Teach Your Kids How To Cook Easy Zucchini Muffins

Teach Your Kids How To Cook Easy Zucchini Muffins

Kid friendly recipes have to be delicious, nutritious and very flavorful. To get kids to munch down on veggies would sometimes need major negotiating on your part because kids normally don’t voluntarily eat veggies. Looking for a great way to sneak in veggies to your kids would be really easy if your kids themselves would be a part of preparing that fun & nutritious meal. It always helps.

Making creative ways to have your kids take part in the process of the meal preparation is a good step towards getting your kids to happily eat veggies and also it gives them 2 benefits: 1) the means to have them eat healthy and 2) having fun quality time with your kids.

ZUCCHINI MINI MUFFINS
(my 5-year old and I made these together)

This is a recipe that little chefs will have fun making. Food processor shredding is usually a big event. When you try this recipe with your little chef, measurements may end up a bit vague or off (just watch for soda/powder quantity as too much will ruin the muffins). Don’t fret.

Part of baking is having fun, part is learning to measure well. If the batter looks too dry at the end of mixing, add a bit more sour cream or a little milk. If it’s too wet, add a bit more flour to “fix it”.

The sugar is minimal here and you could reduce it more if you want to serve these as an accompaniment to dinner. As the recipe is, they’re not sweet muffins. An alternative to making the muffins sweeter would be serve them with honey butter or a sprinkling of cinnamon sugar.

Have your kid, do the mixing with his/her clean hands. Don’t be afraid to get messy with your child. Kids love to make a mess in the kitchen.

2c Shredded Zucchini skin left on*
2c all-purpose Flour
2 large eggs
4oz cold unsalted butter
1/3c caster sugar (baker’s sugar) **
1/2c cr�me fraiche (or sour cream) ***
1tsp baking soda
1tsp baking powder
1tsp salt
1tsp cinnamon
1tsp ground nutmeg
1tsp cake spice

Pre-heat oven to 350�F.

Using a food processor fitted with its shredding blade (or you could do it by hand), shred a few small or one large zucchini until you get about 2 cups packed. In a large mixing bowl rub the cold butter into flour until it resembles coarse sand. A little chef may love to do this. Add sugar, salt, soda, spices and baking powder and mix well.

Break and beat the eggs (discarding the shells) and then add the cr�me fraiche beating again until cr�me fraiche is broken up in the egg mixture (it will look like a mess of white chunks in the yellow – that’s okay).

Using a wide spatula, wooden spoon or your hand, pour the egg mixture into your flour mixture and dump in the shredded zucchini then combine to produce a wetish batter. Don’t over mix: The mixture should have flour well incorporated.

Spoon into prepared muffin cups or tins. We used mini muffin pans, and allot a cooking time of about 12-15 mins. Bigger muffins may take a bit longer. They’re done when they read about 190�F on an instant read thermometer stuck into its middle.

* If you want the zucchini to blend in, peel it first.

** These are not sweet muffins. If you want them sweeter I would suggest adding up to 1/4c of honey to the recipe.

*** Out of sour cream or Cr�me Fr�iche? Full fat regular or vanilla yogurt would work – but vanilla yogurt will make the recipe sweeter