Food Preparations That A 3 Year Old Can Do

I don’t often share the practical life activities (in the kitchen) of the kids because I seldom take photos of them while working.  Mostly, because they handle some delicate materials and I wanted to give my full attention whenever we work in the kitchen.  Now that Vito is quite adept in this area, I started taking pictures to demonstrate some of the things that he can work on independently.  These are mostly breakfast and snacks preparations.  And because our main meal involves boiling oil or water and meat, only the big brother can participate on this not Vito (3 years old).

MAKING A FRUIT SMOOTHIE

We love making fruit smoothies at home and the kids enjoy helping me out with all the fruit chopping and mixing of ingredients before we set them off in our Nutri Ninja blender.  One of our favourite flavour at home is watermelon smoothie with mint.  Here Vito is learning how to use a watermelon scooper.  He is struggling with this tool and needs more practise.  He managed to make a few scoops before complaining that it’s hard (the watermelon).  Mavi finished the rest of the work and we later enjoyed a delicious watermelon drink!

My personal note, I should have introduced this earlier.  I think scooping is a different skill from spooning because of how we move and twist our hands when we scoop.

We are using a Nutri Ninja blender to make smoothie and we are using it almost every day!

RACLETTE GRILL

The kids are fascinated with our mini raclette grill.  I highly recommend that you should try this.  It’s a perfect tool to demonstrate to your kids what happens when you heat up cheese or salami.

The raclette grill we’re using is Boska from Amazon.

PREPARING A CEREAL MEAL

His breakfast is either cereal, sandwiches or fruits.  These were the first food prep I taught him because of simplicity.  It’s a great help if he could work on his food independently why I tend to the husbands’ and Mavi’s need in the morning.

Tips:  place the cereal in a small container that’s easier for the kids to open and close, and scoop.  I would place our milk in small jugs as seen in the photos, these were the same milk jugs we used in practising pouring when he was a toddler.

MAKING HONEY LEMON DRINKS

Another drink that I love to make is iced cold honey lemon juice.  This is very simple to prepare and is a very healthy drink too!  He is using a manual citrus juicer for this. 

MAKING A SANDWICH

My Vito is a butter monster, he can basically eat butter on its own.  Now on mornings when he don’t want cereals, I would give him the option to have a sandwich.  Just put a reasonable amount of butter in a small plate, prepare the bread separately and have some child-size bread knife.  I bought our knife from a local pharmacy shop but you can always purchase a similar cutlery set in Amazon.  It comes with a spoon and fork which Vito also used since he was a toddler.

See the handling skills there?  How he would scrape the butter, apply it on the bread evenly (still practising) and fold the bread so he can easily eat it.

MAKING SCRAMBLED EGGS

One of the popular practical life skills for younger children is how to crack open an egg.  Vito has been practising this for a while now because I often cook herbed scrambled eggs for them.  I’ve been asked about the ceramic milk jug we’re using.  I got this from a local store but it is also available in Amazon.

PITA PIZZA

One of our favourite afternoon snacks is pizza.  For Vito, I would use pita wraps instead of a pizza dough to avoid putting it in the oven.  Like with pita wraps, I just heat it up in a non-stick pan for a few minutes and it’s done!  The kids love margarita pizza and pepperoni and in this example, Vito created a pizza with just mozarella and red cheddar toppings.  The sauce is ready made (garlic and basil) but you can easily make one using an automated chopper.

I will talk more on this in a separate post.

MAKING BRUSCHETTA

Another afternoon snack that the kids get involved in preparing is bruschetta.  Mavi used to work on the tomatoes but because I’m letting Vito practise, he’s doing all the works for now.  I’m going to make a post on how we make ours at home.

The knives we are using at home (for Vito) are from Curious Chef.  He’s using the smaller size knife in working the plum tomatoes.  I love wooden chopping boards.  I highly suggest that you use these instead of plastics.  Get a small size for your kids and make sure to put a non slip mat underneath the board.

SLICING FRUITS

I think this is one of the most basic and important skills a child can acquire even as a young age.  My kids love to prepare their fruit snacks on their own and they feel proud about it.

Just some note, apples are very hard and a three year old can’t easily use the apple corer or might find it hard to to slice.  What I did is I thinly sliced the apple into pieces and let Vito work on each piece.  Here you see him using a corer, in a wooden chopping board and he would place the small apple pieces into his tray.

We are using this Bamboo bowl and tray for years now, purchased from Amazon.

Here’s another favourite crinkle cutter of Vito.  He uses this mostly in slicing grapes, strawberries and vegetables (carrots and potato).

And that’s about it!!! We do lots of other activities in the kitchen as well, but these are things that both of the boys often do.  For more updates on their progress, you can follow us on Instagram.

Follow us on Facebook, Pinterest, Google Plus, Instagram or Twitter for updates!  More learning materials at Pinay Homeschooler Shop.

Pin this for later!