Our Idea To End Childhood Hunger!

KidsCookUSA is back with a new idea!


We sent our 1000 kids/1000 recipe blog and idea on to Mrs. Obama. We're still waiting to hear from the White House. We'll definitely keep you posted. LOL!


This summer, we had a blast swimming and reading and eating ice cream and loving life with no school. But then it hit us. While working on our recipe blog, we had so much fun going to cooking classes and even going to a cooking camp, Operation C.H.E.F, we wondered if we could keep collecting recipes. What if we could get chefs, sports heroes, musicians, celebrities, fireman, and even our school principal to come up with real recipes for us kids to make by ourselves (or with a little bit of grown-up help) - not just mac and cheese or scrambled eggs - but REAL FOOD that kids could make for family meals and be proud of.


And then, what if these guys would even teach us in person how to make these recipes? Our immediate wish list includes tons of famous people but we also would love to learn from grownups who care about kids in our own neighborhood. Where we live in Northern California, we are sure there are plenty of restaurants, fire stations, SF Giants or San Jose Sharks players that would teach us to make a meal without using chicken nuggets. :)


Our plan is to collect a bunch of recipes and share them in our KidsCookUSA cookbook and donate money from the cookbook to Share Our Strength, a non-profit program trying to help end childhood hunger.


So...we are on the hunt for our first brave chef to invite us to his or her kitchen. Let us know if you know of anyone. Maybe you can come with us.


Here's to kids helping each other out!


Michael and Georgia

Parmesan Halibut

PARMESAN HALIBUT

by Pat and Timmy (ages 9, 8)

Ingredients
4 halibut filets
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1 tbs lemon juice
1/2 cup parmesan cheese
Garlic powder
Salt, pepper


Directions
Sprinkle fish filets with garlic powder, salt, and pepper. Mix mayonnaise, parmesan cheese, and lemon. Spread thick layer on top of fish. Bake in oven at 375 degrees for 30 minutes.

Roasted Truffle Asparagus

ROASTED TRUFFLE ASPARAGUS

by Kelly (age 5)

A truffle is a kind of mushroom and truffle salt is delicious!


Ingredients
Asparagus
Olive oil
Truffle salt


Directions
Wash and break off asparagus bottoms. Pat dry. Drizzle with olive oil. Sprinkle with truffle salt.


Roast in toaster oven at 400 degrees for 10 minutes. 

Breakfast Oatmeal Bake

BREAKFAST OATMEAL BAKE

by Jackson, Isabelle, and Madeline (ages 10, 8, and 5)

Our Grandma's Oatmeal Bake is a favorite in our household. It is tasty and healthy. What a combination!! We make it together and enjoy it right out of the oven. We wrap the leftovers in foil in single serving pieces and put them in the freezer for later use. Then, we can enjoy this breakfast any morning by unwrapping, putting in a bowl and popping it in the microwave for 1 minute!


Blend:
2/3 cup vegetable oil
1 cup sugar
2 eggs


Add:
4 cups of oatmeal
3 teaspoons baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1 1/2 cups of milk
2 cups chopped apples (about 2 apples)
1 cup nuts (optional, we like walnuts)
1 cup raisins OR 1/2 cup chopped dates


Mix it all together. Put it in a 9 x 13 pan and bake at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes. Serve dry or with a little milk (Isabelle's favorite option), plain yogurt, or Greek yogurt. Enjoy!!

Carrot Ginger Soup

CARROT GINGER SOUP
by Scott Givot, CCP

Immediate Past-President to the IACP

(International Association of Culinary Professionals)

This recipes comes all the way from Oslo, Norway! Chef Givot makes this recipe with elementary age kids in a cooking course called "Mat og Helse" which means Food and Health! He said it is nutritious, tasty, and doesn't take a lot of time to make. We're going to try it!!

Serves 10 for a soup course.

Ingredients

3 pounds of fresh carrots, peeled and sliced

4 tablespoons of Knoor liquid chicken bouillon (or 2 cubes of chicken/vegetable bouillon)

3 inches of fresh ginger, peeled and sliced

2 garlic cloves, peeled and sliced

1 red chili pepper, seeded and sliced fine

Juice and zest from 1 lemon (save zest for garnish)

Juice and zest from 1 orange (save zest for garnish)

1 can light coconut milk

Water to cover all ingredients in the pot, about 4 liters

2 teaspoons of powdered cumin

Sea salt and cracked fresh pepper to taste

Garnish (optional)

1 teaspoon of Turkish/Greek style yogurt of light sour cream (per seving)

Zest from lemon and orange

Drizzle of extra virgin olive oil

Chopped fresh parsley or cilantro leaves

Directions

Place the carrots, bouillon, ginger, garlic, chili, lemon and orange juice (NOT ZEST) and coconut milk in a large pot. Fill the pot with water, just covering the surface of the vegetables.

Bring to a boil and reduce heat slightly to a rapid boil. Cover and leave the lid slightly ajar.

Cook for approximately 40 minutes or until the vegetables are tender. Add the cumin to the mixture and stir.

Either use a hand blender to puree the mixture in the pot or let the mixture cool slightly and then transfer to a blender to puree it into a smooth and creamy texture. Return pureed mixture to pot and keep warm until serving. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Pour servings into bowls and garnish, if desired.

Chandler's Cookies

CHANDLER'S COOKIES

by Chandler (age 12)

The recipe is an original and our family devours these cookies whenever they are made.

Ingredients
3 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 pinch of salt
2 sticks of real butter (1 cup)
2 eggs
2 teaspoons of vanilla
2 teaspoons of coconut extract
chocolate chips (semi-sweet)
broken up pieces of white chocolate, coconut candy bar

Directions
Mix together all dry ingredients in a small bowl.

Mix together all wet ingredients in a larger bowl.

Add ALL dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix on high setting of mixer until smooth.

Add chocolate chips to your liking.

Add broken up pieces of candy bar to your liking.

Mix up and drop by spoonfuls on cookie sheet.

Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes.

Serve fresh out of the over or let cool and transfer to an airtight environment so the cookies remain soft!!

Avocado-Tomato Salad

AVOCADO-TOMATO SALAD

by Brady (age 2)

This is one of my favorite salads to eat. I help my mom scoop out the avocado!

Ingredients

1 ripe avocado

1 Roma tomato (cut into bite-sized pieces)

1/2 cup corn (cooked)

juice of 1 fresh lime or about 1 tablespoon of lime juice

Directions

Take and avocado and cut in half. Remove the pit and scoop out small chunks into a small bowl. Add the tomato and corn and gently mix. Sprinkle with lime juice. Dig in...with a fork or I just use my fingers!!

Chefs Move To Schools Program

We just heard about a really cool thing that is about to change the way kids eat lunch at school We may even decide to start eating hot lunch again since we've been packing our own lunches for the past 2 years.

Mrs. Obama has a new part of the Let's Move campaign called "Chefs Move To Schools" and it is such a great idea. She is asking chefs to volunteer time to work at their local schools to come up with better food for lunch. Is that brilliant or what? We have something at our school called deli day which sounds kids of good but the piles of slimy mayo egg salad and tuna fish are disgusting. It would be awesome if one of our local chefs came up with a better lunch idea.

Check out your local news to see what chefs might be making a visit to your school!!

Chocolate-Raspberry Pastries

CHOCOLATE-RASPBERRY PASTRIES

by Claire (age 8) and Timo (age 4)

We like to make these tiny pastries when we have a craving for something sweet and fancy!

Ingredients

Pre-baked phyllo pastry shells (you can find these in the freezer section - just thaw and fill)

Bittersweet, semisweet, or milk chocolate (we like Ghiradelli bars)

Heavy cream, chilled

A little sugar and vanilla for the cream

Fresh raspberries or other berries

Directions

Arrange the pastry shells on a serving platter.

Melt the chocolate in a glass measuring cup in the microwave or in a little metal bowl set over a pan of simmering water (a "double boiler") on the stove. Make sure to have a grown-up help you with this!!

If you want to make homemade whipped cream, pour the chilled cream into a mixer bowl and add a little sugar and vanilla. 1 cup of cream, 1 tablespoon of sugar, and 1 teaspoon of vanilla is a good ratio. Beat with a mixer until the cream thickens enough that you can pick it up with a spoon and it holds its shape. Store any unused whipped cream in the refrigerator. If you want to save some time, you can use canned whipped cream.

Fill the pastry shells with some melted chocolate. Let them cool. Top with little dollops of whipped cream and some berries. (For fun, Claire did the math and figured out how many berries would be needed to put 2 berries on each pastry they made!)

For something different, you can fill these pastry shells with any combination of pudding, caramel, or chocolate and top with fruit or other goodies...get creative with it! This is a quick and easy way to make a fancy-looking dessert for company, tea parties with your friends, and so on.

Berry Poppers

BERRY POPPERS

by Luke (age 6)

Ingredients

1 pint fresh raspberries

I pint fresh blueberries

Directions

Gently wash the berries and let them dry. Carefully slide one blueberry into each raspberry.

Arrange on a platter and eat!!

We Need Your Help

Recipes from kids aren't flying in :( but we still are hoping to collect 1000 recipes from 1000 kids across the world to send to Mrs. Obama. We hope she will use it in her Let's Move campaign as a giant blog of kids recipes. We think the recipe blog should be free and available to any kid that wants to learn to cook.

We need moms, chefs, kids, grandmas...anyone that like to cook to send us recipes for kids. Maybe we'll end up with 2000 recipes and only 1000 are from kids, but it will be the largest kids cookbook in the world!

Garrett Weber Gale is helping us out. Kirstie Alley retweeted our link for us. But we need more people. Come on! Don't you want to be part of it?!

Together, kids can change the world!

Double Berry Smoothie

DOUBLE BERRY SMOOTHIE

by Nicholas (age 7)

Ingredients

3-4 frozen organic strawberries

6-8 frozen organic blackberries

3-4 pieces of frozen organic mango

1 medium organic banana

1/2 cup rice milk or other milk

5-6 ice cubes

Directions

In a blender, blend up banana, rice milk, ice, and mango.

Pour into glass, only fill half the glass.

Into remaining mixture, add in the strawberries and blackberries and blend again.

Fill the glass to the top.

Garnish with berries!

Prehistoric Kale Crunchies

PREHISTORIC KALE CRUNCHIES

by Claire (age 10)

Ingredients

Organic dinosaur kale

Organic olive oil or coconut oil

Organic garlic salt

(Cookie sheet and parchment paper)

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Wash the kale thoroughly and then cut off the stems. Dry the kale leaves and lay them out on the parchment paper. Lightly grease the kale leaves with the olive or coconut oil and sprinkle with garlic salt. Place try in oven and let cook for 10-12 minutes. When the timer is up, the kale should be green or light brown color. Let it cool or eat it while it's hot (but wait a few minutes so you don't burn your mouth).

Gold Medal Corn on The Cob

GOLD MEDAL CORN ON THE COB

by Garrett Weber-Gale, 2x Olympic gold medal swimmer

For kids just learning to cook, this is an easy recipe to make for the summertime. Just grill the corn or bake it in the oven. It's easy, healthy, and tasty!

Ingredients

Fresh, sweet corn on the cob

Olive oil

Fresh dill, finely chopped

Minced fresh garlic

Grated Parmesan cheese

Pepper, salt

Directions

Pre-heat oven to 375 degrees. Husk the corn. Lightly rub each ear with olive oil. (This helps the spices stick to the corn!) Take aluminum foil and make pouches for each ear. Lightly salt and pepper each ear of corn and then sprinkle with the dill, garlic, and Parmesan cheese.

Put corn in oven and bake for about 12-15 minutes until corn is hot. Let cool slightly and then take a bite and enjoy as those kernels explode with flavor!!

**You can also cook the corn on the grill, if you'd like. Either put the corn directly on the grill or cook in the aluminum pouches. Same great flavor!

Liquid Lunch

LIQUID LUNCH: Strawberry, Raspberry, Banana Smoothies

by Riley (age 13)

My mom makes these for most every swim meet, especially for trials /finals meets where I am swimming starting at 7:30 am and then racing for points, usually after 5pm. Most of these championship meets last 3-5 days, so good nutrition is very important. These smoothies supply a lot of easily digestible carbohydrates and taste delicious.

Ingredients

2 cups frozen strawberries

1 cup frozen raspberries

1 banana

1/2 cup organic vanilla yogurt

Orange juice to cover (about 2 1/2 cups, use apple juice if you want)

Directions

A day or two before a meet, put all the ingredients into a blender. Blend until mixed up. This can be tricky because the frozen berries really thicken it up. Add a bit more juice if it gets too thick.

Drink a smoothie when mixture is done and then freeze the remaining smoothie in baggies or small cups (like little sippy cups).

Put frozen smoothies in the ice chest when packing food for the morning, right next to the ice pack. By lunchtime the smoothie will be the perfect consistance to eat, still frozen, but soft and delicious.

*****Riley, We know Garrett will be a big fan of this recipe!! Thanks for sending it in!! Michael and Georgia*****`

Chia Seed Pudding

CHIA SEED PUDDING

by The Roll Kids

(Tyler,14 Trapper,13 Mathis, 6 and Jaya, 2)

What's Chia Seed Anyway?

Chia seeds are known to be the "runner" food of the Aztecs. They are packed with protein. This recipe features chia seeds and is a raw vegan pudding that is great brain food. We often make it the night before a school exam. We eat it chilled in the morning for breakfast.

Ingredients

2 tbsp raw cacoa powder

4 tbsp raw honey

8 tbsp chia seeds (black)

1 medium-sized avocado

2 tbsp organic coconut oil

2 cups filtered water

Directions

Put chia seeds in a small bowl with filtered water stir for three to five minutes until they become gelatinous (like Jello). In a food processor, add chia seed and water mixture, honey, avocado, cacoa powder, and coconut oil. Process for 3 minutes, stoping to scrape down the sides of the bowl. Adjust honey and cacoa powder to taste. Pour into individual serving bowls and chill (not you, the pudding). Serve cold and enjoy!

Jamie's Fabu-ealthy Family Night Pizza

JAMIE'S FABU-EALTHY FAMILY NIGHT PIZZA

by Jamie (age 7)

Ingredients

1/2 cup warm water

A package of active dry yeast

3/4 tsp sugar

1 tbsp olive oil

1/4 cup of whole wheat flour

1 cup of flour

1/4 tsp garlic, minced

Directions

Stir the yeast in a bowl of warm water until the yeast is dissolved. Stir in sugar and oil and then mix in the wheat flour and garlic. Slowly pour in the regular flour and only put in enough until it can be kneaded (mixed up with hands). The dough should be kneaded for 2-3 minutes and add flour as needed if dough is too sticky. Use spray oil or coat a layer of oil in a bowl while turning dough over to coat in light oil all around. Cover with towel and let rise in warm place.

This should take 25-35 minutes.

* If you have a bread machine, throw all the ingredients in and hit the dough button!

When dough has risen, take a greased pizza pan and press dough while pushing up along the sides of the pan to make the crust. Bake for 10 minutes at 350 degrees F and take out to cool.

Topping Ingredients

1 jar of pizza sauce

1 green pepper chopped or slices

1 onion, chopped

1-2 Roma tomatoes, diced

A pinch of basil

Small can of pineapple

2 ounces of shredded mozzerella cheese

1/2 cup finely ground Parmesan cheese

Directions

Top the crust with pizza sauce and add the green peppers, onions, tomatoes, and pineapple. Sprinkle the Parmesan cheese over the top to include the crust and finish it off with mozzerella cheese.

Bake for 8-10 minutes at 400 degrees F.

When cheese is bubble, grab your hot pads, take pizza out of oven. Let cool a bit. Enjoy your movie night!!

Roasted Cauliflower and Carrots

ROASTED CAULIFLOWER AND CARROTS

by Ryan (age 5)

Ingredients

1 head of cauliflower, cut into bite-sized florets (that means take the flower part and chop it up)

1 bag of mini carrots (all carrots sliced in half)

1/4 cup of olive oil

2 garlic clove, peeled and cut in quarters

Sprinkle of Kosher salt

Directions

In a bowl, toss everything together. Spread out on a cookies sheet and bake at 375 degrees for about 20-25 minutes until the carrots/cauliflower are soft but not mushy. Put in serving bowl and watch it disappear.

**My mom says that roasting makes the veggies taste sweeter...and I like that!**

Hummos? Hummus? Either Way It's Good!

HUMMOS

By Sophia (age 8)

Ingredients
1 can of chick peas, drained and rinsed well
2 cloves of garlic
2/3 cup tahini (sesame paste)
1/3 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice
1/2 cup olive oil
1-2 tsp salt
1/4 cup cold water
*Extra bit of olive oil for drizzling. Not to put in food processor.


Directions
Put all ingredients in food processor or blender and let it run for 2-3 minutes (the longer the better so it gets nice and smooth). Pour into a bowl and drizzle with olive oil. Chill for an hour before an hour before serving.


Serve with:
1 red bell pepper cut into slices
Mini carrots
Grape tomatoes
Sliced cucumbers
Really, any veggies are great with it!