Cooking with your toddler

A family baking session isn't just great fun - it's educational too.

Reading recipes aloud, choosing, naming and weighing ingredients helps to develop reading and maths skills. Waiting for food to cook even helps little ones learn to tell the time.

'Even young children can help by adding things to the bowl or sprinkling cheese on pizzas,' says Carola Weymouth of Cookie Crumbles children's cookery school. 

Children also love mixing - fairycake mixture is good as it's not too thick yet not so messy that it will splash everywhere either.

Try investing in some cookie cutters and child-sized cooking equipment such as rolling pins.

If they like cooking, they'll LOVE decorating their creations too. icing and stick-on decorations are great fun.

Above all, says Carola, be realistic. 'Don't expect prefection. Granny will love the homemade biscuits even if they are totally misshapen - it's just lovely making things together.' 

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