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Book Review

Super Snacks: Seasonal Sugarless Snacks by Jean Warren, Illustrated by Glen Mulvey (Totline Books, 1992).

Adult or any age with adult help.

Frustrated with our family's culinary rut, I went to the library and came home with a haul of children's cookbooks. I told my kids to pick out something new and make it for us.

My older son (age 11) skipped all the colorful kids' books in favor of this low-budget gem. I think it's actually written for day care providers, who have many of the same culinary requirements as juvenile chefs do. The recipes are simple, fast, and use ingredients kids recognize and like. Many recipes don't even require any actual cooking (with heat) or cutting with sharp knives, so younger kids can do them on their own.

My son started with a peach yogurt smoothy, which we all liked (except, in defiance of the sugar-free title, we added a little honey to the recipe from the book. Hey, that's Big Learning, right? Learning to make changes in a recipe to achieve desired results). Then he made cheese popcorn.

I think this is a great sourcebook for getting kids started cooking on their own, and you can't beat the price. It's out of print, but available online for a couple dollars.

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Cookbooks for kids - more Big Learning picks