Cooking

This week, Samuel finally got a chance to get properly involved in cooking. Every day he's been asking me if he can prepare the dinner, after having got inspired by all the cooking programmes we've been watching.

I bit my lip, and for once let him help! (the kitchen very much being my territory, and cooking very much being my thing, I'm useless at letting the boys help!)

First he grated raw potato, which we blanched for 2 minutes, drained, mixed with a little oil, and pressed into a large baking dish. This went into the oven for 10 minutes, to produce a shell.

He then browned some mince, which I added beef stock to, then some frozen diced mixed vegetables, herbs, seasoning, and 100g of grated cheese. This then got poured in to the shell, topped with more cheese and crumbled crisps (gluten free cooking tip: instead of breadcrumb toppings, crushed up gf crisps - ready salted or cheese and onion work best! - and use. Yum!) and baked till the top was lovely and crispy.

He also invented a dish completely from scratch. He sliced tomatoes and courgettes, and layered them up in a dish. He drizzled it with olive oil, I seasoned it, then he grated cheese on top. This got baked alongside the other dish, and I have to say it tasted brilliant!

He said he's going to become the youngest chef in the country!

Its a good balance to some more really negative stuff we've been having to work through with him, which is proving very hard and quite distressing for all of us.