Corbin in the Kitchen

If you haven't been brought up to speed on how Tyler and I decided to temporarily lose our minds become super-parents, here's the cliff notes version:

1. We really wanted to try and find a way to incorporate some 'brain jogging' into something other than online assignments and worksheets..

2. We decided to challenge the boys to utilize their reading, math, listening and direction following skills and make. us. dinner. all. by. themselves. (...and yes, the jury came back and verified that we've lost it...)

THE RULES:

1. Select a recipe book, read through the book and choose a recipe you'd like to make

2. Make your grocery list (we did the shopping, cause, well #coronavirus)

3. Select your 'team' (since we have three boys we had 3 jobs: Head Chef, Sous Chef and Table Setter)

4. Make your meal with minimal to no help from mom
5. Work with your team on executing a delicious meal and a nicely set table appropriate to what you're serving

Phew. Okay, so here we go.

Corbin started us off first by making Mix and Match Mama's 'Sloppy Joe Pot Pie' with baked potatoes as his side.

He started off by reading and retrieving his list of ingredients.

After gathering his ingredients, he needed to do his 'prep work' as he said per his binge watching of Master Chef with his mom the week prior ;) 

(Fun fact: ALL of my kids are OBSESSED with all things Gordon Ramsey!)

For Corb, that meant dicing an onion and measuring out some Worcestershire sauce.

I promised, promised, PROMISED myself before I got started with them that I would LET. THEM. MESS. UP. however I did not want one tiny mistake to result in them making a bad meal. 

SO, a little pro tip for ya if you're thinking about trying this with your kids: 

Have them measure EVERY. SINGLE. THING. out into small bowls.  

Kinda like this Worcestershire sauce:  If I were making this dish, I would have just poured the two tablespoons directly into the browning meat.  

For Corbin, I wanted him to measure it and put it in a bowl. That way, if he over measured or accidentally spilled some, we wouldn't be eating Worcestershire soaked sloppy joes... it would go into the bowl instead of the MEAL... make sense? 

So we individually measure and separate EVERYTHING! 

For this particular meal, Corbin needed to brown a pound of ground beef and add all of his ingredients to the meat once it was cooked and, yep, he did that completely on his own.

I know.  You mom's head's are spinning.

HOT STOVES?!

GREASY GROUND BEEF?!

Breathe and que the mantra (that we learned from Shay!):  SLOW AND LOW.

1. Add, mix, stir ingredients SLOWLY and;

2. Keep your tools LOW (ie: keep your spatula touching the bottom of the pan)

Say it with me...Slow and low.... Slow and low....

We recited this 6 or 700 times. 

When Corbin got his dish into the oven, he worked with Liam on how he wanted to serve his dish (did he want to use a bowl? A pasta bowl? A plate? Spoons? Forks?)

They both decided on pasta bowls on my silver chargers with my orange dessert dishes ;)
I give them an A+ for creativity.

Liam and I had a lesson on properly setting a table.  We worked together to make one place setting and then he went on to 'build' the other 5.

Teaching the boys to set a table was something that I didn't think they'd be crazy about learning, but all three of them really bought into it!

Dinner was served and it was VERY GOOD! 

Corbin executed beautifully and we will definitely be making this dish again (albeit a few tweaks to the recipe that the chef himself has suggested ;)).

You can find the recipe he chose here!