Last week in After School Program, we started telling the Dreamers (that's what we call the 5th grade students we work with since they're in the "I Have a Dream" Foundation) about the two clubs that they were going to chose to be in. David, my coworker, is going to run the sports club which will be an opportunity not only for students to play some sports but also to learn what it's like to be a coach. They will make plays and look at statistics of some professional athletes (which will incorporate math!).
I'm going to be leading the Cooking Club. As a member of the cooking club, Dreamers will get to look through cook books, decide on what recipe they want to cook, and then cook it. We have a limited kitchen that consists of a hot pad pretty much, so we'll have to be creative about what we make and how we make things. For the demo, I wanted to make something that was tasty to entice them to join my club, but also something easy since it would only be about a 10 minute demo, including the blurb about the club.
I decided on no-bake cookies: peanut butter, chocolate and oats--who would say no, right? Well we have two girls who are allergic to peanuts so I also had to find an alternative. Fortunately that wasn't too difficult since there are numerous no-bake recipes that don't include peanut butter in them.
I made the majority of the cookies the night before so that they could be refrigerated and harden as they're supposed to. Plus, with the limited time of my cooking demo I didn't know if I'd have time to finish all the cooking.
The entire club demo day went great! We got a lot of Dreamers excited about the two clubs and I was able to share some tasty treats after my demo. We had the students fill out a little club application that had them explain why they wanted to join a certain club. Not surprisingly, most of the girls voted for cooking and most of the boys wanted to join the sports team. However there were a few exceptions so it's not a complete divide between the genders.
We don't start the clubs until next week I think so I'll update about what we make after we've come together as the official Cooking Club. I'm hoping to take a few of them on a field trip to a Whole Food's Kid's Cooking Class one Saturday--that is the bummer though, the kids' classes are only on the weekends. We'll see how it goes!
Chocolate-Peanut butter Cookies:
Ingredients
2 cups sugar
4 tablespoons cocoa
1 stick butter
1/2 cup milk
1 cup peanut butter
1 tablespoon vanilla
3 cups oatmeal
Waxed paper
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Directions
In a heavy saucepan bring to a boil, the sugar, cocoa, butter and milk. Let boil for 1 minute then add peanut butter, vanilla and oatmeal. On a sheet of waxed paper, drop mixture by the teaspoonfuls, until cooled and hardened.
No Peanuts Recipe:
Ingredients
2 cups white sugar
3 tablespoons cocoa powder
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup milk
3 cups quick cooking oats
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Directions
Mix together sugar, butter or margarine, and milk in a saucepan. Bring to a boil and boil for one minute, stirring constantly.
Remove from heat and mix in cocoa, quick oatmeal and vanilla. Drop by spoonfuls on waxed paper.
Notes:
1. if start to get crumbly, add a little water (1-2 tsp)
2. someone boils for 6 mins
3. The key to making it great is to remember to let the mixture come to a boil and THEN boil it for one minute longer.
4. For this particular recipe, after 1 minute of boiling, get a cup of cold water and drop a small spoon full of the syrup into the batter. If it forms a small, soft ball in the water, take it off the heat. If it creates a stringy thread, it's not done yet.
5. less than 15 minutes if you put the cookie sheet in the freezer. I would recommend spraying the wax paper with non stick spray before dropping the cookies on it.
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