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Archive for the 'Cooking' Category
Back To School
I found this great article while perusing one of my most favorite things to read, the Chronicle food section this week. Listed here are plenty of great, and healthy, meals to send your kids off to school with. And best of all, they’ve already been kid tested, and approved!
Send students packing with kid-tested meals
Amanda Gold, Chronicle Staff WriterWednesday, August 30, 2006
Their expressions were pensive, focused. They chewed and swallowed meticulously. Between bites, the only sound was the quick scratch of pencil on paper or the squeak of an eraser.
More silence as forks were put down and pencils abandoned.
“Well?” I asked carefully, holding my breath. “What do you think?”
“Good,” giggled 5-year-old Adam Jones, as he slithered off his chair under the conference room table, any remnant of concentration swallowed with his last bite of pita pizza.
Healthy Food In Schools?
Am I reading this correctly, kids are chosing a salad bar over pizza?? Kids have never had much of a choice when it comes to school lunches. Fried, processed, sugary foods without much nutritional value are the staples in most schools. But not in Berkeley. The Chronicle ran this story today in the Food Section (my favorite!).
School lunch lightens up
Chef is changing the way Berkeley students eat, one salad bar at a time
Carol Ness, Chronicle Staff Writer
It’s 7:30 a.m. in the Berkeley High School kitchen, and Ann Cooper is jumping up and down, shrieking like a kid on a sugar high — all because of four day-old pizzas.
“When I came seven months ago, we were making 40 pizzas a day. Yesterday, we made 28 — and four are left over!” Cooper just about yells, happy that kids are steering themselves away from the refined-flour-and-fat slices. “And there’s a line at the salad bar!”
Making Your Own Baby Food
The first 4 or 5 months are simple, babies only need formula or breastmilk and they’re as happy as can be. Then it’s time to introduce solid foods. It can be a big decision. Is it hard to make baby food? How bad is the jar food? Will my baby develop bad habits depending on what he eats (or doesn’t eat) first?
Although it sometimes seems like there’s never enough time to do anything these days, the article below explains how important early nutrition is, and also how making healthy food for your baby is not all that hard or time consuming. Of course, I always keep a couple of jars on hand, just in case.
A Fresh Start to Healthy Eating
Introducing solid foods is a very important step in your baby’s development and well-being. In fact, studies show that babies who are fed nutritious, healthy diets grow into stronger kids and better-adjusted eaters than those who are fed poor diets.
Many parents don’t realize that making baby food at home is a simple and economical plan to provide your baby with the best in quality, nutrition and taste. It makes it easy for you to ensure your child gets the best start possible. Making baby food using fresh, all-natural ingredients has many benefits, including:
* Increased nutritional value
* Elimination of additives
* Improved freshness
* Added variety
* Enhanced control
* Lower costs
Mmmm…Magnolia Cupcakes
I sometimes consider myself a real cupcake “snob”. Growing up on only home made treats as a kid, I find it tough to even like most bakery cupcakes. That was until I went to NYC and tried cupcakes by Magnolia Bakery — never dry and they have lots of (well my favorite) buttercream frosting!
A copy of their recipe is below (and here’s the link, since they look so pretty in the photo). I have one of the Magnolia cookbooks and have made the cupcakes about 4 or 5 times now.
If you follow the recipe exactly, they come out wonderful!! Disclaimer: I have to admit that it’s temptingly dangerous to have them around — in fact, I’m waiting for my daughter’s first birthday in August to have an excuse to make them again. Not that excuses are needed.
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Everyone is always asking us which is the most popular cupcake at the bakery. Most people are surprised that it is what we call the vanilla vanilla - the vanilla cupcake with the vanilla icing (and the most popular color for the icing is pink). Makes about 2 dozen cupcakes (depending on the size of your cupcake papers and muffin tins) Read more »