6 Sites To Get Your Kids Cooking 

School may be on the horizon, but we've still got some sunny summer days left to fill. If camps and vacations are over and you find yourself ready for some low-key family fun, head to the kitchen! Long summer afternoons and evenings are the perfect time for you and your kids to experiment with cooking. No homework pressure, flexible bedtimes, plentiful produce...what better time to crack the cookbooks? (Plus, your kids can brush up on the reading and direction-following they'll be doing back in school.)

I will admit that cooking with my kids is a recent phenomenon. Until now, dinner prep time was my island of relative quiet and focus...the thought of managing my kids and their inevitable mess kept cooking relatively solo. But now that they're older (10 and 7) and more independent, it's a pleasure to cook together. My son recently made himself a lunch of pad thai -- a Thai noodle dish topped with scrambled eggs, bean sprouts, and green onions -- all by himself. (And my fantasy of sitting back while my kids took over meal duty was born.)

Which is not to say that little kids shouldn't cook! On the contrary! Preschoolers and kindergartners are natural experimenters and are drawn to the real-life work going on in the kitchen. If you're ok with some flying flour, getting them cooking, or at least involved in meal prep, is one of the best was to encourage independence and healthy eating. 

The easiest place to start is with simple meals your kids already love. Choose a day when you're all feeling relaxed -- cooking with kids requires a balance of vigilance and laid-back humor, so you'll need your reserves of patience intact. I find that it generally works better to start with special cooking projects rather than simply involving them in regular family meal preparation, at least in the beginning. 

Little ones can help retrieve ingredients, stir, pour, and taste. (When they start getting bored, give them a baking tray full of rice, or some flour and water to play with.) Older kids can read recipes, measure, learn basic knife skills and, soon, cook on their own with supervision. 

No doubt you've got plenty of inspiration sitting on your cookbook shelf, but there are a ton of ideas on the Web as well. Here are a few good places to start: 

Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution: Get Cooking
My kids' interest in cooking took off during the recent run of Jamie Oliver's TV show, Food Revolution. In it, he attempted to overhaul a school lunch program and, in the process, showed the town's citizens (including kids) how easy it is to cook fast, healthy meals. I'm not usually one for celebrity chefs or reality TV, but I was so impressed with his passion and his ability to bring people together. My kids appreciated that he treated the children on the show with respect and empowered them to do something meaningful. 

Rachael Ray Kids
Several Parenthackers have enjoyed the recipes and approach in Rachael Ray's kid cookbook, Cooking Rocks! 30-Minute Meals for Kids. Turns out, she's also doing a lot to help families cook and eat more healthfully through her non-profit Yum-O. A good chunk of Ray's website is devoted to kids...recipes, articles, blogs and more. 

FamilyFun: Cooking With Kids
Disney's FamilyFun -- the website and the magazine -- never fails me. The crafts are cute and doable, and the recipes are simple and crowd-pleasing. Lots of good stuff here...I'm partial to the Scallion Pancakes. 

AllRecipes: Helping Kids Cook
I'm a recipe Googler -- I love to compare different recipes for the same dish. As such, I find myself at AllRecipes a lot. The sheer volume of recipes is astounding, and I love reading the reviews. This is a natural spot to look for recipes to try with your kids. 

MyDaddyCooks
Talk about inspiration! This site is Nick's video blog of his cooking projects with his toddler son, Archie. Cooking with a two year-old is impressive enough, but cooking AND filming? Well, that puts all my excuses to shame. Have a look. 

[Photo: Daniel Hambury, Stella Pictures]

What's Cooking Blog
Michelle's company, What's Cooking, offers cooking classes to kids in the San Francisco Bay Area -- and that's just one of the ways she's encouraging kids in the kitchen. She's also working on a cookbook, and putting together school class plans as part of Michelle Obama's Chefs Move to Schools campaign. On the What's Cooking blog, you'll find recipes, stories, and news from Michelle. 

[Header photo courtesy of elanaspantry.com]

So get cooking! Got a favorite site you frequent or recipe to share? Tell us in the comments! 

Thanks to Twitter helpers @whatscooking, @erinehm, @thewilderones and @sarahgilbert for their ideas.

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