One of our favorite Fall activities is apple picking. Followed by baking all sorts of apple related treats.

The hands down favorite is apple crisp. This recipe is is one of those no-brainer recipes. It is infinitely adjustable. Serve it hot. Serve it cold. Serve it with ice cream or whipped cream. Serve it completely alone. You can add more topping if you like the crispy top or add more apples if you prefer a greater apple to crisp ratio.

My two youngest each have different preferences. My daughter only likes the apples and my 3yr old son only the topping. They each eat their own serving and then swap plates. It is way too funny, like they are some old married couple.
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I made these a few days ago and my children loved them. They raved on and on about these muffins and wanted to know if I would make them again. As in RIGHT THAT VERY SECOND.

Something that gets that much of a good review begs to be shared.

1 package Jiffy corn muffin mix
1/4 cup chopped deli ham (I used Boars Head honey ham)
1/4 cup shredded cheese (I used a cheddar/colby jack mixture)
1/3 cup milk (I used water because the only milk I had on hand was vanilla flavored soy)
1 egg
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard

(I quadrupled this recipe and it made 24 large muffins and 12 mini-muffins)

It’s America’s favorite you know. (For my celiac peeps, here is a link to a delicious gluten free cornbread recipe. Add the ham, cheese, and mustard to this recipe.)

Dice up your ham into small bite sized pieces.

Dump all the ingredients into your bowl and mix well.

It is another recipe that is easy enough for kids to make.

I love my muffin tins, the way that they are worn and well loved.

Grease your muffin tins really well. A word of advice I have, if you have paper liners that you normally use for cupcakes, I would use them. These muffins are notorious for sticking. Also, it would make them better able to be transported intact in a lunchbox.

Bake in a 400 degree oven for 15-20 minutes. Serve these warm or cold.

Be prepared to buy the ingredients to make them again.

My children love to cook. I am a firm believer in self-sufficiency and therefore I encourage them to hone their cooking skills whenever possible. The fact that it gets me off of meal preparation has nothing to do with it. Really. Ahem.

My older kids can cook real meals. They know their way around the kitchen and can easily read a recipe and make it completely on their own. Well, except for my oldest who will wander around the kitchen asking where the mixing bowl is, where the measuring spoons are, where do we keep oil - that sort of thing. I keep telling him that those doors on the walls of the kitchen are not merely decorative. I know it is shocking. But you CAN OPEN THEM AND LOOK INSIDE. And not only that… the stuff you are looking for… it lives inside!!

My 7 and 9 yr old sons are just beginning to cook multi step recipes. Both of them are too small to deal with carrying heavy hot things or pots of boiling water. I think seeing me drop a huge tray of boiling hot lasagna on the floor cured them of the constant asking if they could get things out of the oven.

I have two small stools that they stand on to make the stove more accessible. They are just cheap ones I bought at Walmart or somewhere similar. But they have a rubber bottom so that they do not slip and slide around on the floor, something that is important when standing near the stove with them.

But they have moved from the toast station (yes, with this many people we have a toast station) to the actual stove. They can make grilled cheese and scrambled eggs. My 9yr old can make omelettes and this summer mastered cooking meat on the grill. He thinks that he is a real man now.

Now they are starting to learn basic recipes, easy go-to recipes that will hopefully keep them alive in college and those years afterward when they are more interested in spending their disposable income on beer. And girls. But I am trying not to think about that now.

This weekend they decided that they wanted to make Sloppy Joes.

Brown your ground beef in a deep skillet.

Grab a couple of cans of Tomato Soup and a jar of salsa. Not sure why I didn’t photograph the jar of salsa. Hope it didn’t feel left out, poor neglected salsa. As an aside, did you know that this soup is not gluten free? It is one of the things that annoys me. Why is wheat constantly used as a filler? Does tomato soup really need wheat added to it?

Stir the beef and brown it. Bonus points if you lock your sister in the pantry while you do this.

Drain the beef. (This is definitely a parent job, not a kid job. because they will either burn themselves or pour the ground beef right down the drain.)

Turn the heat down to medium and pour the cans of tomato soup in.

They definitely keep a closer eye on things than I do.

Let it all simmer until it thickens a little bit.

I serve this on rolls. It goes a long way. I always have leftovers.

So the next day, or day after that, I cook up a pound of elbow macaroni and mix the leftover sloppy joe mix into it. Then I top the bowls with shredded taco cheese. It is like a whole ‘nother meal. A whole ‘nother meal that I didn’t have to cook.

And that is the best kind of meal of all.

My garden runneth over with non-ripe vegetables. And sadly, the warm summer growing days are over. We have had frost a couple of nights now and so I was forced to pick everything.

Remember the movie Fried Green Tomatoes?  I love that movie.  If I had to rank my most favorite movies of all time it would be at the top of the list.  Along with the Princess Bride and the Wizard of Oz.  I am sure that there are others that I just can’t even think of right now.

The movie was what first introduced me to fried green tomatoes.  Before that green tomatoes were something that sat on your windowsill until they turned red or rotted.

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Edible crafts are the best crafts.  At least in my mind they are, because who has room to store project after project!

There is something about baking and cooking that children love. I suspect it has to do with taking ingredients, that seem somehow random to them, combining them and coming up with something that tastes good.

“It’s like magic!” one of my children recently exclaimed after we baked a loaf of bread.

Pretzel Recipe (makes 12 largish pretzels)

2 cups flour
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp sugar
7/8 cup water
1 1/2 tsp active dry yeast

Mix it all together like you would bread.

Don’t know how to do it? Don’t have a bread maker with a dough setting?

This is a great tactile experience for younger children. And it is extremely easy to do. I know what you are thinking, I used to be afraid of baking bread too.

Get a mixing bowl.
Measure water in first, room temperature. Too hot or cold and it will not rise.
Then pour the flour, sugar, and salt in the bowl in a little mound.
Dig a little hole in the top of the mound, like a volcano.
Put the yeast in the little mound.

Then stir it all up.

When it is doughy, dump it out onto a floured table and knead it.

This is the part when all the kids can help.

After they are done kneading, put it in a bowl and cover the bowl with a damp cloth so the dough doesn’t dry out while rising.

Once it has doubled in size, it is ready to shape into pretzels.

Break the dough into 12 pieces.

Your children can make the traditional pretzel shape. Form the dough into letters or shapes. Or even just leave them as pretzel sticks, but that would be boring. Let them play with the dough as long as they want to.  The dough might end up tough, but you know what?  They will not care.

Once you are done shaping them beat an egg and brush it over the pretzel.

Sprinkle them with Kosher salt.

Or a mixture of cinnamon and sugar.

Place on a greased cookie sheet and bake at 450 for 10-15 minutes. The time will depend on the thickness you have rolled the pretzels to. So keep an eye on them. Once they are golden, they are ready to come out of the oven and enjoy.