Put yourself in my shoes for a couple of moments. You are getting ready to teach three weeks of cooking camp this summer, and you find out that you will be teaching in a classroom, not a kitchen. The good news is that you will have a refrigerator, some cabinet space for tools and ingredients, and a microwave. The bad news is that the oven (in an adjacent building) is off limits for 2 days/week. What’s a teacher to do?
Time to get creative. You will have to bring a few tools from home…a blender is helpful for making hummus, pesto and the occasional mixed drink. (No, you aren’t giving the kids booze – but they sure love smoothies and iced lemonade!) And you won’t want to forget your electric skillet. You will rely on this tool for recipes every single day. You will grow to love your electric skillet. You may even start to hover near it when groups of kids draw near, just so it won’t fall on the floor and break into bits…
Okay – snap out of it. You don’t have to think how to use the electric skillet with 16 (yes, 16!) 9-11 year olds last week. I’ll be nice and tell you how we are using it…
- whole grain banana pancakes
- soy crumbles with cumin & chili powder for our (Kosher) taco salad
- freshly picked summer squash for pasta primavera
- sauteed corn/zucchini/purple basil (from our field trip to the farmer’s market)
- cooking pasta (yes, it can even be used to boil water for pasta!)
- ratatouille
- making the brine for our refrigerator pickles
Do you have an electric skillet? What do you like to make in yours?
my electric skillet sort of got forgotten about when wegot an electric griddle (not that we can cook all the same things on them but I did use my skillet for a lot of things that we began doing on the griddle)-my griddle got dropped and busted though and I was just thinking about my skillet last night when we had pancakes (breakfast for dinner) I need to figure out what cabinet it is stashed in the back corner of and dust that puppy off! I hope cooking class is a smashing success!
Cooking with kids is a battle.
Hi Jane – cooking with kids can be a battle, but if you take the time to set up expectations, it usually goes very well. Kids feel so lucky to be included, and it is quality time well spent together.
I just picked up one at a steeply discounted price from Sur la Table. I’m so excited for the possibilities in our classroom programs here in Chicago. I’m also a big fan of the griddle/grill combo upon which much can be accomplished!