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How to Build Your Perfect Cookie

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Adapted from http://www.thekitchn.com/

For the sake of developing and altering your own cookie recipes, let’s talk a bit more about texture and how to adapt a base recipe to your own liking.

Some cookies are crisp, while other are soft and cake-like. Eggs, sugar, butter, and flour, as well as the shape of the cookie, help determine the final texture. Here’s a study in how to get the kind of cookie you want to eat.

Chewy Cookies

Usually chewy cookies have a higher moisture content. How do you make this happen? Here are a few ways:

  • More eggs.Depending on the cookie, this moisture may come in the form of eggs.
  • More brown sugar.Using a high ratio of brown sugar will attract and absorb moisture for chewier cookies.
  • High-gluten flour.For a chewy cookie, it is best to use a high-gluten flour (all-purpose, bread flour, or a combination of the two) to help develop structure.
  • Mix by hand, not with a mixer.For denser or chewier cookies, mix the batter by hand instead of creaming the butter and sugar together with an electric mixer or use melted butter.

Crisp Cookies

The cookies must be high in both fat and sugar. As opposed to chewy cookies, the moisture content should be low.

  • Keep cookies small.Thinner, smaller cookies tend to bake up more crisp. Think back to when we discussed how sugar helps cookies spread: The more sugar, the more they spread, and the more crisp they will be.
  • Use more granulated sugar than brown sugar.For intentionally thinner cookies, try substituting some of the brown sugar for granulated sugar.
  • Use baking soda.Be sure to use baking soda.
  • Don’t overbake!Do not let the cookies overbake. When done, the edges should be set, while the center is a bit gooey.

Cake-Like and Soft Cookies

For a softer texture, a cookie needs high moisture with low fat and sugar.

  • Make cookies larger and thicker.They are usually larger and thicker to help retain and absorb the increased moisture.
  • Chill the dough (and use shortening).Try chilling the cookie dough or adding shortening so they better retain their shape longer during baking.

Reduce the baking powder. For less-puffy cookies, decrease or replace the baking powder and/or mix by hand

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The World of Cookies

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Chocolate_Chip_Cookies_-_kimberlykvLittle Cookhouse has been experiementing with cookies lately, starting from our “If you give a Mouse a Cookie” lesson, to our upcoming lesson on Sugar cookies.

Cookies come in all sorts of shapes, sizes, flavors, and textures, and it’s such a joy to pop it into your mouth whenever you please! And cookies are so fun and easy to make, no matter how young or old you are. I never knew how many types of cookies there are, until I came across this article! While it would take days to cover every cookie out there, here is a brief look at some of the most popular ones.

European Butter Cookies

Characteristic of types like almond horns, checkerboard cookies, shortbread, tea cookies, sablées, chocolate-filled or jam-topped spritz cookies, and crescent cookies, these cookies are tender, sandy, buttery, and sometimes made with almond paste. These are often the cookies found wrapped in tissue and packed in metal tins around the holidays.

Adorned with simple things, like chocolate glaze or almonds, these types of cookies tend to be not-as-sweet, petite, and more modest than a chocolate chip cookie the size of your head, a delicate florentine cookie, or something dripping in caramel and covered in sprinkles.

American-Style Drop Cookies

When someone says the word “cookie,” how many of us have visions of the jumbo chocolate chip variety? Think: white chocolate macadamia nut, oatmeal raisin, snickerdoodle, and peanut butter cookies — these types of cookies are easy to make, and produce chewy, indulgent results.

They tend to be much softer than other biscuits found throughout the world. The dough typically comes together in a mixing bowl, gets dolloped onto a cookie sheet, and finds its way into our bellies after just 10 to 15 minutes in the oven. These cookies are also great for making ice cream sandwiches.

Piped Cookies

Indicated by their name, these types of cookies are piped onto baking sheets before being baked. They include meringues, spritz cookies, strassburger cookies, and the shells for French macarons.

Bar Cookies

Bar cookies consist usually of a batter that has been poured or pressed into a rectangular pan and then cut into squares or bars. These may be layered with other ingredients (think: lemon and jam crumble bars) or be as simple as a brownie. These types of cookies may also be known as “tray bakes.”

Refrigerator or Icebox Cookies

The dough for these cookies comes together, then is rolled into a log. From there, the dough is chilled long enough for it to be cleanly sliced into round, uniform cookies, then baked. Think: butter cookies, sugar cookies, and sablées. For extra crunch and flair, try rolling the log of dough in sanding sugar or chopped nuts before slicing!

Rolled-Out Cookies

As their names implies, the cookie dough for these cookies is rolled out, then cut into shapes. Think: holiday sugar cookies, gingerbread, and even homemade graham crackers.

Pastry-Like Cookies

The opposite of drop cookies, these more-delicate cookies require their own set of rules. For something special, try making tuiles, florentines, French macarons, or palmiers!

Specialty Cookies

As mentioned, there are so many cookies out there! Here are few others worth checking out: rugelach, Mexican wedding cookies, thumbprints, madeleines, biscotti, and macaroons.

The World of Cookies Read More »

How cooking helps with the psycho emotional development of a child

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How cooking helps with the psycho emotional development of a child

Recently, I’ve attended a talk about the psycho-emotional needs of a child. Emotional learning begins at a very young age, as children discover a wide range of emotions, and evolves as they grow. Let me share below a useful table depicting their behavior and needs based on their age period.

Age PeriodRegulation/CopingExpressive BehaviorRelationship Building
Infancy:
0 – 12 mos.

Self-soothing and learning to modulate reactivity.

Regulation of attention in service of coordinated action.

Reliance on caregivers for supportive “scaffolding” during stressful circumstances.

Behavior synchrony with others in some expressive channels.

Increasing discrimination of others’ expressions.

Increasing expressive responsiveness to stimuli under contingent control.

Increasing coordination of expressive behaviors with emotion-eliciting circumstances.

Social games and turn-taking (e.g., “peek-a-boo”).

Social referencing.

Socially instrumental signal use (e.g., “fake” crying to get attention).

Toddlerhood:
12 mos.-2½ years

Emergence of self-awareness and consciousness of own emotional response.

Irritability due to constraints and limits imposed on expanding autonomy and exploration needs.

Self-evaluation and self-consciousness evident in expressive behavior accompanying shame, pride, coyness.

Increasing verbal comprehension and production of words for expressive behavior and affective states.

Anticipation of different feelings toward different people.

Increasing discrimination of others’ emotions and their meaningfulness.

Early forms of empathy and prosocial action.

Preschool:
2-5 years

Symbolic access facilitates emotion regulation, but symbols can also provoke distress.

Communication with others extends child’s evaluation of and awareness of own feelings and of emotion-eliciting events.

Adoption of pretend expressive behavior in play and teasing.

Pragmatic awareness that “false” facial expressions can mislead another about one’s feelings.

Communication with others elaborates child’s understanding of social transactions and expectations for comportment.

Sympathetic and prosocial behavior toward peers.

Increasing insight into others’ emotions.

Early Elementary School: 5-7 years

Self-conscious emotions (e.g., embarrassment) are targeted for regulation.

Seeking support from caregivers still prominent coping strategy, but increasing reliance on situational problem-solving evident.

Adoption of “cool emotional front” with peers.

Increasing coordination of social skills with one’s own and others’ emotions.

Early understanding of consensually agreed upon emotion “scripts.”

Middle Childhood:
7-10 years

Problem-solving preferred coping strategy if control is at least moderate.

Distancing strategies used if control is appraised as minimal.

Appreciation of norms for expressive behavior, whether genuine or dissembled.

Use of expressive behavior to modulate relationship dynamics (e.g., smiling while reproaching a friend).

Awareness of multiple emotions toward the same person.

Use of multiple time frames and unique personal information about another as aids in the development of close friendships.

Preadolescence:
10-13 years

Increasing accuracy in appraisal of realistic control in stressful circumstances.

Capable of generating multiple solutions and differentiated strategies for dealing with stress.

Distinction made between genuine emotional expression with close friends and managed displays with others.Increasing social sensitivity and awareness of emotion “scripts” in conjunction with social roles.
Adolescence:
13+ years

Awareness of one’s own emotion cycles (e.g., guilt about feeling angry) facilitates insightful coping.

Increasing integration of moral character and personal philosophy in dealing with stress and subsequent decisions.

Skillful adoption of self-presentation strategies for impression management.Awareness of mutual and reciprocal communication of emotions as affecting quality of relationship.

Note. From Saarni (2000, pp. 74-75). Copyright 2000 by Jossey-Bass.

The talk got me thinking about whether the lessons we developed for Little Cookhouse can help children grow emotionally and socially. By having children of the same age period work together, they can learn to share and learn how to take turns, and learn to express their emotions and requests politely and in an acceptable way. This interactions helps kids to learn skills on reading interpersonal cues, and to execute appropriate behavior in interpersonal situations!

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What children can learn from the Mouse who wants a cookie!

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Little Cookhouse conducted our very first class requiring our 3-5 years old to measure out the ingredients. It was a very good learning experience for us, as we need to work with a lot of ambiguity.

  1. Ambiguity in precision, given that the quantity required for ingredients are typically given in grams. In order to make it manageable for kids so young, we converted it into spoons and cups size. Sound simple? Actually not so, because a cup of liquid is different from a cup of flour or a cup of butter!
  2. Ambiguity in measurements, given that the recipe is now based on tablespoons, and a child may not scoop a full tablespoon as required in our measurement. The consequence, is a cookie that may not turn out to be a cookie….

Fortunately, our little chefs manage it well (with assistance from Teacher and parents of course!), and produced cookies which tasted great, even though there were slight differences in colours, size and even the sweetness.

This, as we explained to parents, is what makes baking a learning process. We can teach children the importance of measurement, that by adding more or less of something, their output may differ. Your ultimate goal is not the creation of restaurant-quality food, but boosting your child’s self-esteem and encouraging independence. More importantly, it’s about having a happy kid who’s excited to spend time working on something and doing it well!

Baking is also about providing early exposure to the child, in terms of measurement, scooping, sieving, which all helps in their numeracy and fine motor skills development. It also presents opportunities to talk about culture, nutrition and values. For instance, parents can continue to engage the child after the class, by discussing about the values from the story ‘If you give a mouse a cookie’.

Parents can ask leading questions like “Will you give the mouse a cookie?”, “Why did you do so?”, “Do you think the mouse is being greedy?”, “Do you think the boy was very kind and helpful, and such an act is something you can also learn from?” etc.

Again, it’s not about arriving at a factually correct answer, but about stimulating the thinking of your little one!

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Cooking abilities by children’s age

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Cooking abilities by children’s age


When dealing with children, our advice is to think safety first, and don’t try and tackle anything you feel unsure about. The skills mentioned for each age range are meant to be a guide, and will depend on the maturity, dexterity and exposure of each child.

Activities to try with 3 – 5 year olds (simple, nothing sharp)

  • Weighing – pouring or spooning ingredients into scales. Using measuring spoons
  • Washing fruit and vegetables
  • Cutting soft ingredients eg butter, mushrooms, strawberries using a strong plastic knife
  • Breading and flouring – you can set up three stations with flour, beaten egg and breadcrumbs for fish fingers
  • Mixing – using either a spoon or hands to mix together ingredients
  • Tearing and squashing – tearing herbs and lettuce or squashing fruit
  • Sieving – it’s best to balance the sieve over a bowl and tap it rather than shaking it around!
  • Using a pestle and mortar – a light wooden one is better than a heavy one
  • Kneading – light kneading can be fun but you’ll need to step in to complete the task
  • Rolling, shaping and cutting dough – choose plastic cutters and a small rolling pin
  • Spreading – buttering bread and spreading icing
  • Podding, picking and hulling – podding broad beans, picking leaves, tomatoes or grapes off the vine and hulling strawberries

Activities to try with 5 – 7 year olds (introduction of cutting tools)

  • Cutting using a small knife – children should learn how to form their hand into a claw to keep fingertips out of danger, take a look at our knife skills video
  • Cutting with scissors – if you can get smaller scissors or children’s scissors, use them to snip herbs
  • Grating – fingers can easily be grated so keep watch and make sure they don’t get too close to the end of whatever they’re grating
  • Measuring – even the very youngest children can do this but as children learn to read and do basic maths, this is a great opportunity for them to do this with less supervision
  • Rubbing in – rubbing in flour and butter with fingertips is called for in many recipes
  • Beating and folding – show children how to beat cake mixture with a wooden spoon or fold in egg whites without knocking out too much air
  • Greasing and lining a cake tin or tray
  • Peel oranges or hard-boiled eggs – make sure eggs aren’t too hot, run them under the cold tap first and be careful of residual heat
  • Setting the table – encourage them to cherish the ritual of family meals

Activities to try with 8 – 11 year olds (Activities from 5-7yo + planning activities)

  • Planning the family meal
  • Following a simple recipe
  • Finding ingredients in the cupboards and fridge
  • Using a peeler
  • Whisking, using a balloon whisk or handheld mixer
  • Using heat on a hob, oven and microwave
  • Making salads
  • Opening cans

Adapted from http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/howto/guide/guide-cookery-skills-age

 

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