Kid's Kitchen: Great Tasting, Easy Recipes Developed by Kids for Kids

Esther Fisher is a professor of English at the University of Toronto and
a former food critic for The Globe & Mail.

This little cookbook for little people was compiled by three youngsters,
ages three, seven, and nine, with the help of their eighteen-year-old
sister. It’s for kids who want to cook—and most of them do. Cooking
for a child is a form of play, but it’s also participation in grown-up
activity. When cooking, they’re having fun and doing something
“real” at the same time—providing a product they can share with
others and deriving a sense of creativity, the thrill of mastering a
skill, and a tremendous feeling of accomplishment.

The opening section of the book provides helpful hints and safety
measures to be observed in the kitchen, as well as the important message
“Clean Up.” The recipes are easy to follow and emphasize
things—especially sweets—that kids enjoy eating (for example, peanut
butter and jam cookies, banana bread, chocolate sauce, and an apple
crumble pie with a graham cracker crust).

This book is a cute idea, but some of it is too “cutesy”—for
example, the lettering, done by the 18-year-old. And further, the
chapter headings in the table of contents bear little resemblance to
those in the book—“Cakes and Pies” gets lumped together with
“Shakes, Freezies and Jam,” and “Main Courses” becomes
“Desserts, Drinks and Dinners.” And items are listed randomly rather
than in page-number order, adding to the confusion. Aside from these
minor flaws, this is a fun book that many children would enjoy owning.