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Children's cooking skills

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Cooking with children encourages them to build lifelong skills to eat well.

This is a guide to ways children can participate in the kitchen.

Cooking with children is fun, builds lifelong skills and helps kids learn to like new foods.

3-5 years old

  • Using a rolling pin
  • Rolling mixtures into balls
  • Using a cookie cutter
  • Breaking vegetables into pieces
  • Cutting, chopping, slicing^
  • Mashing
  • Serving
  • Tearing leaves
  • Stirring and mixing
  • Measuring

5-7 years old

  • Sprinkling and rubbing in
  • Crumbing, flouring, dipping
  • Picking and podding
  • Using scissors*
  • Spreading
  • Greasing
  • Peeling
  • Squeezing
  • Sieving

7-9 years old

  • Crushing and pounding
  • Shaking liquids in containers
  • Weighing and measuring
  • Using oven or microwave*
  • Using a hand mixer*
  • Draining
  • Skewering*
  • Grating*
  • Pouring

9+ years old

  • Stirring and mixing over heat*
  • Weighing and measuring
  • Grating
  • Using oven or microwave*
  • Using a hand mixer*
  • Using a peeler
  • Using a can opener
  • Using sharp scissors
  • Skewering

^Supervised and with child-safe knives *Close supervision recommended


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