cutting, nothing hot, nothing that you can't eat raw. Or icing/decorating bought biscuits.
Next step is melting in saucepan but no actual cooking eg rice crispy cakes.
I'd leave oven stuff till a bit older because however hard you say 'they're hot mustn't touch' someone always wants to taste them before they're cool...

Thanks for the suggestions. She has made brownies (yum) and biscuits at nursery, but I'm wondering how much 'cooking' she actually did. I was thinking about buying a packet, but that seemed like cheating. Her cousins are here this weekend (5 and 4 and 1), and I thought this might be a fun rainy day activity for the three over-2s. I think a packet it will be!

make muffins .. best idea

mix dry ingredients together
mix wet ingredients together
mix 2 lots together

Don't. Just don't. Walk away from the kitchen now. You'll thank me.

Hi, I've been cooking with my DS for ages and whilst the kitchen's never looked like anything less than a small controlled explosion afterwards-he loves it!

Flapjacks! Oats, brown sugar, syrup and you're done.
Very sweet and gorgeous

if you're feeling adventurous you can add all sorts to them-grated apple, mixed nuts and dried fruits, even chocolate (I hide those for me! )

agree with Feistybird, and do it in the garden on a tray, then let them sprinkle over 100s and 1000s

That's about the extent of it at that age

Choc cornflake cakes. No cooking required. And lots of spoon licking opportunities.

100g SR flour
100g sugar
100g marg/butter
2 eggs
pinch bicarb
makes 12 fairycakes

foolproof messy and lots of fun.

chocolate cornflake cakes as they can mix it all together and put it into cases and eat some straight away!
My kids just like mixing things so they always help make omelletes, cakes, biscuits etc

snap puddle :)

I occasionaly buy the packet bun mixtures so all we have to add is an egg and some water or milk. I let her pick which ones she wants which is normally Dora the Explora.

I throw everything in the bowl and let her mix, I put the mixture in the cases and cook and when they've done and are cool, dd decorates them with the icing and whatever decorations they come with.

I let her help with normal meals too. Like throwing veg in the pans etc and anything that needs mixing she usually gets to do.

great idea - DS does loads of cooking with his father and me. Mainly muffins, eggy bread, shaking the salad dressing bottle, spreading toast with marmite/whatever, filling jam tarts, etc. Helps peeling potatoes by handing them to me and then counting them in the pan.

have to say the kitchen takes some cleaning afterwards but he's happy.

buy biscuits and some icing tubes.

cornflake cakes

and my personal favourite is jelly -
or even better n that - angel delight - cos thats just lots of stirring and no hot liquid - and you can put sprinkles on top and its ready ded quick

I don't bake with DD (I am not a bkaer - leave that to grandparents and my sister) but we do cook together and have done for a while. She loves making burgers, nuggets, meat balls,anything coated with breadhcrubs - lots of hand on, squishing involved. She also does the prep for meat or fish - adding herbs, rubbing in oil, seasoning. She helps to peel mushrooms and to tear them up.

All good fun :) Yes, a bit messy but cleanable. And she loves her food so getting her involved is just fab.

Thing is, if you actually enjoy cooking, it's absolutely soul destroying doing it with a two year old, IMO. A bit like watching them rip up one of your favourite books, or something.

DD often bakes angel dleight and decorates biscuits at nursery. Not as messy as full blown baking. The Angel delight is tied in with a shopping trip too - some of them have to go and buy the packets and the milk, then they come back and prepare thenm. And then eat it at snack time.

Really MI? I don't agree. I love cooking (not baking) and love getting Dd involved.

I find it all so...sploshy, and you have to spend ages watching them stir something ineptly and splashing it over the floor and generally turning what was previously quite a reasonable kitchen upside down, and then they want to eat the cake mixture before you've put it in the cake tins, or worse they want to pour it out so it goes all over the floor and then they don't understand why Mummy has become a vile avenging angel...

...and you have this mental picture of how in tune with each other you should be, not grinding your teeth waiting for the little bugger to get bored and wander off to watch the telly so that you can actually clean up the knee-deep kitchen floor and vow Never Again...

Ah, maybe that is why I only do it every so often and only when I know we have loads of time. i also only choose certain taks for her to do. At the moment she loves washing the dishes - novelty as we have a dishwasher - so she gets that job

I really love cooking, but when 'help'is offered in the form of my DDs, my heart sinks, I'm afraid. Takes twice as long, creates twice as much clearing up and theybicker constantly about which jobs I give them.

DD2 is ok on her own, she just likes to sit and do a running commentary on what I'm doing. But DD1 always wants to help - and DD2 usually wants to do anything DD1 is doing.....so usually I'm doomed.