Baking with Kids

Baking is one of my favourite things to do. I’m not the best baker. I’m ok. I make things that taste pretty good but don’t always look pintresty.

But I enjoy it.

It both stresses me and relaxes me at the same time.

There is something about measuring and stirring that releases some tension.

Baking is something that I love doing with my kids.

If you want to test your patience try baking with little ones.

This holiday when discussing gifts for the kids teachers they decided that they wanted to bake.
While I love to bake, I’m more of a recipe follower than a recipe creator. I’m always on the lookout for easy, uncomplicated recipes that I can make with the kids.

If you are looking for last minute holiday gifts to share with teachers, neighbours, family friends or coworkers nothing beats homemade treats.

A couple of evenings spent baking together and we have a little something for teachers and their school bus driver.

I’m sharing with you a couple of my favourite recipes to make with my little ones.

The first recipe is Candy Cane Cookies. They are sweet and buttery and taste even better a day or two after they are made. I stole this recipe from The Kitchen Magpie.

INGREDIENTS

• 2½ cups of flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 cup of butter, softened
• 1¼ cups of white granulated sugar
• ¼ cup packed brown sugar
• 1½ tsp vanilla
• 1 egg
• ¾ cup of crushed candy cane

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Kick the tires and light the fires to 375 degrees.
2. Cream together your butter and sugar until it’s light and fluffy. Add in the egg and vanilla, mixing thoroughly. Beat in the flour, baking soda and salt.
3. When that is done, mix in the crushed candy cane.
4. Prepare parchment paper lined cookie sheets.
5. Roll a heaping tablespoon of cookie dough into a ball, 8 per cookie sheet.
6. Take a glass and using the bottom, flatten out each cookie. If the cookie sticks, start wetting the bottom of the glass with water, they will come right off.
7. Flatten each of them as much as you can. This is a dry dough – no sticky chewiness going on here- but it’s just wet enough to make perfect little flat cookie patties.
8. Bake at 375 for 9-11 minutes, until golden brown. Cool on the sheets completely.

The Second recipe that I would like to share with you is Cranberry Pear Loaf. This recipe is such a nice change from Banana Bread. I have a loaf pan that bakes four loaves at the same time and this recipe works perfectly. Wrapped up with some nice cellophane and ribbon it makes a fabulous gift.

I took this recipe from Parents Canada.

INGREDIENTS:

1/4 cup (60 mL) butter, softened
1/2 cup (125 mL) canola oil
1 1/4 cups (310 mL) sugar
3 large eggs
2 tsp (10 mL) vanilla
3 cups (750 mL) all-purpose flour, or half all-purpose, half whole wheat
1 tsp (5 mL) baking powder
1 tsp (5 mL) baking soda
1 tsp (5 mL) cinnamon
1/2 tsp (2 mL) salt
2 large pears, coarsely grated
1 cup (250 mL) buttermilk
2 cups (500 mL) fresh or frozen cranberries

DIRECTIONS:

1. Preheat the oven to 350˚F.

2. In a large bowl, beat the butter, oil, sugar, eggs and vanilla with an electric mixer for 2–3 minutes, until pale yellow and fluffy.

3. In a small bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. Add about a third to the butter mixture and beat on low speed until blended.

4. Add half the grated pears and half the buttermilk, then another third of the flour, the rest of the pears and buttermilk and the rest of the flour, stirring or beating on low speed just until combined.

5. Gently stir in the cranberries and scrape the batter into two 8 x 4-inch loaf pans or several mini loaf pans that have been sprayed with nonstick spray.

6. Bake for 1 hour (for larger loaves) or 30–40 minutes (for minis), or until golden and tops are springy to the touch. Cool completely in their pans on a wire rack.

Makes 2 large loaves or about 8 mini loaves.

Lastly nothing beats a good old fashioned peanut butter cookie. These cookies don’t last in my house. They are super easy to make and taste delicious. I took this recipe right off the back of the Peanut Butter jar but you can also find it on the Kraft website.

Ingredients

• 1 cup smooth peanut butter
• ½ cup of sugar
• 1 egg

Instructions:

• Mix all ingredients together
• Roll a spoonful of dough into a small bowl (if dough is too soft put in the fridge for about 10 minutes)
• Place on cookie sheet lined with parchment paper
• Bake for about 10 minutes at 350 degrees

The good thing about these recipes is that they are all easy. They don’t require weird and crazy ingredients. They are perfect recipes to try with kids!

They also make great gifts.

My kids are super excited to bring their treats to school and are really proud of themselves for doing all the baking.