Cooking Up 2014

Tonight we count down the last seconds to a fresh start of a New Year.  I wanted to recap all the recipes we cooked up these past twelve months.  Grab a snack, 'cause this is bound to stir your appetite.

January was a Tailgate Party.  We "celebrated" the Super Bowl with foods meant for munching.  Vegetarian Buffalo Chicken Dip sounds like an oxymoron, but it delish!

We also created Rolo Pretzel Delights (top left), Sweet and Spicy Pretzel Mix (bottom left), and Crescent Pizza Pockets.

February was No Cook Cuisine.  We tested Apple Snicker Salad, Baldwins, Easy Turkey Wrap Sandwiches, Strawberry Mice, Crock Pot Spiced Apple Cider, and Microwave Potato Chips.  We needed a cooking device to crisp the potatoes, but it was so simple, it didn't seem like cooking.

March was Something on a Stick.  

We tested a Meatball Sub on a Stick, Mini Corndogs (we shortcut on this recipe with refrigerated rolls), Rainbow Fruit Sticks (top middle), S'more Sticks (top right), Pancake and Sausage Minis, and Stuffed Celery Sticks, which looked like adorable butterflies.

April was Sweet and Savory Baked Treats.  Check the archive for the details.

May was Fudge and Flan, another archived event.

June was Junk Food.  Get the recipes on the archive.

July was our annual BBQ with a little lesson from the Food Bank of the Southern Tier with the game Hunger 101. 

We tested Campfire Cones (what a sweet mess!--left middle and lower pictures), Raspberry Aqua Fresca, because June is Raspberry Month (top middle), Watermelon Slices, and Unbreakable Bubbles.  Too much fun in the sun!

August was Sparkling Snacks  Check out the results in the archive.

September was canceled.  I took a much needed mini-vacation and expected the kids to get studying.  School was BACK IN SESSION!!!

October was a Creepy Cupcake Challenge.  Prepare to be scared on the archive.

November was my annual Birthday Bash.  I L.O.V.E. to celebrate my birthday and choose to honor my special holiday with my teens.  This year we switched gears a bit with the recipes and created our own Thanksgiving Feast.  We tested Mini Turkey Pot Pies, Green Bean Fries, Apple cider, and ran out of time to make Cone-a-copias> ice cream cones full of sweet treats.  We were all well fed by the end of the afternoon.

Finally, December was a combined effort for First Friday Art Club and Teen Cooking Club.  We made gifts and edible treats in our annual Make and Bake event.  Click the link for the archived event and get a taste of the happenings of First Friday Art Club.

Hope you test out some or all of these yummies.  They come to you "teen-approved."

2015 sessions begin on January 12.

Spread the good word.  We love to cook at the library.  Sign up today!

Until next time..

10..

9..8..

7..

6..5..

4..3..2....1.....

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

sPArKLinG SnaCkS

This post goes back to August, when it was still Summer Reading Club with the teen theme of "Spark a Reaction."  Teen Cooking Club was busy making a bunch of reactive treats.

The sweetest of our treats was edible DNA.  Our models utilized Twizzlers and Dots. 

 My teacher friends remarked upon a fantastic rocket project using alka seltzer and film canisters.---I know!--What's film?  How can you get a film canister?  Luckily, we still have many mom and pop shops.  Our own local B & C Photo in Elmira, NY was happy to help with this conundrum.  With paper, glue, tape and markers, each student personalized their "ships" and prepared them for take-off.

The stuff you see flowing from bottles below is Elephant Toothpaste.  This stuff was so fun and very reactive!  Good idea for an outdoor summer project.

                                                 

We also cooked some quesadillas and had juice mixed with ginger ale- very sparkly- because these kids HAVE TO EAT!-  but we were a-buzz with activity, so no pics of the food frenzy.

The most interesting project for us all was the Alka Seltzer Rocket.  The instructions are so simple.  Sourcing the canisters was really the most difficult part.  Everyone got a canister to take home and further experiment.  There were some that seemed to be duds, they just would not work, but given time, they truly Sparked a Reaction.  Hopefully this video is a sign of the fun we had. 

Creepy Cupcake Challenge

October is full of spooky haunted happenings.  I decided to create a cupcake decorating contest to scare us out of eating all the trick or treat sweets.  You may expect that almost nothing holds these kids back from eating junk.  I wonder if they would eat chocolate covered broccoli....

The kids were split up into random teams by drawing numbers.  They were given a set of rules and expectations, which included a deadline for judging.  I contacted our local Arts Council to have arts minded individuals choose 2 winners for this contest.

Cakes of various colors were baked, then franitically decorated to meet the deadline.  I saw so much creativity happening all at once, the Local 1000 Union Hall was a buzz with activity.

The judges were serious in their selection process.  I cannot claim only 2 winners out of this contest.  The work was wonderful!  Take a peak at some of the entries.

 

The success of cooking contests proves that kids like to be given a challenge they can tackle.  Although two winners were selected, the contestants had so much fun.  They each pointed out elements they appreciated to their parents and all look forward to the next Teen Cooking Club.  We will be cooking again on November 14 for my Birthday Bash.

Come back....if you DARE!

Sweet & Savory Baked Treats

There are unfortunate times when one might think they produced and published an amazing blog post, only to realize a few months later just how totally incorrect their thought was and that the photographic evidence of an awesome teen program disappeared in the virtual trash can.  The Sweet & Savory Baked Treats session of Teen Cooking Club has fallen victim to this neglect.  
Since this program occurred WAY BACK IN APRIL, I will keep this short and (pun) SWEET.

For starters, we created a delicious home baked granola. 5-ingredient-peanut-butter-granola-bars are quick and fun to make.  I love to have filling snacks like these at home to curb my appetite.  I believe this recipe proved to be magic.  They disappeared before I got a photograph.

The Chef in Training provided a simple recipe for cookies-and-cream-popcorn.  If you have an air popper, this recipe is made so fast!  

If you have ever dined at the famous seafood restaurant, you know Red Lobster's Cheddar Bay Biscuits are heavenly.  Check out the simple recipe here.  

Ranch Pretzels are another tasty treat..  If you like to buy flavored pretzels at the market, try this frugal alternative.  

The sweetest option for the event was Orange Cream Soda Pop Cupcakes.  These cavity creators were so cute!  We loved adding the straw for the perfect Soda Pop appeal.

Sweet & Savory Sea

June was Junk Food

June was the month for Junk Food.  We celebrated the end of school year with things that can rot your teeth.  It's amazing how fast that food disappeared!  

The buffet spread looked like this:

Butterfinger popcorn, Oreo and Peanut Butter Brownie Cakes, Raspberry Aqua Fresca, Strawberry Shortcake, and Nachos filled the buffet bar and the young adult bellies!

As I fill the year with healthful bites, I decided it was time to break for the bad, and I'm sure there were some bad belly aches in the aftermath.  Perhaps not, some of these kids have iron stomachs.  The recipes were easy to find on Pinterest.  Simply search "junk food" and you are inundated with results.  Butterfinger Popcorn was a sweet and EASY treat.  The hardest part of the recipe was keeping the teens from eating the candy bars while they were instructed to smash them.  They claimed it was heartbreaking to destroy a perfectly good candy bar.  "What did this Butterfinger ever do to you?" joked one of my sugar freaks.

Oreo-and-Peanut-Butter-Brownie-Cakes were so good, I never even tasted them!  Luckily I forced those hands away from the food for one shot before the goodness vanished.

Notice those brownies are already GONE!

June is Raspberry Month, so we made a refreshing drink with one part pureed berries mixed with one part water.  The kids loved this drink so much, we made a lottery to be fair on dividing up the mixture. 

Nachos are my easy dinner favorite at home.  They can be as healthful or harmful as you choose, just about always a different concoction.  I found it funny how many questions were posed regarding the whole nacho making process.  Sometimes the simplest things can be over complicated in a young mind.

The final recipe to discuss was Strawberry Shortcake.

We had a great strawberry picking season in the Southern Finger Lakes region.  I could not resist celebrating the harvest with a summer time favorite.

The recipe was on the packaging of a Bisquick box.

I showed the teens how to make whipped cream from scratch, none of that scientifically engineered tub stuff.

It's always fun to hear "That was so easy! I want to show mom!"  It tells me my mission was successful.

It's always a fun-filled 2 hours at the Local 1000 Union Hall.  I somehow split into several of me to instruct the various tables and clarify instructions.  It's often chaotic for one person, but I love it!  And who could not L.O.V.E. these adorable (paper plate) faces?!?

Sometimes the waiting is the hardest part.  Ready?......1..2..3.....EAT!!

Fudge and Flan

The theme of Teen Cooking Club for May 2014 was Fudge and Flan.  I always attempt to introduce a new food to my group, and flan was foreign to most kids this time around. 

Unfortunately, this flan experiment had to be from a box.  I have been blessed to enjoy fresh flan from my Latin American friends through the years, and there is no replacement for food from home, from the heart.  The caramel made from scratch cannot be beat.  Sadly, with only 2 hours to work, setup of kitchen, introduction, instructions and clean up included, there was not enough time to complete a flan from scratch and have it ready before we closed the kitchen.  

Flan from a box :-/    {Pay no mind to the mess around the left hand burner.  

This instructor never makes mistakes!}

When my students assembled these personal portions of flan, the "caramel" went in the cup first, followed by the cooked custard mixture.  If a teen or tween crinkles their nose at "caramel" in a pouch and questions, "What is that brown stuff?," a mental alarm goes off that the "food product" is less than tasty.  

If time was available, we would have made this amazing recipe from Pati's Mexican Table, which airs on PBS.  I am a cooking show addict and have totally fallen for Pati and her friendly approach to Mexican cooking.  I have learned a lot from her episodes.

Along with flan, we made smoked-sea-salt-caramels, which took forever, but my prized students persevered that recipe.  Chubby-hubby-buckeye-truffles were another team's concoctions.  And this fudge recipe was made in a double batch, which curiously disappeared before my taste test, hmm. 

You know a good recipe when there are no leftovers!

Overall, the kids had a great time and I heard my name with questions at least 642,987 times as the kitchen was abustle.  They cooked, cleaned, learned and goofed off as much as they could.  I claim another success in the kitchen of Local Union No. 1000.

FYI, the kitchen we use is in our local union hall, located within the Corning Civic Center Plaza.  Through request of their board members, I am granted use of the facility at a discounted rate to provide these cooking classes for free to our local teens.  If not for the generous support of our USW Local 1000, there would be no Teen Cooking Club provided by the Southeast Steuben County Library.  Be sure to thank our local union for such a gift to our community.