I tend to be one of those people who likes to do things the easy way.  I buy Ziploc bags and put my chip bags into them instead of buying ties or bag clips.  I buy ice cream and relish - I don't make something that is already out there on the market.  And, until recently, I always bought already made bags of microwave popcorn. It just didn't dawn on me to do things any other way.  Well, my husband and I were shopping together recently and he threw a bag of popcorn kernels into the cart.  I just stopped and stared, and then I started to laugh at him. What in the world was he planning to do with those?  He looked back on me with that, "You've got to be kidding" expression.  I honestly had never dealt with popcorn kernels and had no idea what to do with them.

After laughing at me for a very, very long time, my husband taught me the art of cooking popcorn. Now, you know I must not be that much of a chef if I say "art" and "popcorn" in the same sentence.  I promise I really am a very good cook - just not a popcorn cook.  I couldn't' believe how easy it was.  And I also couldn't believe that, in the past, I've spent so much money buying popcorn bags!  So, now I know how to make popcorn from "scratch" if you will, and then I can put my own amount of salt and butter on it.  What a great invention!

Involving children in the family cooking process is a great way to show them how to cook and to give them specific jobs in the house.  Here are a few ways to get your kids involved.

1. Menu planning - When you sit down to plan the family menus, have your children help you.  Little children can look at the pictures in cookbooks and point to things they'd like to eat.  Older children can read through the recipes and select items that would be easy to make and healthy.

2. Shopping - Take children to the store with you.  Give them specific items that they need to find from your grocery list (while still keeping an eye on them for safety).  Give them one or two items at a time, and then add to the list when they return with these items.

3. Cooking! Let your children share in the cooking process.  Kids love to be little chefs.  Buy them aprons and give them easy tasks that they can accomplish as you cook.  They can be the ones who pour liquids, who crack eggs, who stir the bowl and the like.  Involve them now so that they will know how to cook and will become more involved later in life.

It's always helpful to get kids involved in the house in any way that you can.  Cooking is an easy way to involve them and to teach them something at the same time.  Consider these ideas - you'll be pleasantly surprised how much they enjoy joining in!

My kids picked up on a very cute idea the other day.  They overheard older children talking about the family restaurant and they decided that they needed to create one too.  What, you might ask, is a family restaurant?  Well, it's actually a really cute idea.  Each night, a different child in the house gets to create the menu, shop for the food, and cook the dinner that the family will have.  Ok - so maybe you want to do it once a week instead of each night, but you get the idea.  It's a lovely way for children to take responsibility in the family and to make something that everyone can enjoy.  For beginning readers, it's also a great way to practice their reading skills as they look through cookbooks and choose products in the store.  Now, obviously, younger children will need your help to put everything together.  Older children, however, can really do much of this themselves.  They can create real menus to distribute to the family and can be in charge of cooking the food.

The food for a restaurant can be extremely simple or more ornate.  For instance, a five and seven year old might team up to create sandwiches.  They can buy tuna, cream cheese, peanut butter and cheese and give everyone a choice of which type of sandwich they'd like.  Instead, they might make pizza and offer a variety of toppings from which to choose. Whatever the food is, family restaurant night is a great idea to involve the kids in the family process and to make it fun for them as well!  Bon Appetite!

My children have discovered heaven and they are now permanently enjoying themselves.  Heaven to a seven year old and five year old is soda floats.  You know the good old soda floats you used to have with cola and vanilla ice cream?  Well, someone introduced my kids to this concept and they are now soda floating their way through the summer.  The most humorous part of this, however, is the combinations that they've created.  Whoa to the person who thinks that vanilla ice cream is sufficient.  Oh no.  My five year old declared the other day that he was only having a soda float if he could pick out a new ice cream flavor.  He didn't want that "boring vanilla junk" as he so eloquently put it.  So, on our adventure to the store, he picked the brightest, cheeriest combination of flavors you can imagine.  And, to top it off, regular coke wasn't the way.  He wanted melon soda.  So, now, they come home from camp and create strawberry, kiwi and mango ice cream floats in melon soda.  My teeth are about to decay just from writing these words.

I must say that summer is a time for enjoyment.  We all want our kids to have great memories of relaxing, playful summers.  Well, I've decided that my contribution to these memories will be soda floats.  Their teeth might rot and their minds might turn to sugar, but my boys will remember their childhood with delicious soda floats.  Try it - your kids are guaranteed to thank you!

Grilling is a very satisfying activity.  It's great to stand there and to see your food taking form from start to finish.  In addition, for those of us who tend to be less patient, grilling is a great way to get your food cooked - fast!  There is very little preparation that has to go into grilling.  You put a bit of sauce on the meat, chicken or fish, let it sit for a few hours, and then throw it onto the grill.  Grilling is a great thing to do with friends.  It's very social - everyone likes to come to a barbecue - and it's something that you can do while talking to people.  Rather than sitting in a stuffy kitchen trying to talk to your friends, you can be outside with them, enjoying yourself and listening to their conversation.  You are part of the night, rather than slaving away on your own in the kitchen.

There are even some great furniture pieces that are made for grilling.  There are picnic tables these days that have a pit in the middle of them.  You set the grill up there - right in the middle of the table - and enjoy hanging out around the fire and having your grill!  Another great idea is grilling at the beach.  Many beaches have fire pits where you can have a fire and a barbecue. If the beach that you go to doesn't have this, then bring along a small portable grill and supplies for the grill.  Make sure to use precautions, obviously, but there is no reason that you can't enjoy your grill at the beach.  Go ahead and be creative with the grill - you'll love the results!

You gotta love the grill.  It's such an amazing invention.  Now, one of the reasons that I happen to love the grill is that I do all of the cooking in the house - and my husband does the grilling.  That means that anytime that I'm lazy and don't really want to have to cook another full meal, I can simply marinate the chicken and then say, "honey, it's time to grill!" And boom - eventually, we have food to eat.  But, even if you are the one who makes the food on the grill, it's such a terrifically easy and clever invention.  You can marinate your meat in basically anything and it will taste delicious on the grill.  Even hot dogs taste better when grilled.  Why in the world would that be?  But, it's true.  And vegetables on skewers are the best.  Marinade them in a little bit of soy sauce or teriyaki sauce and put them on the grill. The more burnt the better.

The grill is really a very healthy invention as well.  Most of the fat from the meat drips off and away from the meat when it is grilled.  This leaves a more lean meat that you are eating and a healthier meal.  Fish is wonderful on the grill as well.  It tastes great and is so easy to make.  One of the best things about grilling is the time that it takes.  In no time at all, your food is ready to eat and the clean up is minimal.  If you don't own a grill, consider getting one. They are a great, easy way to enjoy yourself - particularly if your spouse does all the grilling!

Have you ever had trouble figuring out what to bring to the beach?  Every food ends up sandy, you end up tasting nothing but sand in all of the food, and everyone goes home hot and hungry.  What, really, is a good food for the beach? It's hard to come up with a good food, but it seems quite easy to come up with bad ones.  Anything with bread is a bad choice for the beach.  Bread seems to be a sand sucker, absorbing all of the sand on your hands right into its squishy consistency.  It's bad news for anyone trying to bite into a sandwhich, enjoy a hot dog, or relax with a nice, fluffy pita.  Other things that people always seem to bring to the beach are grapes.  Again, they tend to be sweaty in the bag where you left them, and then that sweat invites sand as well. 

So, what should you bring to the beach?  First of all, you need to bring a lot to drink.  When you are out in the sun all day, it's really important to keep fluids in your body.  People tend to be less hungry when they are hot, so you don't need to overdo it with the choices for foods.  Bring basic items like rice cakes, apples, cheese sticks, pretzels, yogurts.  The more things that you can eat with a spoon or fork, the better off you'll be in terms of sand.  Forget about dessert at the beach as well.  I always laugh when I see some family pulling out a full cake at the beach or digging into ice cream.  Ice cream at the beach!  Can you imagine?  Unless you are on a one week camping trip, you will be returning home soon and won't starve during your stay at the beach.  Just bring the necessities and have a fun time!

Many of us worry about burning food.  I even know some people who refuse to cook because they are always worried that they will burn the food.  In order to become a good cook, however, there is always a need to try new things.  And sometimes those things do burn. The secret is to know what to do with burnt food.  Here are some suggestions.

1. Scrap it away!  Sometimes, the burnt food can be salvaged.  I am not the best baker in the world, and I've often burnt the cookies coming out of the oven.  How disappointing to see this lovely batch of cookies with burnt bottoms.  I've found that it is often possible to scrap away at the bottom of the cookies and keep the rest of the cookies to serve! Yes, the cookies become a little flatter, but they can still be served and enjoyed.  This is a great trick and a way to salvage your food.

2. Cover or smother - Sometimes, the burnt food can be covered and the burnt areas won't even be noticed.  Pancakes for instance, can be smothered in syrup and no one at the table needs to know that they were burnt.  Toast can take jam or butter.  There are many foods that can be burnt and still eaten if you don't make a big deal out of it and smother the food in something else before serving it up.

3. The trash - Yes, there are times when the food just can't be saved.  We can't always cover up everything. And in those cases, we do have to be willing to toss it.  Sometimes the family won't be nice and patient and sometimes you just can't smother something else onto the item.  It is important to know when you've been defeated and when to admit that you aren't going to be able to serve that pie. 

We all make mistakes.  Some can be fixed and some can't.  We just try our best and hope it turns out well.  Bon Appetite!

Bread is a major staple in most people's lives.  It nourishes us, sustains us, and allows us to feel full.  It's also an incredibly easy thing to make on your own.  Yes, you can just run to the neighborhood store and buy loafs of bread whenever you want to; but, as an item that nourishes the whole family and is such a constant, it's a lovely idea to make your own bread sometimes.  There must not be too many items in the home with more cobwebs on them than the bread machine.  People love the idea of the bread machine, but when it comes to actually using it and taking it out often, this just doesn't seem to happen.  Although it takes longer, it's much more fun and emotionally satisfying to make bread yourself.  Get your hands in there and knead the dough - feel the wheat and water mixing in your hands.  It's a great way to relax and to really get involved in something that you are doing for yourself and for your family. 

Another added bonus about making your own bread is getting the kids involved.  Kids love to cook and they love to be allowed to explore in the kitchen.  You can let them pour in some of the ingredients, or mix the batter together, or form the dough into loaves and fun shapes.   Whatever task you give them, they will relish the chance to be involved and to do something in the kitchen.  And then they will have great satisfaction seeing the items that they've made cook and be placed on the table.

Enjoy some relaxation and emotional nourishment while cooking for the family - make some bread today!

I'm having about ten people over for dinner tomorrow night and between now and then I have approximately twelve seconds to get the food made.  How, exactly do I plan to accomplish this task?  I call it marathon cooking.  I put the stopwatch on myself, turn off the phone, and get ready.  I try to make sure to have all of the ingredients out on the counter and all of the pots that I need ready to go.  Then it's on your mark, get set, go!  And I'm off.  I usually manage to throw together a meal - with an appetiser, four to five main parts, and dessert in one hour.  Of course, it takes longer than that for the food to cook - but I'm basically done with everything that I have to do in an hour.  How do I do this?

1. Choose very simple recipes - Although my food looks nice, I never go for anything that is too complicated or takes too much time.  Separate the egg whites and yolks and fluff one of them with a mixer?  Forget about it.

2. Bowls - I use the same two bowls for just about all of my cooking.  I use them over and over again, cleaning them quickly and then starting again.

3. Selection - I try to select recipes that need the same thing for more than one recipe.  For instance - I'm making mushroom soup and mushroom saute - so I can chop the mushrooms for both items at one time and save myself a lo t of trouble by chopping the vegetables at the same time.

That's about all the advice for now. More to come next time on my marathon cooking.  Someday I'll have time to cook at a calm pace...but for right now, it's marathon cooking for me!