"How" do you bake with your toddler?

[LittleDoe]

I know lots of mums do this but just wondering how exactly?? DS is 2 and a quarter. Do I let him help to weigh / mix ingredients and just embrace the inevitable mess? I love baking on my own but the thought of doing it as a toddler activity is a bit scary! But equally would love him to enjoy cooking and baking too.

Hints and tips gratefully received!

(Sorry if this seems like a strange question.)

I think there are two approaches.

I am anal about it. I measure as much as I possible can etc, but let DD have a go at everything (eg, spooning flour onto the scales) but move whatever I'm doing away from her and give her a spoon and bowl to play with it she's leaning on the scales or whatever and going to muck up the recipe. Correspondingly, the younger she was and the less able to follow instructions the more quickly she got bored and went and did something else while I finished.

From 2 1/2ish her concentration improved massively. She pours stuff in, mixes, cracks eggs, has a go at measuring things out (that's the thing she likes least though), grating cheese, spooning things out. She always stays for the whole recipe now and I enjoy it much more because I don't have to pay so much attention to what she's doing.

OTOH, I have a friend who always let their DC just muck in whatever they wanted to do, and if they chucked in eggs at the wrong point or way too much flour went in and the whole lot died completely in the oven she didn't mind. Kids are similar ages and similarly good at cooking!

Small kids often hate electric whizzers though, I have got quite good at beating by hand.

DD stands on one of these steps

It's quite handy in general as I'm a short arse and nick it to reach the top shelves!

DS is 3 and I let him help with some cooking/baking. He's helped make soup, put toppings on pizza, and helped me make a beef casserole last night - mainly just putting things which I've just chopped into a big pan, and having a turn at stirring. He stands on a chair but he knows that the cooker is hot and not to touch it, and that pans can be hot as well.

I'd like to let him start chopping things soon - he's done a bit with me holding his hand steady, but I'm a bit worried about how best to go about it.

I think it's definitely related to their concentration and attention span. DS knows that he has to be calm and to listen when we are cooking and I'm really strict about it - the slightest hint of silliness and he gets warned to stop or he will have to get down. I'm a bit more lenient with baking stuff if we're mixing cold ingredients and doing it at the table, though. But he still has to listen and not fling things everywhere.

My DD is almost 3 and loves to stir (even a bowl of flour can be stirred) and tip things out of bowls into other bowls.

We also make pizza as well as baking - I chop up veggies etc and line them all up and DD decorates the pizza base. They cook quickly so don't require a lot of patience. And DD wolfs all the veggies instead of putting them on the pizza (which she will pick off later and refuse to eat ) so a great way to get some extra into her

She stands on a chair at the work surface. And agree with needing clear up time afterwards

Some great ideas here!

I think I started with making scones so ds could use a cutter and cut out shapes and then proudly put them on the tray. Now he can attempt egg-washing the tops and tapping the sieve and telling me when the scales get to a certain number (not that I believe what he says there!)

By 2.6 he and 3yo dn were 'peeling' carrots - I cut ends off and the carrot was laid in front of them and I showed them how to stroke away from them with a fat peeler. To start with the carrots remained unscathed but by 3 peelings were coming off. Dn will grate cheese too.

Now I do a lot of giving ds pastry or cake mix to shape into little cases while I do most of it. Decorating cakes is also very popular - ds and dn insisted on collaborating and decorating each of their own 3rd birthday cakes. It showed but they were delighted. :)

My two older children prefer mixing random stuff together to actual cooking. I think it's because I took a long time to get over myself wrt less than impressive results .

I give my dd a bowl; put a lot of random ingredients together and let her stir it about. I then do the proper baking whilst she is occupied. She is 3 and I cannot be dealing with her helping me 100% just yet. I let her do small things like putting paper cases in the tin and stirring but not measuring

DC both love cooking and baking with me. DD2, now 2.9, is usually to be found with her fingers in the butter, her hair in the bowl and the spoon in her mouth. But they have a great time. I rarely do "special" baking for the DC, they just join in chocolate cake/ bread/ fruit cake/ pastry whatever. They also both help out ( stand at the worktop and sample in a supervisory way, mainly) with ordinary cooking. Resign yourself to a lot of clearing up at the end (and fights over who gets to zero the weighing scales this time: am very bored of that one....)