Family baking challenge

A few months ago we downloaded the YouTube Kids’ app and showed our kids some cake decorating and cookie decorating videos. (Btw, have you seen the YouTube Kids’ app? It’s all filtered for children so you don’t have to worry about what they’ll be watching.) This started a big spin down the rabbit hole of cooking and baking videos. To say they’ve learned a lot is a huge understatement. Some days Rebecca teaches me more than I want to know about how to do something in the kitchen. It constantly blows my mind what they’ve learned. Its great to be able to bake at this level with the kids but I’m also interested in trying some professional baking courses like those offered by Saavor, they even give tips and qualifications in running a baking business; the possibilities are endless! Everyone knows I love baking. My friend who lives in India gave me a list of the top baking schools in Delhi and said that I should visit one when I visit her which I thought was a great idea!! But for now I’m happy to explore these family baking challenges.

We recently got the Amazon Fire Stick and started watching the Food Network’s Kids Baking Challenge. This has really caught our kids’ interest because the kids who compete in this show are only a little older than they are. They’ve been begging to recreate their own challenge with no winners (because we all like different flavors).

We asked the girls to think about what flavors and ingredients we would need. They each made a list and I added it to our meal planner and picked them up in my regular shopping trip. We made 2 batches of plain vanilla cupcakes with the plan that each person would make 6 cupcakes total. We didn’t need 5 batches of different flavored cupcakes.

Katherine and Caroline were meticulous about testing oranges and lemons. Rebecca diced strawberries and then set them aside to dry so they wouldn’t have so much liquid in them. (Seriously, would you have known to do this? I didn’t!) Then they filled their cupcake pans and we baked them.

Katherine made an orange cupcake with vanilla frosting and added orange garnish. (I swear she used that word herself!)

Caroline made lemon cupcakes with blueberry frosting. She knew exactly how to cook the blueberries on the stove before adding them to the frosting. She said she was making blueberry coulis (and yes, I had to google that word to get the correct spelling).

Rebecca made strawberry cupcakes with vanilla flavored frosting that was colored purple.

Matt and I totally got in on the fun. I made a vanilla cupcake with a chocolate peanut butter frosting and he made pineapple cupcakes with coconut frosting.

We spent some time around the kitchen island that night talking about which cupcakes we liked best, what flavors we would try next time, and complained that we couldn’t take one more bit of a cupcake. This was a really great family activity. We spent hours together in the kitchen working and learning from each other. However, it took a REALLY long time. I think we were all wiped by the end of the night.

Do you ever do any kind of elaborate cooking? What flavor of cupcake would YOU make?

xoxo
–k

Cooking in the kitchen is great for kids. Here are 5 reasons to do it. (If you’re not a fan of the mess, there are a list of ideas of how kids can help in the kitchen without the possibility of making a mess!)

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