According to Natalie, it was time for another Non-Lame Playdate and this time, she came to me with ideas to pitch!! Her choices were:
1) Book Club where everyone was to read The Velveteen Rabbit beforehand and come prepared to read their favorite excerpts.
2) Crazy Make Up playdate....self explanatory (and also immediately dismissed by her mother).
3) Cooking Club where everyone brought their favorite recipe and ingredients to prepare their recipe for the group.
After some back and forth discussions on the Book Club vs Cooking Club...she and I settled on the Cooking Club playdate.
Cooking Club Play Date
This activity took a little planning and preparation, but the end results were more than worth the efforts required to make it a successful day.
The Concept:
- Natalie made invitations a week ahead of time and instructed the girls to bring a recipe to swap and an apron if they had one.
- Picking the recipe - my goal was for the girls to do the majority of the work and I didn't want it it to be too difficult. I also would advise double checking on any allergies!!
- We had two friends to participate (this was the perfect number...any more than that and it would have been a bit much to facilitate!!).
Shopping List:
- Ingredients for the recipe
- I bought cookie boxes for the girls to take their granola bars home.
- I bought small photo album for the girls to put their recipes in.
- Make sure you have enough baking supplies so that each child has their own "station"
No Bake Granola Bars
Yield: 10 Bars
Ingredients:
- 1/4 cup butter
- 1/4 cup honey
- 1/3 cup packed brown sugar
- 2 cups quick oats (not rolled oats!)
- 1 cup crispy cereal
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
- chocolate chips, peanut butter chips, raisins, etc.
Directions:
- Line a small jelly roll pan with wax paper
- In a large bowl, stir oats and crispy cereal. Set aside.
- In a saucepan, melt the butter, honey and brown sugar together over medium heat until it bubbles. Turn down the heat to low and cook for an additional 2 minutes, constantly stirring.
- Once done, stir in the vanilla.
- Pour the mixture over the dry ingredients and gently fold until evenly coated.
- Pour the entire mixture into half the pan, pressing down in between. You want the bars to be about 3/4 inches thick. Make sure sides and top are packed tightly.
- Sprinkle with choice of chocolate chips, raisins, etc.
- Cool to room temp before cutting into bars.
I set up their individual cooking stations and got all the ingredients out prior to the girls arriving. I went step by step through the recipe (my Mom would be proud as there were a few opportunities for math lessons as the girls were measuring their ingredients - fun AND educational!!).
The only part of the recipe that I had to do was the stove top part (I had three sauce pans going at once!!). I also poured the melted mixture into the dry ingredients for the girls.
While the granola bars were cooling, I had the girls sit down for lunch where they toasted their culinary achievements and they shared the recipes that they brought. One girl brought her great grandmother's recipe for peanut butter pie and they talked about how special that person was to her Mom - it was such a sweet conversation!
After lunch, the girls were able to decorate their recipe book covers to make them as individual as they are!
It was finally time for dessert and to test the fruits of their labor and the little chefs just raved over their results (I tried some too and have to say it was really yummy!!). Some of the granola didn't stick together, but I put that in zip lock bags for them to add to ice cream or yogurt.
As the girls went off to play before being picked up, I cut the bars up and put them in the cookie boxes (separating the layers with parchment paper).
I attempted to add dishwashing to the list of the day's activities, but it was voted down. :O) However, the girls had such a good time that even facing the dish pile at the end of the event was worth it!!!
